Read The Company of Darkness Online
Authors: Lisa Olsen
The Company of Darkness (35 page)
“Is something wrong?” Cady asked, getting out to join him. “Is there something else we need to do?”
Rikard turned toward her with a tight smile. “Here’s where I have to leave you.”
“You’re not coming with us?” she blinked. Somehow she’d thought he’d stick by her, at least until Ethan was up and around.
“I’ll be of more help to you here than on the road. Keep driving until he wakes, Ethan should be able to take over from there. And don’t stop the car, you won’t be able to get it started again.”
That’s when she understood he wasn’t leaving the Company, he intended to go back. “But… they’ll know what you did.”
“Alma didn’t see me hit her from behind. I was careful, there are no cameras on that side of the building.”
“They’ll still know you helped me. How else would we have gotten this far?”
“They’ll know what I tell them. That you forced me out here to open the barrier and then drained me and left me to die.” Cady opened her mouth to protest, but he stopped her with a single finger to the lips. “This only works if we move fast before they have time to come upon us. Alma trusts me, but only for as long as I give her a reason to.”
Cady was already shaking her head, brushing off the touch to her mouth. “I can’t do that. What if I take too much?” The last guy she’d touched… she could’ve killed him for all she knew.
“You won’t. Besides, you’ll need the energy to get to safety. And I have more to offer than most. Here, take this as well. It’ll keep you safe from Alma’s search, for a while at least.” He dug into his pocket, drawing out a small disc suspended on a black leather thong. The pendant was a shiny silver-gray with a rusty red vein running through.
Cady recognized it right away as hematite, though she could tell it wasn’t the same one Ethan had given her to shield herself from being found. This time it didn’t feel cold at all, but hot to the touch, burning her fingers when she turned it over to see the tiny symbols etched into the back. She quickly dangled it from the leather thong before shoving it into her pocket.
“Can’t you just lie on the side of the road and pretend I sapped your strength?”
“It has to be real for it to work. Hurry now, or this will all be for nothing.”
“Damn you, John… I finally get a chance to kill you and you have to go and do something like this.” Why did he have to pick now to stop being such a dick?
The corner of his mouth tugged up into a half smile. “You called me John.”
“That’s your name, isn’t it? Or was that bullshit, like the rest of that dream?”
His fingers brushed across the top of her cheek in the ghost of a touch. “Nothing about that dream was bullshit.” Before she could say anything to that, he got down on his knees, looking up at her with absolute resolve. “Take it, Cady. I give it to you freely.”
What was she supposed to do now? She could leave him there without doing as he asked, but he was right – Alma would suspect him if she didn’t make it look good. Steeling herself for the rush of energy, her hand clamped down on his shoulder… and nothing happened.
“It needs to be skin to skin for it to work,” he said with a faint smile.
Nodding, she took a deep breath, hand hovering about an inch from his neck. “Thanks, John. For everything.”
He grabbed hold of her hand and pressed a quick kiss to her palm before clasping it against his cheek. And still, nothing happened. “Hey, it’s not… ow!” Cady scowled as Rikard pinched her on the back of the hand,
hard
, his hand trapping hers from pulling away. And then the power kicked in, his energy flowing seamlessly into her, and she could only stare in wonder.
A furrow of pain appeared on his forehead as she robbed him of his vitality, but he didn’t cry out, he didn’t even look particularly upset, only at peace with his decision. They remained locked together until he lost the strength to hold her hand to his cheek any longer and slumped to the ground, unconscious. The rush of power was incredible, far more than she’d taken from anyone before and it took her a moment to absorb it enough to function. As soon as she got her wits about her, Cady knelt beside him, desperately feeling for a pulse, which came back steady and strong, to her great relief.
“Thanks, John,” she repeated, leaning down to kiss him gently on the lips. “For everything.”
* * *
Instead of going south where they would most likely expect her to return, Cady pointed the Jeep north, cruising along I-5 once she made it to the main highway. Her biggest concern now (besides having the Company breathing down their necks and the fact that Ethan hadn’t made so much as a peep since she’d propped him up in the passenger’s seat at the last rest stop), was running out of gas before he woke up. Not only did she not have her purse with her or any money, but she had no idea how to get the car started again if she were to stop.
But the more miles they put between them and Southern Oregon, the better she began to feel. Maybe it was John’s energy still coursing through her veins, or maybe it was the thrill of freedom after being held captive. Maybe it was the fact that Ethan slumped beside her without the oppressive influence of Ash intruding when she touched his hand, but Cady felt something she hadn’t allowed herself to feel for a while.
Hope.
But even her excessively buoyant mood was taxed as the indicator needle edged closer and closer to the empty symbol on the gas gauge. So it was easy to see why she almost ran them off the road into a ditch when Ethan sat up higher, blinking at the pre-dawn light.
“What happened?”
“You’re awake!” Cady squealed, fighting against the loose gravel on the shoulder as she pulled over as fast as she could. “Oh, thank God! I was starting to seriously freak out. How are you feeling? Are you okay? Does it still hurt anywhere?”
“I feel fine,” Ethan said, swallowing a yawn, eyes squinting as he tried to gain his bearings. “Where are we?”
“Um… somewhere on I-5 nearly to Eugene. Are you sure you’re alright? You were out for a really long time. What’s the last thing you remember?” She hardly knew what he was aware of from the time she’d entered the ritual room, or if he’d been beyond reasoning by then.
“I… was in the middle of the ritual, but something was wrong.” His hand massaged the skin over his heart as if it ached. Despite the fact that he was still shirtless, he hadn’t noticed the lack of Ash’s glyph yet. “Did it work?”
Cady reached out to lay her hand over his skin with hesitation at first, growing bolder when her touch didn’t cause him any pain. With a smile, she leaned forward in the seat, drawing him into a tender kiss, the first she’d given him without thought to Ash since he’d bound him. Ethan returned the kiss hungrily, coming more fully awake at the contact only to pull away, his face drawn into a mask of awe.
“I don’t feel him anymore. He’s completely gone. I’m free,” he said in wonder.
“We both are,” she grinned back crazily, kissing him again with overwhelming joy until the sound of a car passing them on the highway made her pull back to look. It never stopped or gave any sign that the driver looked twice at them.
“How…?”
“Rest up, it’s better if we keep on the move, I’ll catch you up while we drive.” They had enough gas to make it to Eugene at least, and from there they’d have to figure out what to do next.
Ethan sat in stunned silence for most of it, but by the time she was done with her tale, he’d formulated the beginnings of a plan in his head. “Alright, why don’t you pull over and I’ll drive for a while. I have a few places we can go to lay low for a while, get our bearings, regroup. We’ll need to head back south. I’ve got money stashed away, weapons… enough to tide us over until we decide where to go next.”
Cady shook her head, flashing him a brilliant smile as the sun peeked over the horizon. “No, I’ve got this. I know exactly where to go.”
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Read on for a special preview of the next book in Lisa Olsen's
Company
series,
The Company of Lies
, available now!
Books by Lisa Olsen:
The Company Series:
The Company of Death (Spring 2015)
The Fallen Series:
Forged Bloodlines Series:
Wake Me When the Sun Goes Down
Meet Me When the Sun Goes Down
Find Me When the Sun Goes Down
Miss Me When the Sun Goes Down
Follow Me When the Sun Goes Down
Hear Me When the Sun Goes Down
Release Me When the Sun Goes Down
Trust Me When the Sun Goes Down
Tempt Me When the Sun Goes Down (early 2015)
The Vampire Diaries:
For more information, visit the author’s website at
http://www.lisaolsen.net
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http://www.amazon.com/author/lisaolsen
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Chapter One
“All you did was touch them and they keeled over?” Ethan kept coming back to the moment when her story of escape from the Company’s clutches took on a decidedly supernatural twist. The early dawn sunlight made it too bright to look at him for more than a quick glance, but it was enough to see the deep furrow over his cornflower blue eyes.
Cady laid a hand over her heart, eyes wide and earnest. “I swear, that’s all I did. I wasn’t trying to blast them or anything.” And here she’d thought the demon riding shotgun on the back of her neck was a dud, completely dormant. It turned out it was something of a passive defense mechanism. There were worse things to get stuck with when having a demon forced into you, she supposed.
His fingers brushed over the palm of her hand, making it twitch, and she threaded her fingers through his to keep him from tickling her any further. “So why isn’t it doing anything to me?” he asked, his hand relaxing after a few moments.
“I have no idea.”
She’d pulled her long tangle of hair back into a messy braid that blazed fiery red wherever the early morning light hit it. The end was loose and starting to unravel without a scrunchie. A missing hair tie wasn’t the worst of their problems though – no purse, no money, no phone, no ID. Ethan didn’t even have a shirt and his chest was liberally smeared with his own dried blood from the ritual knife that’d drawn Ash from his body. Before too long they’d have to stop, Rikard’s Jeep was almost out of gas and hopefully an opportunity would present itself. Luckily, the signs said Eugene was just up ahead.
“Maybe it doesn’t work on a Reaper,” Ethan ventured, and her eyes fell to the tattoos that started on his hand and curved around his muscular arm all the way up to his bare shoulder. Should she tell him? She’d kept her initial telling of the escape to a more bare bones account the first time through, not wanting to overwhelm him with details. She’d neglected to tell him exactly how large a part Rikard had played.
“No, it does.”
“The guards don’t count,” he disagreed with a shake of the head. “They might have a demon bound to them to give them added strength or speed, but it’s not the same as the magics that bind a Reaper. It could be that those same rituals afford some protection to me.”
“No, I get the difference, but it dropped Rikard like a hot potato. Twice.”
“Oh, right. I’m still a little fuzzy on that. You knocked Rikard out in the hallway, and then still got him to hotwire the car for you and break us through the barrier before you drained him again?”
“Not exactly.” Cady shifted uncomfortably in her seat. “Rikard was the one who conked Alma on the head so I could pull you out of the ritual room.”
“After you took him down in the hallway? Why would he do that?”
She’d been asking herself the same question for the past few hours of driving. While she was still unsure about Rikard’s motivations, she was pretty positive Ethan wouldn’t approve of them, or that kiss of goodbye or thanks, or whatever that was. She wasn’t sure herself why she’d done it, the guy had been unconscious at the time anyway.
“I guess maybe he felt sorry for us,” she hedged. “I’m just glad he did it. There’s no way I could’ve gotten us through the protection spell to get out of the complex without him. Thank God you taught me the basics of the spell or we might still be back there.”
Ethan was quiet for long moments and she started to wonder if he’d heard her at all, but a quick glance showed him to be lost in thought. “Rikard’s not that bad of a guy sometimes, but don’t let yourself think he’s your friend, Cady. Whatever his reasons, if it went against the Company’s best interests, you can be sure he had a selfish motive behind it.”
“I don’t doubt it,” she sighed, thinking any altruistic tendencies the Fixer had probably originated below the belt.
“I’m more interested in this new ability of yours. Do you feel different? Can you still sense the demon inside of you?”
Instead of concentrating as he asked, Cady took the exit for Springfield. “Hold on a sec, I don’t think I can focus on demons and driving at the same time, and the sun’s glare is starting to get to me.” What she wouldn’t give for the pair of oversized sunglasses sitting on her dressing table back home!
Pulling into the parking lot between a gas station and a Burger King, she put the Jeep into park, not sure how to turn it off. “Okay, I give up, how do you stop this thing?” She’d given so much effort to keep going, she’d hardly thought about stopping.
Ethan reached under the dash to untwist a pair of wires and the engine rattled and fell silent except for a ping and a low hiss. He kept looking at her expectantly, so Cady closed her eyes to concentrate, letting go of his hand to focus on her own body. It was there near the base of her neck, the pinwheel of energy spinning as strong as any of the others she’d encountered so far.
“Whatever I did, it fed the demon. It’s stronger now, definitely out of hibernation.”
“But it’s not continuing to amass power, that’s a good thing. Try not to worry about it. It’s actually a great side effect to have.”
“If you say so,” Cady grudgingly agreed. Though she was glad for the protection that’d allowed them to escape, the idea of anything demony inside her still ranked pretty high in the
things to worry about
column in her book.
“I guess I’ll have to be careful not to antagonize you or anything,” Ethan teased, picking up her hand again. “Do you think it’ll kick in if I insult you? Should I be wary the next time you ask me if those pants make your ass look big?”
“I already know it doesn’t work if you irritate me,” she muttered, eyes narrowing to dangerous slits. Whatever he found so amusing about the situation completely escaped her, but she couldn’t stay annoyed with him in the face of the smile she saw so rarely. “You’re sure in a good mood for a guy who spent the better part of the night having his chest sliced open again and again.”
“I’m sorry, it’s just… I can’t believe we made it out of there. I can’t believe we’re finally together the way we want to be.”
The warm sentiment made her heart turn over, the last traces of irritation curling away on the gentle breeze as she laid her hand over his chest. Despite the chill in the morning air, his skin was still warm to the touch. “Careful now, you’re going to make me think you love me or something.”
Ethan’s hand wrapped around the back of her neck, drawing her closer until their lips almost touched. “You know I do, come what may.”
She opened her mouth to protest that
come what may
and he swallowed her words with a kiss, deep and full of longing. After weeks of avoiding his touch for fear of reaching Ash, they had no excuse not to give in to the desire that sprang up between them wherever their bodies touched. Cady shifted in the seat, her body canting toward his as she tried to get closer to him, but the console in the middle didn’t give her much room to maneuver. There was a motel across the street, and it was on the tip of her tongue to suggest they move there when his stomach growled loud enough to capture both of their attention.
“How long has it been since you last ate?” she pulled back to say, but Ethan wasn’t interested in the subject, his lips seeking hers again.
“It doesn’t matter, I can wait.”
“Ethan, there’s no rush. Like you said, we’re finally together. I’m pretty sure you can take a break and eat a few eggs first.”
“No, thank you. All I want is you.” His teeth scraped along her collarbone in a different kind of hunger and Cady was way too distracted by his hands to offer up another objection. At least until his stomach growled again and hers replied with a deep gurgle. This time he was the one to break the kiss and pull back to meet her gaze. “When’s the last time
you
ate?” he asked, cocking a single brow in question.
Too many hours for her to count; she didn’t remember eating much at the campus the night before. “I guess we’re both hungry. But I can wait if you can.”
“How about we go inside and get something to eat?” He gave her a chaste kiss on the lips and settled back into his seat. “Like you said, there’s no rush.”
Cady
was
hungry, but they had a problem. “With what money? I didn’t stop to grab my purse on the way out of there.”
Ethan’s eyes swept over the parking lot, lingering on the gas station and the fast food restaurant. “Give me fifteen minutes, I’ll get some.”
“Do you mean by stealing?”
“For now, until I can get a hold of some resources I have tucked away.” His hand closed over the door handle, but Cady held him in place, the idea not sitting right with her.
“I don’t know, it’s not like stealing from bad guys. Anyone out here in this dinky town is likely to feel it if you rob them.”
“I’m not going to go mug someone in the parking lot,” he said with an exasperated breath. “I’ll hit the gas station. They should be flush with cash and at those prices, it’s literally robbing from the rich to feed the poor.”
“It still doesn’t seem right. Even if it’s part of a chain, there’s someone local who’s going to feel the hit.”
“I’ll only take enough for us to get by,” Ethan insisted. “Unless you can think of some other way to make some quick money?”
She shook her head, years of being raised a cop’s kid influencing her views on petty larceny. “If we were in the city I’d say we could trade Rikard’s Jeep in for some cash, but…”
“Wait, this is Rikard’s Jeep?” Ethan blinked, a slow smile spreading across his face that Cady couldn’t fathom. In the next instant his knee came up, boot smashing against the inner panel of the door until it came loose, revealing a small pistol and a short stack of hundred dollar bills.
“Jackpot,” Cady breathed, her jaw dropping at the sudden bounty. “Is there more, do you think?” She gave her door an experimental kick, but nothing broke loose.
“Why don’t you hop out and I’ll check?” he offered, but she kicked it harder, surprising herself when the panel caved in from the force of her blow.
“Oops.” Her grimace of embarrassment turned into a squeal of delight when she pried the panel back to reveal another stack of cash, a group of IDs rubber banded together and two passports, all with Rikard’s picture. “Should we try the drive-thru?” she grinned, holding up the stack of bills.
“Screw that, let’s get some real food.” His head tilted at the Shari’s Restaurant on the other side of the highway. Once more he reached for the door handle, and once more, Cady held him back.
“Hold on a sec though. Sit tight, okay?”
“What are you…?”
“You might be able to get away with that look at a fast food place, but a sit down restaurant is going to be strictly no shirt, no shoes, no service. I’m going to go see if they have anything you can wear at the gas station mini-mart.”
“I’m not so sure I like you going off on your own,” he frowned, but she was already half out of the car.
“Oh please, it’s like fifty feet away. You can watch me the whole time.” Without waiting, she darted across the parking lot, leaving him to watch after her with a deep furrow on his brow. Once again luck was with them, and she returned a few minutes later with a canvas bag in one hand and a tall, beef jerky stick in the other.
“Here you go, clean up with this first.” Munching, she tossed a packet of baby wipes to him to swab off the dried blood on his chest. Once he was clean, she shook out a t-shirt that said
I ♥ Oregon
in red, over a map of the state. He put it on without complaint. The arms stretched tight across the biceps, but overall it wasn’t a bad fit.
His lips curved down into a disgruntled scowl once he smoothed it down. “I smell like a baby’s ass.”
Cady smiled around a mouthful of jerky. “Aw, and you’re as cute as one too,” she teased, poking him in the cheek with a meat stick until he turned and took a ravenous bite. “Come on, I’m starving. Do whatever thingy you do to make the car go.”
“Let’s walk.” Without waiting for her to respond, he stepped out of the vehicle, stretching first one way and then the other, his back cracking mightily as he flexed.
With a skeptical glance at the distant restaurant sign, Cady remained in the car. “But I’m starving.”
“Then eat the rest of that jerky before I steal it. Come on, the walk will do you good. We’ve been cooped up in the car for hours. Besides, it’s better if we leave the Jeep behind in case they can track it.”
She hadn’t thought of that. The restaurant wasn’t all that far away, and Cady was used to walking everywhere, but she hated to leave the Jeep behind after it’d proved so lucky for them. However, that wasn’t putting delicious pancakes in her belly. “Okay, okay, we’ll walk,” she agreed, dropping Alma’s gun into the bottom of her new canvas bag, along with the stack of money. Ethan pocketed some of the bills from his stack and tossed the rest into her bag, along with the bundle of IDs.
“What good will those do us? They have Rikard’s picture all over them.”
“I can doctor them for us a lot easier than making new ones from scratch. Something tells me we’ll need them before too long.”
“You are all kinds of handy, you know that?” she smiled, kissing him on the cheek as she came around to his side of the Jeep. “It must be why I keep you around.”