The tiny enclosure seemed to constrict, squeezing my lungs. I tried to slow my breathing, which hissed in short, shallow gasps. Blackness enveloped me. It pressed against my face, pushed its way into my nose and mouth.
The men continued to talk, but the roar of blood from my pounding heart drowned them out.
Something hit my nose and slid down onto my check.
Please don’t let it be a bug. Please don’t let it be a spider.
Something else landed on my forehead and slid into my hairline. I thanked God when I realized it was just a drop of liquid of some sort and not a spider.
Then the coppery tang of blood oozed its way up my nose.
My aunt lay bleeding to death on the floor six inches above me. Another drop hit my nose, another my lips. I pressed my mouth closed and squeezed my eyes shut. Short bursts of air shot in and out of my nose.
Power poured through the wood above me. A burning blossomed in my chest and stomach then seared fiery trails down my legs and arms.
The fire reached my neck. I concentrated on it. Willed it not to advance to my head. If it reached my head, something bad would happen.
Heat radiated from me into the tiny space, burning me alive. The nightmares I’d had after they cremated Grandma suffocated me, locked in the coffin, sliding into the oven, the flames licking around me.
Several more drops hit my face in rapid succession. The cremation image took root in my brain, the nightmare now real. The energy I’d held at bay surged up my neck and engulfed my head.
A piercing scream vibrated my dirt coffin. Blood dripped into my mouth. My scream amplified to a roar. In the back of my mind, I knew I’d lost it,” but try as I might, I couldn’t get “it” back.
A loud boom and brilliant light flooded my grave as my power blew the rug and wooden door off my hideaway.
Molten energy boiled like a geyser out of the opening, hitting the ceiling and shooting outward. Small dark objects hurtled through my rectangular field of vision—books flying through the air as if in a hurricane.
More screams joined my primal roar—men’s screams. A man’s bloody face appeared above me, looking down in horror, a gun in his hand. A fat book smashed into his temple and he shot sideways out of sight.
My wail continued until the burning in my chest ceased. Then it abruptly stopped. My mouth snapped shut.
I lay frozen, listening to the room above through the ringing in my ears. No sound of movement. Should I look out? Was someone waiting for me? After what seemed an eternity in the smothering confines of the hole, fear of leaving now cemented me in place.
This was stupid. I was far more vulnerable lying prone waiting for someone to poke their head into the opening again and shoot me.
Aunt Tibby moaned. “Marlee.”
That settled it. My concern for her outweighed my fear.
I wriggled onto my stomach and pushed my head up inch by inch until I could see over the floorboards.
A tornado could have ripped through the room with less damage. The couch hung diagonally, wedged though the front door. Chunks of wood that had once been furniture covered the floor like monster-size confetti.
One man lay facedown near the front window, another lay against the east wall. Neither of them had life static. A third man lay partially covered with debris where the kitchen table used to be. He was alive. I couldn’t see or feel the fourth man.
My aunt lay four feet from me by the west wall in a pool of her long, white, angelic hair and blood. I eased out of the hole and crawled toward her, checking over my shoulders every few seconds.
I reached her and brushed the hair from her paper-white face.
“Aunt Tibby?” I whispered.
Her eyes fluttered open, and her mouth twisted into a cross between a smile and a grimace.
Blood covered her ruined chest. My hands hovered over her, not knowing what to do. Should I compress the wound or elevate her legs or . . . ?
Aunt Tibby’s hand waved weakly.
“Too late, dear,” she whispered. “Always was a lousy shot.”
She coughed and frothy blood drooled from her mouth.
“Lousy shot?”
“Aiming for my heart.” A short chuckle turned into another cough. “Wanted to die right away.”
“No,” I said. “We can get you in the car. Where’s the nearest hospital?”
My throat constricted, and my tears flowed freely onto the wooden planked floor.
“No time,” she said.
“Aunt Tibby, no.”
She grabbed my hand with surprising strength.
“Listen to me,” she said. “You get out of here. Don’t go the police. Sarkis has government ties. He’ll have them looking for you. Don’t let that bastard get you. But if he does—”
She looked straight into my eyes and a link clicked into place between us. Her lips didn’t move, but her voice rang out in my head.
Kill him
.
Her eyes closed and the connection broke, but her grip remained firm.
I held her hand.
“Aunt Tibby, I’m so sorry.”
Her eyes opened but her gaze was on something over my shoulder. I darted a look expecting to see the fourth man with a gun, but no one was there. A bone-chilling cold filled the room.
“Daniel?” she said. Still looking past me, she paused as if listening to something. I looked behind me and then to her. The cold intensified, and I gasped frost into the air.
Her eyes were clear, her face relaxed when her attention returned to me.
“I’m going home,” she said. “Daniel says for you to go to the dark-haired man that isn’t—” A racking cough turned into a wheeze.
“Your destiny is tied to his. He will help you, but beware or he will take everything that you are. His love can kill you.”
She coughed once more, and reached out with her free hand. It closed around something. The white impression of someone’s thumb pressed into her skin across her knuckles.
Serenity and joy masked her face. With one last exhale, she closed her eyes. Her energy left her body and joined another energy source that flared behind me. The two entities expanded when they joined. The new combined entity moved forward, and soothing, viscous power flowed into me. My aunt stood before me with a dark-skinned man.
Daniel
.
The serenity on my aunt’s face filled me. My heart broke over her death, but my soul shared in the rejoicing and freedom emanating from her now.
Their bodies dissolved into a golden mist. It moved away, leaving what they’d shared within me. They glided up and passed smoothly through the tin roof and were gone.
Tears flowed down my face. I sat gazing at the ceiling, cherishing the warmth inside me, until something crashed by the back door.
I spun and got back on all fours, ready to jump to my feet and flee.
The debris by the back door that covered all but the third man’s feet moved. A moan drifted from beneath the rubble. I stood and turned to run out the front door, but was stopped short by the sofa on its end wedged into it. I’d have to pass the trapped man to get out the back door. And where was the fourth man?
I needed to get over the debris without killing myself, watch the downed man, and look for the fourth man all at the same time. I took a deep breath and inched toward the back door, glancing from the man on the floor to the open back door to the floor in front of me. I stopped after a few feet and turned back to Aunt Tibby’s body. It lay on the floor on what looked like a small, red vinyl sheet. At least that’s what I told myself. I’d never been very good around blood, especially not pools of it.
Should I leave her there?
Another moan drifted from the debris, and a splintered chair fell away to reveal the man’s bloody face. I’d have to leave her. It helped that I’d felt her depart. I could look at what lay on the floor as an empty shell, a container she’d used while here.
A large piece of wood shifted off the man on the floor. I approached the back door at a slight angle, scanning the outside area for the fourth man. I reached the doorway and popped my head out and back in like I’d seen police on
Real Cop Stories
do on TV.
I did this a few more times until I’d scanned everything I could, then I crouched and crept out the door and down the rough, wooden steps.
I continued this way on shaking legs around the cabin, trying to step silently through twigs and leaves that seemed to explode with sound when my shoes hit them. I rounded the side of the cabin and reached the corner where the side connected to the front. Still no sign of the fourth man. The faces of the three men still in the cabin flashed through my brain. I remembered the flash I’d seen of the men driving down the road. My stomach lurched. The fourth man was Mr. Smith.
My hand clamped over my mouth to stifle a scream. Why did it have to be him? It was his appearance that had started this nightmare.
Something scrapped on the front porch. I hugged the wall of the cabin, used my police head-popping maneuver around the corner, and ducked back to go over what I’d seen. I put my other hand over my mouth, squeezed my eyes shut, and pressed myself against the rough logs.
Mr. Smith lay facedown under the sofa that protruded through the broken door. I peeked back around. His ankles were pinned between the sofa and the broken bottom half of the door. A small pool of blood widened under his head.
I reached my hand out toward him and opened my senses. A strong energy signal emanated from him. He was alive and not critically hurt.
My rental car sat parked where I left it about a foot behind my aunt’s ancient Fairlaine, which was six inches behind a tree stump. The men’s black GMC SUV sat about a foot behind my rental.
I grimaced. Another damsel-in-distress lesson, don’t park so close to another car that the bad guys can block you in. Darn, darn, and double darn.
I attempted to tiptoe over the gravel toward the cars, but tiptoeing over gravel is an oxymoron, it can’t be done. Every footstep crunched. Between the crunchy footsteps and my pounding heartbeat, every creature in the forest could hear me.
A quick inspection of the inside of the GMC showed no bad guys hiding, but no keys either. I tried the door handle, but it was locked. Even if I could smash the window and take the behemoth vehicle out of gear, I wouldn’t be able to push it backward up the incline. As big as it was, I’d be hard pressed to push it on flat ground.
Crap, I just want to go home. I just want to live a normal life.
I looked to the heavens and whispered. “I’m not good at this covert sh—stuff.” Saying shit to God probably wasn’t something I should risk just now.
I stood back a few paces and lifted my hands to the side of the truck. Since the wheels wouldn’t roll, and the truck was on an incline, it would probably be easier to push the big SUV sideways than backwards. I gathered power into my shoulders, but even before I released it, I knew it wouldn’t be enough. My little scream-and-demolish-my-surroundings stunt had drained me.
This place had such a low available energy I wasn’t recharging very fast. Where had the energy come from when I’d demolished the cabin then? Images of the two dead men flashed in my mind.
No. Surely not. Could I have drawn so much energy from them that I’d killed them? Pummeling them to death with books and furniture was something I’d been trying not to face or think about, but it was almost acceptable in a way. They were trying to harm me or kidnap me, so conking them on the head with something was justifiable. Sucking the life out them . . .
Okay, now wasn’t the time to be worrying about this. They were dead. I’d obsess about how I’d killed them later. My stomach clenched.
I’d killed them.
I’d killed two human beings.
I teetered on the verge of falling apart, but dissolving into a weeping puddle wouldn’t accomplish anything. I’d stopped dissolving into puddles when I was twelve. I shook my head hard and fast a few times.
I needed the keys to the SUV. The dead guys would be the easiest to search, but I wasn’t sure if I could touch them. A dam of guilt over killing them sat tenuously just behind my fear and need to escape. If I touched them, that dam might break and hysterics wouldn’t help my cause. The guy next to the back door was alive, but the most logical choice was the closest man—Mr. Smith. He’d been driving in my earlier vision of the men. Something in me just didn’t want to get that close to him.
Stop it, Marlena Marie Burns. Stop it and get through this.
I stiffened my spine and walked toward Mr. Smith. The closer I got to him, however, the more my spine-stiffening wilted and the softer I walked. By the time I was three feet away, sweat poured from my brow and my hands shook like the leaves in the surrounding trees.
He wore a forest-green windbreaker and khaki slacks. Nice that he color coordinated his outfit to the job. Maybe fashion tips were in the bad guys code of ethics. I almost giggled. It was truly strange how close the smart-ass section and the stress section of my brain were together. I knew I was dealing with my stress, but I also knew I was postponing what I didn’t want to do.
I’d start with the jacket pockets, since that’s where my father kept his keys—well that and the fact that I wasn’t looking forward to fishing around in the man’s pants pockets.
I took a careful step and leaned forward, hand outstretched, breath held, my hand shaking so much I doubted I could get it in the small slit of the pocket opening. My fingers brushed the green fabric, and Mr. Smith’s right hand whipped around and fastened to my wrist.
His upper body twisted toward me, and he yanked me down. His left hand shot forward, and he grabbed at my shirt. I pulled back, and his grab fell short. He tugged and grabbed at me several more times. I pulled back each time, but my feet slid forward with each yank, tipping my center of gravity toward him.
A picture of our last encounter in the university parking lot flashed through my mind. I had one chance. I braced my foot, twisted, and thrust my hand toward the SUV twenty feet away. I pulled energy into my shoulder. My own body was depleted, but, as before, it found an energy source connected to my wrist and drained it. Mr. Smith screamed and released me. I shot forward, my arms flailing. The energy bolt went off target and hit the back of the Escort and spun it. The back bumper of the Escort clanked against the front bumper of the SUV as it swung past and clear.