Nyx smiles at me. “I used to take the train to and from the city almost every weekend growing up. My dad worked in the city and knew his way around, so he’d act as a tour guide, taking me and Mom around to all the cool spots. Museums, historical buildings, all the best restaurants.” She gets a faraway look in her eyes.
“I didn’t know you were from New York.” Zephyr voices my thought before I can open my mouth.
Her smile is closed-lipped and doesn’t reach her chocolate eyes. “I lived on Long Island, where we’re headed.”
This makes me blink at her, my brown tightening. In the over ten years that I’ve known Nyx, we never talked about where we were from. I don’t know anything about her past.
When I look at Zephyr beside me, and Laurant beside Nyx across from us, I realize I don’t really know anything about their pasts, either. Though Zephyr’s is a more difficult situation.
The past shouldn’t matter, not to a fated pack. But maybe learning a bit more about where we all came from could, I don’t know, strengthen our bond or something.
“I grew up in Southern California,” I find myself offering. “An orphan. Never knew my family. So you can guess what happened whenthingsgot out of hand.” I know they’ll understand my meaning.
In reality, when one of the punk older boys wouldn’t let up on beating the shit out of me, I just snapped, set his ass on fire. I had no idea what was happening in my ten-year-old mind, but there were witnesses, and I was collared and shipped off that same day.
Not that a collar was going to stop my new power from doing things authorities didn’t like. I had no control, and they knew it. But they saw me as an offensive cash cow, so discipline for my mistakes wasn’t as harsh as it had been for other kids in the juvie facility.
“I’m from Northern England.” Laurant lets out a small laugh. “I suppose that’s apparent. But I come from a small, affluent family with government ties going back generations. It was easy for them to hide things from the public. And the authorities.”
We all understand his meaning.
“Didn’t stop them from carting me off the first chance they had, however.”
Nyx winces beside him, grabs his hand, and laces their fingers together.
Zephyr opens his mouth, then shuts it, appearing to think of how to phrase his next words. “My family is gone.”
My heart skips a beat. I’d never heard this part of his story. It can only mean one thing.
I take a page from Nyx’s book, grab Zephyr’s hand and hold it tight.
This is what we’re here for. This is what our mission is going to help stop from happening in the future.
And it’s worth all our efforts.
“Here.” After more than an hour on the train from Manhattan to eastern Long Island, Laurant stops outside a white SUV in the train station parking lot as the lights flash in the darkness and there’s a little honk from the horn when he clicks a button on the key fob we brought with us from the safehouse.
He opens the back hatch, and there’s a duffel bag there, all alone.
Zephyr takes it to the back seat and I assess the trunk lining, running my fingers along the perimeter, slipping one beneath the outer lip.
“You’re clear.” Laurant’s tone is low, his gaze set into the distance.
I peel back the liner to find a door latch, which I open to reveal a large storage space below, filled with strategically lined-up firearms, grenades, tactical armoring, and some electrical devices.
I know collar remotes on sight, and there are four of them here.
My gaze meets Laurant’s then, and we both nod at each other before I pull back the liner, shut the hatch, and we both get into the car, him in the driver’s seat, me sitting shotgun.
The windows are tinted, especially in the back, and at night, it’s almost like they’re blacked out.
Our Omegas change clothes again, then Nyx passes me a pair of black tactical pants and a long-sleeved black shirt. Careful not to slap Laurant in the face—no matter how funny that would be, if he weren’t driving—I change out of my clothes, stuff them under my seat, and change into the all-black gear.
It’s all very “spy movie” vibes, for sure, but I have faith in the rebellion leaders to know what they’re doing.
We’re on the move at night, wearing all black, nothing reflective. The SUV is white, the most overlooked vehicle color because it’s so abundant.
Yeah, the rebellion knows what they’re doing.
