Prisoner Series: Book 3 Teaser...
Chapter 10
8:15am | Sanford, N.C. | June 14, 2030
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“Devil’s argument,” said Gavin. “First, let me clarify where we’re at.” For the first time since all of this began, the question wasn’t how to rescue one of their sisters, but should they attempt a rescue? “We’re saying that maybe she’s in a safe place. Possibly happy. And maybe even with a gift not quite strong enough to think it’s anything more than heightened intuition. Correct?”
“Yes,” said Joanna, looking around the shop at everyone gathered.
“We know it’s been difficult to reach this individual, right?” he said, pausing for approval. “Well, couldn’t it also be said that maybe she’s strong enough to design a barrier to remain hidden? After all, we did experience what can only be described as a reverse surge of energy the other day when Addie grabbed hold of the blue and red threads, right?”
“I’m not so sure that surge came from her, though,” said Zuri. “I mean, I guess it could have, but I could feel two distinct lines pulling me in opposite directions. It felt like that blast originated from the unknown source, not from her.”
“Agreed,” Addie interjected. “I’m fairly certain what I saw came from the black strand.”
“I see what you’re saying—” Gavin started.
“I think I know where Gavin’s going with this,” Maria chimed in. “Even if she didn’t produce that surge, when it was just Zuri straight out of her induced coma, she was still strong enough to feel out for Lexi and Zoey. With all of you combined, her reach is a force to be reckoned with. Even if the eighth had no gift of her own, just a regular person like me, you’d be able to find her. Yet, somehow, she’s keeping you at bay. Seems it would take a lot of energy on her end to keep Zuri, let alone all of you together, from seeing her clearly.”
“Maria has a point,” said Addie. “Wouldn’t we want to have her here with us then? If she is that strong?”
“Maybe she doesn’t want her gifts,” Grant offered. “Or… like Joanna said, she might be happy where she is. Who are we to rob her of that?”
“Or maybe,” Aidan said from the back of the room, “it could be she’s not like you. Maybe she’s gone to the dark side, Vader-style.”
His words rang out in the silence of the room. A thought none of them had considered.
(Florida 11:05am)
Dakota stepped hard and fast through the woods. If steam could come from her ears, she imagined it would scorch leaf and limb as she passed. With red cheeks and a rising heart rate, she fumed at the traitorous actions of her team. Have people always been this unfaithful? I may not have had a normal childhood, but to just go behind someone’s back like that?
Just like when she was a child, they wanted to hurt her, confine her, use her. They aren’t my family. All these years I believed they cared about me, but I’ve been nothing more than a tool.
She woke up that morning even more furious. Everything she’d done. For them. For their cause.
Without intending to, her march through the forest brought her to the beach. The Atlantic spread dark and wide before her as a storm cell raged off the coast. It looked as beautiful as it did menacing, with flashes of lightning and a distant water spout moving south. Dakota hardly felt either the wind or the rain on her skin from her vantage point. Clenching her fists, she wanted to feel the needling pain of driving rain and the surge of wind too forceful to stand.
Without thinking it through, she pulled out her notepad and pencil and began to sketch out the scene. She drew herself standing on the beach, waves lapping against her knees. She penciled palm trees bent and broken and lying on the ground. She sketched the pier in the distance being washed away.
Staring at the page, she focused all her attention on the scene playing out before her. Clenching her notebook, she gripped her head. An unseen pressure squeezed like a vice. Pressing in with her hands on her temples, her vision began to blur as the pain intensified. Nearly blacking out, the sketch smeared as it soaked up the sweat beading across her face before falling to the page.
Without warning, a furious wind sent her flailing back onto her right arm, bending her forearm at an angle it wasn’t meant to. The snap of her arm, along with the searing pain shooting from her head down her spine, was more than she could handle.
Her scream, however, was drowned out by the pelting rain and the crashing waves. Scrambling up the embankment, she pressed behind a fallen palm tree, hoping to block the onslaught.
As she watched the pier disappear, her rage and pain turned to fear, warping her view as her surroundings grew darker and her hearing muffled as if the waves were overcoming her. That’s when she saw them, cinnamon-colored eyes sparkling so bright they cut through the deafening darkness.
She whimpered as her mind shouted, Help me! Please, someone. Help me.