Adam inhaled to speak, but Nick got an arm around his neck and slapped a hand over his mouth.
‘Be still,’ Nick said, his mouth right against Adam’s ear. ‘Please. Be still.’
Adam went still.
Nick hadn’t had time to tell him much about his family, and he definitely hadn’t gotten to the part where someone might be trying to kill them.
Quinn was silent, but her fear was a beacon, her shaking breath giving him information with every passing second. Footsteps approached, slow and steady on the wooden floors.
He could also feel whoever was frightening her. Even breaths, pure confidence. There had to be a weapon of some sort for Quinn to be this pliant.
‘See?’ she said loudly. ‘They’re gone already.’
Please, Quinn
, Nick thought.
Please don’t be stupid.
He tried not to think of Michael’s stories of what Silver had done to Hunter’s girlfriend Kate. The torture, the final bullet to the head.
Was this Silver? Had he escaped from prison?
He begged the air for answers, stretching his senses far.
‘They’re here,’ said a male voice.
Adam went very still. He held his breath.
‘Come on out,’ said the man. No British accent. Not Silver.
But definitely a Guide.
Nick didn’t move. There had to be a way out of this.
Had to be.
He tried not to think of his brothers. Had this guy gone after them first? Were his brothers dead and he didn’t know it?
Not likely, if they were all together.
Then he remembered his conversation with Michael. They were scattered. That could mean anything.
And not just scattered. Scattered
remotely
. Gabriel would be home alone — with no Nick to warn of danger approaching. Chris and Michael were working a job, and if they were finishing the one Nick and Michael had skipped last night, it was a massive yard away from any other houses. Sitting ducks.
Hell, if the Guide took out Nick and Gabriel, he wouldn’t even have to go looking for Chris and Michael. He could just wait for them to come home.
‘You’ve already given me proof,’ said the man. ‘I know this girl is innocent. There is no need for her to die.’
Think, Nick.
God, what the hell use was his GPA if he couldn’t think of a way out of here?
‘Come out
now
,’ said the man. ‘Three seconds and she dies.’ He didn’t hesitate. ‘Three . . . Two . . .’
‘Nick!’ Quinn’s voice, high and panicked.
‘Okay!’ Nick shoved Adam down and stood, revealing himself. He didn’t recognize this guy at all.
But he recognized the danger of a gun pointed at Quinn’s head.
Nick put his hands up to show he was unarmed. ‘Okay. I’m here. Let her go.’
Adam. Stay hidden. Please, Adam.
‘That was easy,’ said the Guide.
Then he pointed the gun straight at Nick’s head and pulled the trigger.
The gun fired, and Quinn flew back and hit the wooden floor
like someone had given her a hard
shove.
The studio windows exploded outward, but the sound only came to her distantly, as though she were underwater. The overhead lights burst and glass rained down.
Time stopped. She felt as if she lay there for a minute. An hour. A day.
After a while, she realized she could open her eyes. She turned her head.
Glass everywhere, sparkling in the light.
She couldn’t see Nick.
She couldn’t breathe.
Her ears were ringing and full, and she couldn’t seem to move right yet.
Where was the man?
He’d shot Nick. She’d seen the flash, had seen Nick jerk and fall.
She had to run.
She had to get to her phone.
Her brain was racing, but everything else seemed to be moving in slow motion.
Move!
She still couldn’t breathe. The pressure was intense, as if an elephant had set up shop right on top of her chest. Her vision was turning spotty.
Had she been shot? She felt like she’d been dropped into liquid amber, and her world was slowly coming to a crystalline stop.
What was
happening
?
And then, without warning, reality snapped back into place. Wind rushed into the studio, chilling her face and making the glass tinkle and drag across the wood.
She could move. She could breathe. She could crawl.
But no. When she rolled over, trying to get to her hands and knees, her body shook and protested the motion. Every joint hurt. Her head swam. Her skin pricked like she’d been sliced open by a hundred tiny knives.
Oh, look. Her arms were bleeding.
The lightbulbs. Glass under her palms.
Nick.
Nick was crumpled on the floor. Not moving.
His eyes were closed. Blood had pooled on the hardwood floor, glistening where glass had collected in it.
She realized she was screaming his name. Glass sliced into her hands and knees as she scrambled toward him.
Then she caught movement from the corner of her eye and flinched, remembering the man.
Hide. Hide, Quinn.
Her brain wasn’t working. Hide where? In the open?
But no. It wasn’t the man. She didn’t see Gareth anywhere.
It was Adam. He was making the same slow crawl across the glass-strewn floor that she was. Blood streaked his forearms. His head was bleeding from the temple — what had happened?
His face was wet. He was crying.
She was yelling. She couldn’t move fast enough.
Nick.
Nick.
Nick
.
He didn’t move at all.
No. No no no no no no.
Adam got to him first. Rolled him onto his back. Nick’s arm cracked onto the hardwood floor, lifeless.
Adam was crying his name, too. He was pressing his fingers to Nick’s neck, struggling to find a pulse. Adam’s words came to her in slow motion, and her brain didn’t want to process them.
He doesn’t have a pulse.
He’s not breathing.
Damn it, Nick.
The side of Nick’s face was soaked in blood. It was already caking in his hair.
Oh, Nick.
Quinn choked on her sobs.
Adam breathed into Nick’s mouth.
And again.
Nothing happened.
Nick’s voice was echoing in her head, from the night he’d told her their secrets.
A gun to the head is a surefire way to kill us
.
God, now it sounded like a premonition.
She’d done this. She should have fought Gareth in the parking lot. She should have screamed a warning. She should have begged Tyler to stay, she should have should have should have —
‘Damn it, Quinn!’ shouted Adam. ‘Snap out of it! Can you get to your phone? He’s got a pulse. We need an ambulance.’
Nick had a headache.
He couldn’t open his eyes. He kept flashing on waking up in the woods, Gabriel leaning over him.
Come on, Nicky, you’re scaring me.
Air swirled around him, fluttering at his skin, full of pride, seeking his attention.
Yes, yes,
he thought.
I’m alive. Good job. This just really fucking hurts.
He knew he’d been shot in the head, but only kind of distantly. Like maybe one day he’d be able to look back on this and say, ‘Well, the one time I took a bullet to the cerebral cortex . . .’
No. That was stupid. If the bullet had gone into his brain, he wouldn’t be lying here thinking about it, would he?
He felt drunk. He wished he could open his eyes.
He wished he could move.
He smelled oranges and cloves.
Adam.
Oh, and Adam was kissing him. This was nice. Breath rushed across his tongue and filled his lungs. Power flared in his chest, finding his blood and sparking through his body.
Another breath and he could move.
Another breath and he could hear. Quinn’s voice. ‘Come on, Nick. Come on. Please, Nick.’
She sounded so worried. Didn’t she remember their whole conversation about air pressure?
Another breath. Wait, this kissing was all wrong. Nick brought his hands up and captured Adam’s cheeks.
Adam jerked back and swore.
Nick opened his eyes and found wide, panicked brown ones gazing down at him.
‘’Sup?’ said Nick.
‘Holy shit,’ Adam whispered.
‘Holy
shit
,’ Quinn echoed. Her bright blue eyes appeared next to Adam’s.
‘It’s . . . it’s impossible,’ said Adam.
‘Nuh-uh,’ said Nick. He shook his head and the ceiling tilted and spun. ‘It’s physics.’
‘He still needs an ambulance.’ Adam turned his head to look at Quinn. ‘Try your phone again. Can you get a signal yet?’
‘I can’t even get the stupid thing to turn
on
.’
Nick sucked in a deep breath, buying himself further clarity. It wasn’t working. His brain couldn’t seem to organize.
Adam was still staring down at him. ‘He shot you. I saw — I saw — there’s blood —’
‘Nothing works,’ said Quinn. ‘Whatever that guy did, there’s no cell signal, no electricity, no cars on the road —’
‘Me,’ said Nick. He winced as reality started to reform, bringing more pain with it. ‘I did it.’
‘What?’ said Adam.
‘The end of
Twilight
would have been so much cooler if this had happened in the dance studio, wouldn’t it?’
‘Are you seriously joking right now?’
Nick struggled to shift so he could sit up, and his arms found shards of glass. The pain helped his thoughts focus.
God, his head hurt.
‘Easy,’ said Adam. His voice was still full of mixed emotion, as if panic and wonder battled for space. ‘Just lie still. Wait for help.’
‘I can’t wait,’ said Nick, more sure now. ‘I need to tell — need to warn —’
‘We can’t warn anyone. Nothing
works
,’ said Quinn. ‘It’s like a bomb went off or something.’
‘A bomb did go off,’ said Nick. ‘But without the explosion part. Help me up.’
He took Adam’s outstretched hand and pulled himself to sit up.
It wasn’t the best idea. He had to grip hard just to stay upright. His stomach rolled and he worried he’d throw up all over the floor.
He had no idea how much damage his pressure wave had caused, or at what distance. Had he knocked out power to more than this building? What had Quinn said? No cars on the road?
God, he needed his brain to
work
.
‘You’re bleeding,’ he said, blinking at Adam.
‘Most of it’s yours.’
Nick reached toward his temple. ‘No, there.’
‘Whatever happened knocked me into the wall.’ Adam glanced left. ‘Quinn hit the risers.’ He paused. ‘You were . . . you were out for a
long
time.’
‘It didn’t hurt that asshole,’ she said. ‘He was gone when I woke up.’
Of course. ‘Does he know I’m still alive?’ said Nick.
‘We didn’t know you were still alive until about two seconds ago,’ said Quinn. ‘You had no pulse, Nick. You were . . .’
‘I’m all right,’ he said. ‘I’m okay.’
But no pulse. If the guy had checked, he would have thought Nick was dead.
Hell, looking at the pool of blood on the floor, Nick might not have checked himself.
Adam touched his face again, as if trying to reassure himself that Nick was really sitting here talking. His breathing was shaking, just the slightest bit, but his expression was full of resolve. ‘Why didn’t he kill us all?’
‘He’s only after us. Me and my brothers.’
Damn it, he
needed to call home.
‘The office,’ he said. ‘Is there a phone?’
‘Dead,’ said Quinn. ‘We already tried.’
Dead.
Chris and Michael were together, but Gabriel was home alone.
Did the Guide know that?
Had he gone there first?
Nick thought of his connection to his twin brother, the way he always seemed to know what Gabriel was thinking, almost before it happened. When Gabriel had rescued Layne from the barn fire, then run home with a broken hand, Nick had
known
. His twin brother’s panic had woken him from a sound sleep.
God, he needed his head to
stop hurting.
Nick pressed his hands to his temples. One came away sticky and wet. He looked at his palm and found a hand covered in blood.
Was he still bleeding?
What had happened to the bullet?
‘Help me up,’ he said again. ‘I need — we need —’
‘You still need an ambulance,’ Adam said, his voice finding that quiet confidence. ‘Quinn, I’ll run up the road and see if I can find a place with a phone. Keep him still —’
‘No,’ said Nick. If there was any chance the Guide was out there, he didn’t want them to separate, too. ‘No.’
‘Yes.’
Adam put his hands on Nick’s shoulders. ‘I don’t care what you want this time. You were — you were —’ Now his voice faltered, and he visibly struggled to keep it together. ‘You’re hurt. We’ll call the cops, and —’
‘No.’ Nick caught his wrists. ‘We need to get out of here. We need to warn my brothers. He’ll shoot them next and they won’t — they won’t —’ Now Nick’s voice broke. Gabriel had been able to stop a gun from firing once. Nick had no idea whether he could do it again, especially without Hunter’s power helping him focus. Chris and Michael would be on a job, oblivious to a threat sneaking up on them.
Nick thought of Chris’s voice, the last thing his little brother had said to him.
I love you, brother.
It sounded so much like a good-bye.
Stop it. Stop it, stop it, stop it.
This wasn’t helping anything.
‘
Help me
, Adam.’ Nick squeezed his hands and heard his voice break again. ‘Please. Help me.’
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Okay. I’ll help you.’
‘Me, too, Nick,’ said Quinn. ‘Me, too.’
‘Me, three,’ said a voice, and a shoe crunched on broken glass.
They all jumped and scrambled, ready to face a new enemy.
But there in the frame of the broken window, looking shaken and frightened himself, stood Tyler.
Nick swayed with the motion of Tyler’s truck. He leaned against
Adam and wished his head would stop aching. At Quinn’s insistence that they couldn’t drive around town covered in blood, he’d washed his face in the studio bathroom — at least the water worked — but now he was damp and cold and shivering. Shock, probably.