“Are you done?” the general asked as he would a spoiled child.
Rick stood from his squatted position and placed his hand on her arm. The little assurance and bit of calm the gesture provided had her swinging her gaze toward him and away from the man she was pissed at.
“Calm down, Red. Take deep breaths, just like you were taught. Release the anger you’re feeling and let it flow out of you. Control where you want it to go, just like Brody taught you.”
Lydia took a deep breath and turned her thoughts inward and away from the ruined exercise. She thought of her family back in Southall. Her brother and sisters that she’d left behind. Instead of releasing the energy, she reined it back inside of her, letting it fall to a silent, deadly simmer before she released her breath and opened her eyes.
“All better?” Rick asked.
She spun around on Rick. “You knew this was a test, didn’t you? You kept it from me.”
Rick held up his hands. “No. They didn’t tell me anything.”
Brody strolled over to her. “You saw all of this in your dream, Lydia. You might not have seen that it was a test, but you knew it was coming. That’s why we worked on disarming electrical boxes today.”
The general crossed his arms over his chest and raised his brow. “Really?”
Lydia narrowed her eyes at the man she’d once thought as attractive and a flirt. “It was just a dream. Besides…” Lydia glanced around. “This isn’t the place.”
The general gently took her elbow and started steering her back to the vehicles. “Tell me what you remember.”
Lydia swallowed around the lump in her throat. She knew it was important that she share everything, but what if she shared and it changed the outcome? There was only one thing about her vision that concerned her more than the rest. When they were back in the Hummer, she decided to take a chance and trust these guys. They were on her side after all.
Rick sat on one side of her and Briggs on the other with Brody and Marlaina riding shotgun in the front with the general behind the wheel. “I know it wasn’t the same place because the building was different. The building from my vision wasn’t brick like that one. It was more like a metal warehouse. There were men guarding the perimeter with guns.”
The general glanced in the rearview mirror. “Could you pick it out from a picture?”
Lydia nodded.
“Is that all you remember?” he asked.
Lydia twisted her fingers together. It wasn’t the building that had stuck out in her mind. It was the fact that Rick hadn’t been with her. She didn’t remember him in the dream at all. “There was one other thing that was off.”
“Well?”
“Rick wasn’t with me.”
All eyes turned toward Rick. Lydia’s heart beat faster. She knew that one day he wouldn’t be around, but if her dream was supposed to be a vision, then that confirmed it for her.
Brody broke the tension. “Planning on taking a trip anytime soon, Romeo? Maybe we can pinpoint it to a specific day.”
Lydia noticed the general glance in the mirror at Rick and nod.
Rick cleared his throat. “I’m leaving tomorrow.” Rick took Lydia’s hand in his own. “That’s what General Lister wanted to talk to me about when we got back from town. I have to go back to testify against Winters.”
“You were just going to leave?” Lydia asked. Her heart fell into her stomach. Granted, she’d known the day would come, but she wasn’t expecting it so soon. They’d just begun to figure things out between them. Well, sort of.
Rick shook his head. “I was going to tell you tonight. I’ll only be gone a week at most, and then I’ll be back.”
Lydia nodded her understanding and placed a fake smile on her face.
Winters was the man who’d killed her father all of those years ago, and he deserved to be dead, not rotting in a jail cell. Had she been able to control her gift a month ago, he’d be dead and they’d all be better off.
Her visions had been one of the main reasons she’d felt compelled to see if the characters she’d seen in her head for all of her life had been real. Finding out they were family had been an unexpected bonus.
Lydia was aware of the hand clasping hers. The close proximity always sent tingles through her body. It dawned on her right then that if she hadn’t felt compelled to go to Southall then she would have never met Rick.
The Hummer hit a bump and pulled her back from her memories and the new realization.
That news wasn’t good for whatever relationship they were building, but that wasn’t what mattered now. She needed to stay focused. Sharing the pieces of information had given them an edge. They could take Floyd by surprise if she could find the building first.