Page 18 of Captured Immune (Secrets Trilogy #2)

18

ARELLA

A rustling sound makes my eyes flutter open. I’m lying on my right side with my head against a hard floor—a dirty floor. It’s covered in mud, dry leaves, and who knows what else.

It’s dark. Some slivers of moonlight shine through the cracks of... tires? I’m lying under a large table pushed against a corner with tires stacked around it. Where am I? How did I get here?

Wherever I am, it smells like rotten wood and stale dung that’s been rained on. Gross. At least I’m out of that evil lair now. Well, I think I am. Why else would there be moonlight?

Someone’s lying behind me with their arm limp beneath my neck. Their other arm rests over my ribs. It’s Trey. I don’t need to turn around to see his face for confirmation. I know it’s him by the sound of his steady breaths and the familiar way his muscular body feels against mine.

My left arm is throbbing. There’s something wrapped around it. I reach up to feel it. It’s a shirt. When did a shirt get tied around my arm? The last thing I remember is that knife slashing me. Everything beyond that is a blur.

I have to get out of here. I have to get away from Trey and anyone else with magical powers. They’re trouble. Every last one of them. Once I get away, the first thing I’m doing is contacting the police. They’ll keep me safe for sure. After that, I’m going to find a baked potato and some bacon. I’m so hungry, I could probably eat the whole pig right now.

With the gentlest of fingers, I pick up Trey’s arm draped over me and slowly rest it over the nasty floor. His breathing remains steady. Dry leaves crunch and crackle beneath me as I move to sit upright. I go slow, careful not to wake him up. So far, so good.

Once I’m upright, I take a closer look at the tires barricaded around me. They’re stacked in rows, three high. I only need to move one row to give me enough room to get out. Maybe if I go slow enough...

More leaves crunch beneath me as I maneuver into a kneeling position. Trey moans softly as his head slumps against the floor. I hold my breath and wait for him to move again. When he doesn’t, I exhale.

At the row of tires farthest from Trey’s ears, I give the bottom tire a gentle push. It doesn’t budge. I push again, harder this time. With a light dragging sound, the tires shift forward a tiny bit. I stop and eye Trey. Thankfully, his eyes are still shut.

I’m about to push the tires again when a rustling sound makes me freeze. I think it’s coming from the other side of the wall. It might be a small animal outside or the wind blowing leaves around. When the rustling stops, I resume my escape.

The tires make another small noise against the floor as I push them again. Trey doesn’t move. I give them another shove. This time, I feel resistance. Something on the other side is blocking the tires from moving any farther. Dang it!

I peer out the small opening I’ve made. It looks like I’m in a barn. Straight ahead is a rusty car—or what’s left of it. Next to that are a couple of old tractors with missing wheels. More rubber tires lie in a pile near the wall. A line of old, broken shovels leans up against some shelves. Everything is covered in dirt.

Trey lets out another tiny moan, making me stop and stare at him. A beam of moonlight shines through my small opening, hitting him just right. I let out a little gasp. Trails of dried blood drip from his temples, all the way down his neck. The bruises on his cheeks are a bright shade of red and purple. A cut on the side of his lip is crusted over in blood. How did he get so banged up? It must have happened after I passed out.

Even with all the gore covering his face, he looks peaceful. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him asleep before. Correction, I’ve never seen him asleep before. I almost feel bad for leaving him like this. Not bad enough to stick around though. I want nothing to do with him and his supernatural friends. Not unless one of them has the power to turn back time to before I was kidnapped.

Since the opening isn’t big enough for me to crawl through, I’ll have to move the row of tires next to it. It takes me a few pushes, but eventually, my opening becomes big enough. I’m about to crawl out when another rustling sound stops me. I yelp as a huge rat scurries across my legs, making me jerk backward, straight into Trey.

“Ah!” His arms flail around as the rat climbs up the tires and weasels its way out the other side.

All the tires fly across the barn as Trey shoots out from under the table and onto his feet. Two fireballs magically burst into his hands, one in each palm. They’re so big and bright, they illuminate everything around us.

“Stay down!” He takes a firm stance in front of me as his head swivels from side to side. “Where are they?”

“Who?”

“The bad guys!”

“Not here.”

He turns to me, still holding the flames. “Then why did you scream?”

“It was a rat.”

Finally, his fire goes out, drowning the barn in darkness again. He slaps a palm against his forehead. “Fuck.”

He dashes across the barn toward the pile of tires and seizes one off the top. It must have belonged to a tractor because I’ve never seen a car with a tire that big before.

“What are you doing?” I ask as he rolls the tire to me and flops it at my feet. “You know we’ll need the rest of the vehicle for this to be of any use, right?”

A little smile tugs at the corners of his lips. “Only you can make me laugh when we’re being hunted by people who won’t hesitate to drive tree roots through my heart.”

The mental image of that makes my throat tighten.

Trey points at the large tire. “Do you think you can work your magic on me?”

Funny that he calls me magic when he’s the one who can make flames come out of his hands. “Why?”

“Because all they need is my DNA to give to a Tracker, and they’ll know my exact location by sensing the use of my powers. If they were tracking us when I used my powers just now, it probably won’t take ’em more than a few minutes to know we’re here. Then all they need is a Teleporter, and they’ll be here within seconds. I need you to make me immune so I can fly us outta here before they arrive.”

And this is why I need to get away from him. He’s the one they’re tracking. Not me. Still, my current choices are to get out of here faster with Trey or slower without him, so I offer him a firm nod. “I can do it.”

“Great.” He sits in the hole of the tire, then spreads his legs apart and pats the space between them.

I accept the invitation by leaning my back against his front. He hisses through his teeth, and I stiffen up. “Are you okay?”

He groans and winces. “I’m fine.”

My heart pounds uncontrollably as he wraps his arm around my waist like a seat belt. Internally, I scowl at my heart for betraying me. My body can’t react this way around him anymore. Not allowed.

My stomach betrays me with butterflies when Trey slips his fingers between mine. Everything in my body tells me I’m safe—except for my head, which is shouting, He’s dangerous! Get away from him!

I flashback to the night I questioned Trey about his abnormalities. After he refused to tell me his secret—one I didn’t realize could be this insane—I asked, “Are you dangerous?”

Without hesitation, he said, “No. Not to you.”

“Who are you dangerous to?”

“Anyone who tries to hurt you.”

I think he knew at that time. He knew people were going to kidnap me, and he did nothing to prevent it. Maybe he’s not dangerous to me directly, but he’s dangerous by association. The second I’m able to, I’m getting away from him. Far, far away.

“You ready?” Trey’s breath on the back of my neck sends warm tingles down my spine.

Stop! I mentally shout at myself. Screw my body for loving the feel of him on me. Actually, screw the world for putting me in this situation. Why give me a man I feel safe with, only to make being with him the most life-threatening situation I’ve ever encountered? It doesn’t make any sense.

“Arella?”

I pull myself out of my swirling thoughts and imagine my waves of water crashing around him. I visualize the water soaking him from head to toe, drenching him with my immunity. “Okay, I’m ready. Just don’t let go of my hand.”

By now, I’m pretty confident in my ability to project my immunity onto Trey without having to touch him. The hand holding is simply for assurance. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.

“I’ll start slow, then I’m gonna go fast, ’kay?” Trey lifts his free hand, then the tire carries us into the air and we soar through the giant hole in the barn’s ceiling.

It blows my mind how he’s doing this. Seeing him move a trash bin from one side of the room to another is one thing, but this? The fireballs, the skilled fighting, the being a member of a secret underground spy ring thing. What else don’t I know about him?

We zoom over a quiet house, then above some woods and a small lake.

More woods.

Another house.

More woods.

Then it’s just woods for a while.

“Arella, I think you’re cutting off the circulation in my leg.”

I release the death grip I didn’t realize I had on his calf. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. I won’t let you fall, babe. Just relax.”

Relax? He wants me to relax? I haven’t been able to relax for what feels like weeks. Now he’s telling me to relax while I’m jetting across the sky on a smelly tire to get away from my abductors? Yeah, right.

“Don’t call me babe ,” I say with a little bite to it.

His hands droop a little. Then he clears his throat and says somberly, “Sorry.”

How can so much pain come out in one little word? If I could still sense other people’s emotions, I’m sure I would have felt his heart shatter in his chest. Suddenly, I feel bad. Not bad enough to take it back though. This man has no right to be calling me babe anymore.

He clears his throat again. “Are you ready to go faster?”

“Sure.” My head jerks backward into his shoulder as we speed through the air like we’re on a roller coaster. “Can I turn around to face you? The wind is making it hard for me to breathe.”

“Of course. Do you wanna land first?”

“I think I can flip around up here.” Slowly, I rotate, sticking one leg into the air over his head, then dropping it at his side. The entire time, he holds me tight around my waist and never lets me go. I wish he didn’t make me feel so safe, yet so terrified at the same time. It’s not that I’m terrified of him; it’s the people who are after me because of him .

I lock my ankles together behind him while my hands find the back of his neck for support. He winces and lets out a pained grunt.

I release my grip a little. “Am I hurting you?”

He forces a tiny smile. “I’m just a little sore.”

He’s totally lying, but that’s nothing new. Either way, I’ll try to stay still so I don’t hurt him anymore.

Now that we’re out of the darkness of the barn, I’m able to get a better look at his bloody face. It’s worse than I thought. I think he’s bleeding from the side of his head. But that’s just a guess, because there’s so much blood covering him, it’s hard to know where it’s all coming from.

I feel the need to take a wet rag to his face and an urge to kiss the pain in his eyes away. It’s the same pain I saw in him the first time he saw me handcuffed to that bed—and all the other times he looked at me while I was in the evil lair.

I believe him when he says he had nothing to do with physically abducting me. If he did, he wouldn’t have been so genuinely shocked to see me there. I know he cares about me, too. Why else would he have attacked his uncle for manhandling me? Why else would he have risked his life to save me? Even though he’s part of the reason why I needed saving in the first place, I won’t discredit that he’s the one who got me out of there.

“Thank you, Trey,” I say in a sweet whisper. “That was brave of you.”

Trey’s face crinkles as more anguish swims across his face. He bites down on his bloody lip and shakes his head. I wait for him to say something, but he just keeps staring at me with that broken look in his eyes.

It takes a while for him to whisper back, “That wasn’t bravery.”

“What was it then?”

“I dunno, but I don’t feel brave.” He lets out a ragged breath like he’s about to cry. It makes me tear up too. I want to cry whenever I think about how they tortured him until he went unconscious for three days. And then they tortured him again . No matter what he’s done, he didn’t deserve that.

“Arella, I’m so sorry.” He chokes on his words. “None of this was supposed to happen.”

I glance over the edge of our flying tire, unable to look him in the eyes. If I do, I might burst into a sob.

The forest is dark and quiet. The treetops seem to wave goodbye at us as we pass them. I feel Trey’s gaze on me as I swallow the dry lump in my throat.

His apology feels sincere. I wish I could tell him that it’s okay. I wish I could tell him that what happened to me wasn’t his fault. But it’s not okay, and some of this is his fault, and I’m ready to know how much.