Expel (33 page)

I fly out—right through the wood of the tiny log cabin, speed over to them with a vengeance. If ever they had my best interest at heart, if ever they were to save me from myself, the perfect opportunity was about to present itself. This was their moment. They could gloat for a decade for all I cared.

I flatten Ezrina’s crooked hands over Tad’s back and jog them along to the boathouse. I really don’t understand why they can’t see me, but it’s for the best. If Tad saw Ezrina, he’d crap his pants.

“How about in here?” Tad raises his brows suggestively.

I so knew it! They were sneaking off to copulate.

They fall in backwards, buttoned together at the lips. My mother’s eyes widen with horror as she spies the carnal catastrophe unfolding before her.

Mom and Tad, Logan and me, the four of us gape at the scene.

A breath gets trapped in my throat as I catch a glimpse of Logan’s face lost in delirium, my neck rising beneath his. Our bodies connect in a frenzy—that’s what we would look like, Logan loving me—me loving him back. As much as I hate to admit it, there is a beauty locked in this moment, a brilliant light shining in the nexus of something unimaginable, holy and right.
 

Marshall beams into the room, hovers by the ceiling in a half soluble state.
Petition your mother for a new trial, Love. If not, this is the destiny that awaits you.
 
He points down over our bodies.
I’m afraid it’s time to rise
, he calls to the two of them. Ezrina’s eyes fly open, look right at Marshall with terror. She can see him, just like I could.
Heathcliff first
, he calls out. Logan’s body snaps back as though he were electrocuted.

“Oh God,” I whimper.

“Skyla,” Marshall nods with the glimmer of an abominable grin.

“Skyla!” Logan shouts, pointing hard over at the body lying beneath mine. “Kill him!”

It’s the last thing I hear as the room glides in a dizzying circle, and I blink back into my own earthy form.

Chapter 57

Like A Lover’s Voice

“Skyla Laurel Messenger!” My mother shatters the silence with her excavating howl.

I sit up, rolling Holden off in the process.

How in the hell do I talk my way out of this one?

Holden wrangles on his clothes, causing Tad to escort my mother out the door.

“You have five minutes to hit base camp, young lady—five minutes!” My mother roars.

Shit. She’ll never buy that virgin routine now. Ezrina’s gone and ruined everything. I am still a virgin, right? I pick up my robe and glance down at my naked body as though it might offer up a clue.

“What the hell happened?” Holden whines as he buttons his jeans. “Did we like just effing get it on?”

I look around the room for a weapon, an ax, a noose, hell I’d hack Holden up limb by limb with a machete if I could. I’m sure Dr. Oliver could pick up the pieces quite literally if he had to.

A long chain, thick and heavy, coiled in the corner peaceful as a snake garners my attention.

I secure my robe, rising to my feet.

“So you wanna do it again?” Holden tilts his head with a hint of pleading. “You know, real quick?”

“Sure,” I say, hopping out of the aluminum vessel that only moments before had Logan and I comprising a duet with our flesh.

My feet wobble unsteady on this new light frame. I snatch the chain up from the floor and snap it to the ground, quick and violent. The metal cinches and crackles as a spark of lightening ignites from the bionic pull.

“Shit,” Holden hisses. “What the hell’s that for?”

I thrash the metal leash with extravagant force—whip his left foot as it touches down on the floor.

“Crap!” He hops up.

“This is how I like it,” I say, swinging the chain so fast it cuts the air with a whoosh.

“Calm down,” he backs out the door, and I follow. Holden trips over a branch and rights himself immediately. “Get that thing away from me.”

I don’t like seeing Logan’s face in pain, the look of confusion bubbling to the surface. I have to keep reminding myself that beneath it all it’s Holden—that Logan’s body is the last place he belongs.

Holden takes off, sprints in the direction of the creek and I take off after him. We traverse logs, avoid bushes, ditch in and out of the new spring grass that stands as tall as a man until finally trekking down towards the mouth of the swollen river.

Holden pauses at the tributary, looks at me one last time before jumping into the water.

I stop just shy of the river’s edge and watch Holden as he struggles to swim across.

The faint call of voices emanate from downstream. I give a hard squint and make out a group of people lounging around on boulders—Brielle hopping up and down, waving like mad to get my attention.

I jump into the water and gasp as it hugs my waist with its icy bite. Holden bobs unsteady as if he doesn’t know how to swim, fighting the current to cut through the middle. I pray Gage was on one of those boulders—that he saw me and he’s coming to help me do the unthinkable.

“Skyla,” Holden reaches for me as a rush of water cascades over his shoulders. He looks relived that I’ve abandoned my weaponry.

“Kiss me,” I say, trying to smile through the pain. I let him reel me in as if this were all a wicked game, foreplay of a maniacal nature. He seals his lips over mine, and I pull us under gentle as a dream. If I didn’t know prior to this that Logan’s body was hijacked by an imposter, I would sure as hell know now. These may be Logan’s lips but they are miles away from being his kisses. This is the bite of a python, the deadly infliction of some disease being dispensed with his wandering tongue. It reminds me powerfully of that night at the falls when I came across Holden in his proper form before digging my fingers into his neck, killing him the first time.

It takes all of my Celestra strength to wrestle Holden to the bottom of the river, pin him down with my body and lay over him like a stone. I remove my lips from his mouth, disgusted by the thought of Holden Kragger impaling me with his lust. Without meaning to I open my eyes, watch the bubbles blow out of Holden’s mouth, his eyes ready to eject themselves from their sockets from the strain of holding his breath. He jerks and squirms, almost launches me off but I hone in my anger and render his muscular arms useless.

His face pinches in agony. And then he gives. Holden gulps down water, inhales long clean strokes like fresh spring air. I would have sold him for silver, done anything possible never to live this moment.

My lungs constrict. I choke trying to hold my breath another second. Holden goes limp beneath me. In the event he’s bluffing I conduct my own reflex analysis by reaching down and wrenching his balls so tight Logan may never succeed at procreation. But Holden doesn’t flinch. I pop to the surface unstoppable, take in a gasp of air so sharp it sears my lungs like fire.

Gage jumps in, dives down to the bottom without me having to say a word.

I pant and groan from the pain, as I make my way towards shore. I would never have been able to carry out that feat if Marshall hadn’t taught me how to push past the pain, believe that I could linger just a little while longer. I guess in the end Marshall helped bring back Logan after all.
 

Gage tosses Logan up on the grass, limp and rubbery. He pushes him onto his side and Logan spills water from his lips like vomit.

“Shit,” Gage rolls him on his back and pushes the palms of his hands under his diaphragm.

I crawl over and seal my mouth over Logan’s, push in a series of steady deep breaths until I feel him jerk.

“Come back to me,” I whisper. “It’s over. He’s gone. You and me, we’re going to win this faction war, remember?” I try to coax him back into his body, wake him up so I can dislodge the idea that I may have inadvertently caused him brain damage.

Logan sits up and engages in the world’s most violent coughing spree.

“You’re back,” I cry.

Logan nods, looks from me to Gage and pushes out a weak smile. “I’m back.”

“Skyla?” Gage pulls me in, looks right into my eyes.

“It’s me, I swear,” I wrap my arms around Gage so tight I never want to let go. “We’re both back and everything is the way it should be.”

Chapter 58

War Drums

My mother and I stare at one another in her cabin that reeks of Tad’s grocery store patchouli cologne. Clearly, we are at an impasse.

“You were cheating on Gage,” she rages.

“Not really.” This is only slightly more awkward than it has to be since both Gage and Tad hover beside us.

“You were
kissing!
” She brings her hands up over her forehead in frustration. “For God’s sake, I hope that’s all you were doing.”

“I bet she’s finally managed to knock herself up,” Tad announces. “Let the record show I’m not giving another damn dime to that clinic in Seattle,” he saws through the room with his winded bellow.

“Fine,” I say.

“Fine?” My mother balks. “Is that all you have to say for yourself? Fine?”

“She’s probably
trying
to get pregnant,” Tad snarks. “She’s jealous over all the attention Drake has drummed up for himself.”

“Not true.” Let the record show I’d be thrilled with zero attention from either Mom or Tad. In fact, I’d be more than pleased if I wasn’t realistically the only female in the room with any reproductive relevance. If Tad finally managed to knock up my mother, it would probably reduce the incidence of these kinds of conversations to nil.

“I think you owe everyone in the room an apology,” Mom sags, fatigued from the confrontation all together.
  

“I apologize for my actions,” I’m quick to admit. “It won’t happen again, I swear.” Like, ever, because I killed the bastard. Although technically it was Nev fondling my body, and speaking of which, I have one serious fucking bone to pick with him. “Um,” I turn to face Gage. “I owe you the biggest apology of all,” I really mean it. “Will you ever forgive me for the countless messes I’ve dragged us into?”

Gage raises his brows, amused. “Why don’t we go for a walk?”

***

Gage. The ways he saves me are incalculable.

We walk into the woods—weave through ancient Hemlocks with trunks so fat you could park a car in them.

His left hand is heavily bandaged.

“What happened?” I pick it up gently and bring it to my cheek.

“Grazed myself with a nail gun renovating a cabin. And here I thought carpentry was going to be my thing.” He pushes his shoulder into mine.
 

I notice one of the discs protruding from his side pocket, and I’m relieved to see it.

“Is that a disc in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?” I laugh because I screw it up and accidentally pronounce disc as
dick
.

“All of the above.” He gives a sultry smile and pulls me down to the ground.

We lay side by side in a clearing, on a bed of fragrant pine needles, soft as a pillow.

Gage traces the outline of my jaw. His eyes never waver from mine.

“I missed you,” he breathes. His finger traipses along the outer edge of my lips, dips into my mouth and he kisses the tip before dotting my nose with it. “Are you OK? Did he hurt you?”

I can read between the lines. I know what he’s really asking. I had explained what had happened between Ezrina and Nev as brief as possible before my mother’s detainment.

“I don’t think so.” I shake my head. Deep down inside I don’t think that was Nevermore’s intent. I can hardly blame Ezrina who was so parched, so thirsty. You could see Nev filling in the cracks of her existence, rehydrating her soul with his hands kneading over her hips. It would have been beautiful if it didn’t involve my body—Logan of all people on the receiving end. It was a love song in the making just watching her shake her hair out for him.

“Skyla.” Gage kisses me with my name still on his lips. “I am jealous for you.”

His words swim through me. My spirit soars to hear that curious phrase.

I take him in with a sigh before he depresses over me, loves me with a quiet sadness. He sends his heated kisses rushing up and down my neck rabid and hungry.

I can hear the beating of our hearts, they escalate in sound, deafen my senses. The ground quakes beneath us.

I open my eyes just as the world fades to nothing.

***

The scenery appears, a deep umber sky, a world dipped in sepia. The sound of a thousand helicopters flying overhead bombard our senses.
 

“We need to find the orator,” Gage screams over the intense walloping that bullets through the atmosphere.

Ellis appears, covers his ears as he runs over.

“I got a lead,” Ellis shouts. His eyes are lost in crimson tracks, glazed over with an oily haze.

“You’re stoned,” I say, disappointed.

 
“You were back with Gage,” he shrugs.

“Are you selling to Gabriel Armistead?” I forget about the war long enough to inject myself into Mia’s wellbeing.

“No,” he gives a hard look. “I wouldn’t give it. He got it someplace else. I know that for a fact.”

Great. Now I have Mia and Melissa’s recreational drug use to police, not to mention the fact this Armistead kid has a standing date with the penitentiary at some point in the future. Obviously he’s going to drag my sisters down. He’s a lunatic, and once Mia and Melissa catch on, I’m sure there will be restraining orders involved. They’ll be lucky if they get out of this three-way relationship without gunfire and homicide.

Speaking of gunfire, we follow Ellis over to a wheat-covered hillside, the blonde shafts move in a slow lethargic rhythm, cheering us on.

Ellis kicks at a mound of hay before reaching in and extracting a crossbow, same one Marshall taught me how to use.

My hair swirls wild as the wind stirs up in a violent rage.

“There he is,” Gage points over to a group of men interlinked in a huddle, the orator stretches above them by three heads at least. “Stay here.” Gage takes off in his direction.

Ellis retrieves a bow and quiver for each of us. The arrows spill—they rain over the splinters of hay, disheveled and impotent.

“Shit!” he cries out in anguish, his left arm still locked in a cast.

“Let me,” I gather them quick as possible until we have a handful in each canister. I sling one over Ellis’ shoulder just as something slaps his jaw in the opposite direction and sprays the air with blood from his mouth.

I turn in time to see Chloe brimming with pride, a wrist rocket dangling from her hand. She missed my temple by less than a centimeter.

Ellis drops his head to his knees before surging with a pissed off look on his face.

Chloe.

I can’t recall if it was my mother or my father who told me that if you die in the ethereal plane you stay that way.
 

I swipe an arrow from over my shoulder, bend over and hoist up the crossbow.

An arrow. That’s how Chloe Bishop will die. Not some mirror that fulfills psychotic wishes. I’ll be damned if I ever let her crawl into her fantasy and have her way with Gage as a means to rid her from this world. Not on my fucking watch.

She pulls back her sling already loaded and ready to go. She heaves with a malevolent smile, shakes a shock of necrotic hair out of her eyes with laughter.

“Skyla!” Gage resonates through the incessant drumming.

It all happens so fast, two deadly weapons slicing through the air, whispering as they pass in the night. I drop to my knees only to find a stone staring me in the face.

The world quakes and trembles, reduces to nothing as the night is swallowed up in thunder.

Gage—he tossed the disc into the field and everything freezes.

Region three is over.

We lost.