“You…doknow that these are shock collars, right?” Myles asks.
Arson looks at him curiously. “Obviously. Why, want to bring one home with us when we break out of here? No kink shaming, I get it.”
Ledger scrubs a hand wearily down his face. “By all that is holy,shut up, the both of you. We need to settle on a plan before Dane comes back.”
“Actually, I’ve already got that covered.” They all turn to face me, and I fight the urge to squirm under their scrutiny. “It’lleither go great, or we’ll all die a terribly painful death. So… you’re welcome, I guess.”
“Ever,” Myles asks carefully. “What did you do?”
I meet his gaze. “Exactly what you taught me. Power without an outlet is volatile.”
An explosion rocks the ground under our feet, Bell slamming into the wall and Myles falling on his ass. I nearly bust my nose on the transparent wall before Skylar dives in to save me once again, acting on instinct to roll us both beneath the feeble covering of the cot as chunks of the ceiling come raining down on our heads.
Eventually, the vibrations fade and the dust starts to settle. I risk peeking out from under the cot just as our door slowly slides open with a riotous screech, sticking partway.
Face pale and looking like it took every ounce of energy she had to make her way down here, Sophia shoves it open enough to squeeze through, leaving a bloody handprint behind. “Only one more to go,” she pants, eyes clouded with pain and trying to hype herself up. “I can do this. Just one more to unlock.”
Her hand slips, leaving a red streak behind on her way down. Skylar scrambles out of our shitty shelter to catch her as she collapses, and the small jolt that goes through his body as they hit the ground has me biting back a smile.
Fate, Karma; whatever you want to call it, despite it having a twisted sense of humor, sometimes? It really does give people exactly what they deserve.
Another tremble rocks the house, sending a cloud of debris falling on us all, but most importantly? A massive crack running down on the wall between our cells.
Ledger rams his shoulder into it with the force of a freight train, chest heaving as it finally gives way and collapses into a shower of plastic shards. Arson helps him to his feet as my mates close the distance between us, smashing me between them andrunning their hands over every exposed inch of skin. When they get to the finger-shaped bruises on my arms? Arson’s eyes turn pitch black.
“Hey.” Palming his cheek, I rise up on my toes to kiss him until some life comes back to his rigid figure. “I’m okay now. Be as mad as you want, just use that rage to get us out of here, okay? Then you can come back and make sure that bastard’s dead.”
Sophia flinches, staring down at her bloodstained hands and whispers, “He didn’t make it.”
Ledger seems almost disappointed. “Died in the blast? Or crushed by debris?”
She meets his gaze with a haunted look. “Neither.” And it’s only then I realize that while Sophia’s covered in blood? None of it’s hers.
Skylar clutches her tighter against his chest, arranging her on his lap to get her off the cold floor when a chunk of the ceiling breaks loose above them. Skylar tucks her head beneath his chin, curling his body over Sophia and bracing himself to take the brunt of the damage.
But it never comes, Myles tackling them both out of the way in the nick of time.
The debris slams into his back, and my hands fly up to my mouth, afraid to so much as breathe and break the spell of denial. If nobody says anything, we can all pretend it didn’t happen. That the damage isn’t that bad.
That Myles is okay.
“Shit,” Arson breathes, diving into action and hauling the debris off of him. “What the fuck were you thinking, you idiot!?”
Ledger and Bellamy are right behind him, freeing Myles from the rubble and hauling him out. One of his glasses lenses are shattered, and there’s a slow, dark patch on his shirt near his ribs that’s spreading far too fast for comfort.
Skylar hovers over him, looking positivelywrecked.“What the hell were you thinking, you idiot?!”
My mate coughs, managing a pained smile. “That it was my turn to save you this time.”
I’m pretty sure I’m going to throw up. I can’t lose him. I justcan’t.
But I shouldn’t have worried, because failure was never an option. Sophia wastes no time setting her jaw with determination and shoves his shirt up, slapping a hand over Myles’s wound and heating it until he’s screaming, but cauterizing the wound completely.
“There,” she pants, face sweaty. “You’ll be oka-” her eyes roll to the back of her head and she collapses. Skylar makes a pained noise, rising to his feet with her clutched to his chest.
Ledger picks up Myles. “Arson, you’ve got Ever. Let’s get out of here.”
I barely take two steps before he throws me over his shoulder and we hustle out of the basement, the mansion crumbling around us. Brief flashes of the staff laying slumped on the ground, faces rapidly decaying, have me closing my eyes shut in denial.
