The closer she came to me, the more she struggled, reaching for me. Her nails scraped over my thighs, and I flinched.
She lowered her head and gnawed on my arm. I sucked in a breath, the pain coming quick and hot. But soon after she started, she was jerked back. She sagged to the floor and began to seize. Her skin lost its grayish tint, and the red glow faded from her eyes. She lifted her arm to the light, turned it, studied it, and a slow grin bloomed.
Rebecca and Ethan exited the chamber.
A gloating Rebecca clapped. “Told you.”
Ethan only had eyes for the girl. “Izzy,” he said, rushing to her.
The girl gasped at him happily, excitedly. “Ethan!”
But one of the hazmat-suit men stepped between them, preventing a reunion.
“Out of my way,” Ethan commanded.
The suited man remained in place.
Scowling, Ethan turned to Rebecca. “Tell him to move out of my way. Now.”
“Your sister has been cleansed, just as I promised,” Rebecca replied. “Now she’s what we call a Witness. And we can’t just let Witnesses run wild, can we? No. We have to test her, find out what she can do and how she does it.”
Rebecca had said the same thing about all the others I’d cleansed. I’d protested more than once, to no avail.
Ethan shook his head. “I won’t let you run tests on her. She had enough of that during her first life.”
Far from intimidated, she said, “And how are you going to stop me?”
He tensed.
I struggled against my bonds. They were going to fight, and I— What? What was I going to do about it?
An alarm screeched to sudden life. I stilled, glanced around.
A paling Rebecca barked orders at the guards. “You, get the Witness into the cage I prepared. You, lock Ali in the safe room.”
Ali, again. Why?
“And you,” she said to Ethan. “If you want to leave this building alive, you’ll shut your mouth and come with me. I’ll expect you to watch my back—or I’ll put a bullet in yours.”
Wait. “Don’t leave me!” I called.
But they’d already marched out of the room. One of the suited men took the collar-bound Witness through another set of doors while the other freed me from the chair. I made to stand on my own, but he grabbed me by the wrist and dragged me through the same doors the other suited man had used.
A computerized voice announced, “Intruders, first floor. Intruders, second floor. Intruders, third floor. Fire, fourth floor.” On and on, the litany continued.
My heart raced, but not with fear, I didn’t think. Was that...excitement? Anticipation? But why?
“What’s going on?” I asked.
He jerked off the mask. “Shut up and walk.”
I gritted my teeth, contemplated tripping him—and the impulse baffled me. We were on the same side.
Down a hall we raced, around a corner. We came to a group of teenage boys fighting guards and zombies at the same time and drew up short.
I watched, enthralled. Throb, throb, throb. I’m not sure I’d ever seen a more awesome sight. The tallest and most muscled of the boys had black hair—and were those violet eyes? Good glory. He was fearsome. A minicrossbow in one hand, a dagger in the other. He pushed his spirit from his body, took down a zombie, then turned in a circle, stepped back into his body and shot a guard with an arrow. His motions were fluid, a ripple of wind, as natural as breathing.
His gaze shifted—yes! violet!—and landed on me. He stopped. Just stopped—
—the world around me crumbled, and suddenly I was on a bed, flat on my back. The dark-haired boy was on top of me, pinning me down. He didn’t mean me any harm. His hands gently framed my cheeks as I smiled up at him. He lowered his head with every intention of kissing me. I—
—lost sight of him and yelped. Hazmat-suit man must have decided it would be unwise to aid his friends, because he yanked my arm, tugging me away from the action. I turned back, needing to see the violet-eyed boy again.
“They’re slayers,” Hazmat said.
That meant... Oh, crap. They had come back to finish the job—to finish me.
Hazmat tripped and fell, taking me with him. Impact hurt. As I crawled to my hands and knees, I realized he hadn’t tripped on his own. He’d had help. Courtesy of an arrow through the back of his neck. Blood pooled around him. But the violence of the action...didn’t shock me.
Heart pounding, I scrambled up to face the violet-eyed boy now stomping toward me. Every cell in my body sizzled. In fear. Had to be fear.
“Don’t hurt me,” I gasped out. Warning bells sounded in my head. Or maybe that was the still-blasting alarm. I backed away, came up against a wall. “I’ll fight you. And I’ll injure you. I will. I hear I’m quite good at combat.”
He stopped a few inches away from me. Those gorgeous eyes danced with relief, happiness and confusion. He took another step toward me.
I held up my hands to ward him off. “Don’t come near me!”