Brain Storm (A Taylor Morrison Novel Book 1) (55 page)

“You think you won?” she hissed at me.

“It kinda looks that way,” I said, looking up as Lars headed toward us, giving me a nod.

“You’re wrong.” I looked back down in time to see her gaze on the limo and the detonator in her hand.

“No!” I screamed and pushed out with all my might as the world exploded into a wall of flame and flying shards of metal.

FORTY-FIVE

I WAS DROWNING, my lungs bursting as I fought for air, my arms flailing in an attempt to find the surface.
 

“Taylor! Stop fighting!” Strong hands grabbed my arms, pinning them down. Panic surged through me and I threw them off, letting my mind do what my body couldn’t.
 

“Taylor.” The quiet voice cut through my panic, his touch dragging me back into sanity.

“Mac?” I asked, unable to focus, my vision blurry and dark.

“I’m here.” He caught my hands in his, trapping them, keeping me still. “You’re safe. You’re not drowning. Just breathe, Taylor. Just breathe.”

I raked the air into my lungs in deep gulps as a blanket dropped over my shoulders and Mac wrapped it tightly around me. My heart was pounding hard, and I was sure Mac could feel the tremors wracking my body.
 

“What’s going on?” I gasped, pulling my arm free and dragging my hand across my eyes, trying to clear them. “What’s happened?”

A chill went through me, sending shivers over my skin as someone pulled my hand away and began blotting my face with a towel, wiping gently at my eyes, clearing them of the gooey substance that seemed to coat everything.

“What’s happened is you’ve destroyed the recovery tank and most of the room. If Sean
hadn’t been close by, you’d have probably taken out the whole wing. I suppose we should be thankful for that at least.” I opened my eyes to see Jenny kneeling in front of me, clearly perturbed. “Come on, let’s get you out of this mess.”

I looked down to find myself on the floor in the middle of a huge puddle of thick goo. I lifted a hand, rubbing the substance between my fingers in confusion. Jenny was right. The room was a disaster. Tables were overturned, the slime I was sitting in covering most of the floor. The recovery tank Jenny referred to, a twisted chunk of metal, the hatch hanging open at an angle. The men who’d been trying to hold me down were still lying on the floor, moaning as medical personnel saw to their injuries. I took it all in, my brain finally beginning to function again as memories came flooding back.
 

“Where’s Connors?” I demanded, struggling to stand up. “Lars?”
 

The tails of the wet blanket slapped against my legs as I rose and I looked down in disgust, kicking them away and nearly falling in the attempt.
 

“Easy Taylor. It’s going to take a while to get your land legs,” Jenny cautioned, taking my arm through the blanket. “Let’s get a wheelchair.”

I would have argued if it hadn’t been for the fact that it was taking everything I had just to stand there.
 

“Ah, I see you’ve been throwing people around again. You’ve gotten very adept at that.” I looked up, relieved to see Connors in the doorway, teetering on the pair of crutches. “Good to see you awake, Taylor. You had us worried.”

“Stay out!” He had started into the room but Jenny’s command stopped him in his tracks. “You want to break the other leg? We can barely stand up in here.” Jenny and Mac were propelling me toward the door, carefully setting their feet as they went. She was right. The floor was covered with the goo from the tank and walking was treacherous.

By the time we made the door I was exhausted and more than happy to collapse into the waiting wheelchair.
 

“Where’s Lars?” I asked again, as we started down the hallway.

“He’s coming. He’ll be here this afternoon. I called him as soon as the alarms went off,” Connors answered. “I figured you must be awake.”

I turned around to throw him a dirty look as he wobbled slowly along, trying to follow us. We turned the corner and he was lost to sight, but I could hear his laughter behind us as it echoed down the hall, making me smile. A vision of flames and flying debris suddenly flashed through my mind, gripping my heart. The explosion. The limo. Connors standing behind it. He could have so easily been killed, his laughter lost forever. So close. It had been so very close.
 

IT WAS LIKE deja vu. I had been here before, looking in the mirror, taking in the damage. Only this time it was worse.
 

Jenny had shooed Mac and Connors away as soon as we reached the room. She’d wheeled me into the bathroom and told me the worst of it, before letting me out of the chair. I avoided the mirror while I showered, letting my hands find the scars and the damage first, preparing myself mentally for the visual.
 

She’d refused to tell me about anything except my injuries, saying Lars would fill me in on the rest when he arrived. Then she proceeded to explain what she’d done and why I was in the recovery tank. The list of damage was long, the injuries severe. I listened as she talked, amazed I was still alive. I wouldn’t have been, she’d informed me, if Lars hadn’t gotten me out so quickly. I owed him my life.

I finished cleaning up, and stepped out of shower. Jenny helped me towel off and slipped me into the dreaded hospital gown before putting me back into the wheelchair. She tucked a blanket around me and turned the chair toward the mirror. Then she stepped back and waited.

I didn’t know the person I was looking at. My hair was a dark stubble, my eyebrows almost non-existent. I’d expected that from the heat, expected the flash burn from the explosion, but not the rest. I was bone-thin, looking more like a skeleton than a live being. My skin was pink and I could see the scars scattered across my torso, healing, but clearly evident. They would always be there, a daily reminder of what had happened.
 

My nose was different, as was the shape of my eyes. My cheekbones higher and my jaw more prominent. I’d been hit by shrapnel, Jenny had said, the bones in my face shattered. She said there’d been five operations. I remembered none of it.

“There’re no scars,” I said. I ran my hands over my features, watching in the mirror to confirm it was, in fact, my face I was feeling.

“Connors brought in the best plastic surgeon he could find. I assisted. The recovery tank took care of the rest.”

The recovery tank. The thing I had just destroyed. Jenny’s creation, one of her most successful experiments and I had just torn it apart.

“I’m sorry about the tank Jenny,” I said, meeting her eyes in the mirror.
 

“It’s alright, Taylor. It wasn’t your fault. We‘d been keeping you sedated, trying to keep you quiet while you healed, but you’d been fighting it. With your mental capabilities, it was only a matter of time before you won. That you happened to be in tank when it happened, well,” she walked up behind me and put her hands on my shoulders, giving them a squeeze in reassurance. “It’s hard enough to deal with the tank when you know you’re going inside. You had no idea where you were. You just reacted. Panicked. I’m pretty sure I would have done the same thing.”

“You wouldn’t have had the same results.” I smiled at her watching my lips turn up in a way I’d never seen before. They’d done a good job, but it was going to take some getting used to. If that was even possible. I heard distant voices in the hall, recognized Mac’s voice.
 

“How’s Sean?” I asked, remembering Mac’s injuries. I’d called him Mac when I first had come out of the tank, disoriented and surprised by the fact he was there. I had hoped that Jenny hadn’t noticed. From the raised eyebrow she sent me, she obviously had.
 

“
Sean
is fine. He’s still doing some physical therapy, but the paralysis he experienced was only temporary. His biggest problem now is feeling he let you down by not being there. That somehow he could have stopped what happened.”

I shook my head, watching the reflection in the mirror as I did it, needing confirmation it was me I was looking at.
 

“What about Connor’s leg?” I watched as a stranger’s lips formed the words.

“It’s good. Multiple fractures, but its healing well. He’ll be using a cane by next week.”

Next week? He had multiple fractures and would be on a cane next week? I looked at my healed scars in the mirror and finally asked the question that I’d been avoiding.

“How long have I been here, Jenny?”

I saw her reflection behind me shift in mirror. She was watching me, looking to see if I was ready.
 

“Two months.”

I gripped the arms of the wheelchair. Two months. Two months had gone by. My mind refused to accept it. It had just happened. I could still smell the smoke, feel the heat from the flames. I shook my head in denial, unable to take it in.

“You need some rest, Taylor. You may be awake, but you’re still pumped full of sedatives. A normal person would still be out for hours.” She grabbed the handles of the chair and backed me out of the bathroom. “You’ll be able to handle this better once they’re out of your system.”

She helped me into bed, hooking up monitors, despite my resistance.

“You’re an unknown, Taylor. I don’t know how you’ll react, as we’ve already seen evidenced.” She swatted my hands away, snapping the wires onto my body. “Just humor me and try to get some rest.”

She left and lights lowered, automatically dimming the room. My mind was whirling with information and questions. There was no way I was going to be able to rest. What I needed was answers. I needed to talk to Lars.

I WOKE UP disoriented and groggy, desperately in need of coffee. You’d have thought after two months I would have that addiction out of my system, but that certainly wasn’t the case. I sat up to find Lars sitting in chair next to me, a cup of coffee, still steaming, in one hand, a folded newspaper in the other. I took a deep breath, savoring the aroma that filled the air. No wonder I’d woken up in need of a fix.

“That better be for me,” I said, reaching out to take it as the lights came up. He smiled, handing me the cup. I searched his face for damage as I took a sip, relieved to find he looked the same as always.
 

“I’m fine, Taylor. You’re the one who took the brunt of it,” he said, reading my thoughts.

“Your voice is better,” I noted, surprised. The raspy growl had changed to a hoarse deep baritone that was much more human than before, but it still sounded painful.

“You thought I always sounded like that?” I nodded and he chuckled as he explained. “Job related injury. Not unlike what you did to Hughes. I’ve had two months of healing since we last talked. Unfortunately this is about as good as it’s going to get. Not great, but I’ll take it.”
 

I leaned back and took another sip of coffee. I could have done without his reference to Hughes and what I had done to him. I had badly damaged his vocal chords and if he had survived, he probably would have sounded much like Lars, if he could even talk that was.
 

“You up to talking?”
 

I nodded, realizing Jenny had been right about the sedatives. Between the rest and the hit of caffeine, I felt much better, my thoughts clearer. I was as ready as I was going to be.
 

“What do you remember?”

“Nothing after the explosion.” I told him. “I remember looking up and seeing you coming toward me. Vivian said something. It sounded off and I looked down, saw the detonator in her hand. She was looking at the limo and I knew, but it was too late. I saw the car explode. Saw the flames rushing toward me. Nothing after that.”

“You saw the detonator in her hand?”
 

I nodded again, knowing that image would be burned in my mind for the rest of my life. I could see it even now, her thumb pressing down on the button, me, helpless to stop it.
 

“Taylor, you never looked down.” My coffee stopped halfway to my lips. “You were watching me. You couldn’t have seen the detonator.”

“No, I saw it, Lars.”

“You didn’t look down,” he repeated. “I saw the fear in your eyes when you knew. Heard your scream as you whirled around to face the danger. Watched as you threw Connors behind you, trying to protect him. I watched you throw the limo away from us as it exploded. Watched the flames wash over you. I saw the metal hit you, watched you fall as it shattered your face. It happened in seconds, Taylor. Seconds. But I’ve replayed it in my mind a thousand times. I’m not wrong. You never looked down.”

“That’s just not possible,” I whispered to him, disbelief at what he said warring with the pain and conviction I heard in his voice. I was so sure I had seen it, and here he was, just as sure, telling me I hadn’t.

“Of course you saw it Taylor.” Mac’s voice surprised me and I nearly dropped my coffee. He must have come into the room while Lars was talking and I’d never heard him, I’d been so focused on what Lars was saying.
 

“You just didn’t see it with your eyes. You saw it with your mind.” He smiled as he walked over and hopped up, taking a seat at the foot of the bed. “It’s your gut instinct taken up a notch. Instead of sensing the danger, you actually saw it this time. Could come in quite handy.”