Emotionally Charged Page 7

  Chapter Thirteen

  I raced down empty alleys and side streets. Sirens blared around me, and I changed direction to avoid them. I was sure Jake was right on my heels, sure I would hear a gunshot go off again and that would be the end.

  Dean bounced where I had him slung in a fireman’s carry over my shoulder. Blood from his arm ran slick and warm down over my coat and onto the crisp white of my peasant blouse, the cutest of three tops I had chosen from to wear this morning to be judged by those... bad guys. How had we gone from makeover planning session to gunfight in just one day?

  I hoped the jostling didn’t hurt Dean too much, but I couldn’t slow down. He was still out of it, which I guessed was the only reason I could keep moving at superspeed, could support his weight so easily. I couldn’t risk being caught, but I had no idea where I was going or what I should do. I needed to help the guy who’d just been shot saving me. I only remembered one thing from first-aid class that seemed relevant: the DR ABCs. I had to get Dean and myself out of Danger then check his Responsiveness. That meant I had to get us as far away from Jake as I could. Airway, Breathing and CPR... it better not come to that.

  Dean moaned and coughed and for a split second I felt relieved.

  Then the coldness sank into me, leaching all my strength.

  My legs buckled and we both hit the cracked concrete footpath. My knees grazed through denim as Dean’s weight on my back crushed me forward.

  I tried to roll him to the side without hurting either of us more. He moved off me, and leaned up against one of the graffiti-covered high metal fences enclosing the backyards around us.

  His upper arm still oozed blood.

  He opened those gray eyes and stared at me.

  I blushed red all over. I had no idea what he thought of me right now. This was all my fault.

  “We should get you to a doctor, or a hospital. We have to do something about your arm.”

  He turned his head to the gunshot wound, staring at it for a moment, expressionless. He brought his other hand up to suppress the bleeding. “No. Hate hospitals.” He flinched at his own touch and stared at me again. “I don’t understand you.”

  I coughed a hysterical laugh but only a breathy noise came out.

  “Were you with them? Or are you just wearing a wig for fun?”

  Reaching up, I patted the side of my head, feeling the curling blond waves of the wig. I tugged it off and dropped it on the weed-covered pathway.

  “It’s complicated.” I didn’t know how to explain without sounding bad, because there wasn’t a way. I’d done the wrong thing.

  “Complicated. Like your shopping money not really being your money. But you tried to stop them. Why? You have a death wish, taking on people like that?”

  “I’m not a criminal. I mean, I didn’t mean to be. I just got caught up with the wrong crowd. I thought they were the right ones. I don’t know.” I glared at the pile of synthetic blond hair on the ground, angry at my own excuses. “I just wanted to be a hero.”

  “A dead hero by the sounds of it.” Dean pushed himself to his feet and walked away, cradling his arm.

  I almost took out my phone but didn’t know who to call or where to go next. I sat on the concrete and tugged at the weeds, tearing them out in showers of dirt, taking my pain out on them. Jake had tried to shoot me, kill me. He’d definitely kill Dean if he saw him again. Everything told me if I wasn’t with Jake, I was against him. He’d come after me. I couldn’t go home; Jake knew where I lived. I’d given him the address. He’d been there, seen my parents, manipulated them.

  I had no money left for travel or accommodation and didn’t know the area well enough to get myself moving in any direction. Tears built up along my bottom eyelashes and the first broke free, splashing on the ground and turning the concrete the color of Dean’s eyes.

  “Do you have somewhere to go?” he asked.

  I looked up, and Dean stood next to me again. I shook my head and another tear spilt.

  “Come on then.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Dean and I both moved slowly.

  I jumped at every sound, expecting a gunshot or an empath to burst out from behind a corner and attack us.

  Dean kept a steady pace but wobbled as he walked. He’d lost a fair bit of blood and must have felt woozy. I’d be woozy just from the pain with a hole in my arm like that. I offered my shoulder for support, and the second time I did, he accepted.

  We only walked two blocks, to where a trailer park spread from the end of a cul-de-sac. Dean pulled out his keys and let us into a mid-sized trailer, permanently fixed in place like most others around it. The screen door rattled and inside, a man lay sprawled across the couch.

  I stiffened and looked to Dean. He just shook his head, put a finger to his lips, and led me past a kitchenette piled in beer cans and a tiny bathroom to a room at the end. The man let out a gurgling snore as Dean closed the door behind us.

  His room barely passed eight-by-eight feet in size, with a small bed, beanbag, and set of drawers taking up most of the space.

  Dean scooped up an old towel from the floor and held it against his bleeding arm.

  Boys. I frowned and snatched it off him. “Do you have any kind of first-aid kit? Bandages or something? Alcohol? At least something sanitary? If you won’t go to a doctor, we better clean that up properly ourselves.”

  Dean left the room. He returned with a box of Band-Aids, scissors, a clean cotton dishcloth and a bottle of vodka with just a finger or two left in the bottom.

  He handed them to me and shrugged, then sat on the side of the bed, looking extremely pale.

  “Okay, we can work with this. Can you take your jacket and shirt off?”

  Dean looked away, almost as though he was shy.

  “I just mean, I might need to cut them off around your arm if you can’t.”

  “No, I think I can manage.” He let out a slow hiss of air as he unzipped his hoodie and peeled it away from the wound. I helped him pull the sleeves free of his wrists, since he worked one-handed to undress. He inched his T-shirt off. It took him a while so I cut the dishcloth lengthways down the middle, and started working around in a zigzag line to turn one half into a long strip. I dropped the makeshift bandage on the bed and soaked the other half of the cloth in vodka.

  Clenching my teeth against nausea, I bent forward to inspect Dean’s arm. A mixture of running, dried and coagulated blood created a gory horror-show. I dabbed around the mess on his bicep until I could see the bullet hole clearly. I leaned so close to Dean I felt his body heat radiating off him and his breath against my face, contrasting with the cool chill he gave me inside. The smell of blood mixed with the smoky-musk scent I noticed on him before. He didn’t smell like a smoker. Maybe just someone who lived with one.

  With the blood cleared, I saw a clean hole passing straight through the edge of his muscle. Thank all things sweet and fluffy I don’t have to pull a bullet out. Just half an inch to the side, and the bullet would have missed him completely. A couple of inches the other way and I didn’t want to think about it.

  I'd just finished cleaning it off when it started bleeding again.

  Dean spoke, his voice low. “You okay? You’re turning all kinds of green.”

  I nodded but didn’t open my mouth to reply, worried I might throw up.

  I stood back up, away from the blood, and took a deep breath. I held up the bloody wash cloth. “You have another clean one?”

  Dean started to get up but I put my hand on his shoulder. He took the hint and told me where to look in the kitchen. I walked back into the room and cut a second cloth in half as well to make some padding for the entry and exit wounds. Then I started wrapping his arm.

  I felt Dean’s eyes on me. I tried to focus on the bandaging.

  “How about your cheek?” His breath tickled the fine hairs on my neck.

  “What about my cheek?”

  Dean lifted his uninjured arm to the left side of my face, but didn’
t touch me. I placed a hand there myself and felt a sting. The first shot Jake had fired. I remembered a pain on my cheek at the time, but then I saw the dead woman and people started screaming, and Jake kept pointing his gun and the world was upside down... I’d completely forgotten about it. My hands shook as I looped the bandage around Dean’s arm.

  “Is it bad? How’s it look?”

  “A thin line, just a graze I guess. Doesn’t look like it bled much. You were lucky.”

  Maybe my empath powers had helped it heal fast. Maybe it would have been healed completely if it weren’t for Dean’s blocking. I wished I understood it all more.

  I sighed and tried to wipe blood from my hands with the already soiled cloth. “Yeah, well, we both must be lucky since we’re not dead. You should have just run. You wouldn’t have been shot at all. Why didn’t you run?”

  Another shrug. No emotion I could read in his face or body language.

  My first-aid results looked pretty dismal when I was done. I stuck the bandage closed with half a dozen adhesive band-aids. At least it didn’t seem to be bleeding through yet.

  Dean stood up and pulled a clean T-shirt from the drawers near the bed. He faced the other way as he put his shirt on in slow, careful movements. Muscles on his back shifted under the skin and I couldn’t help but notice how nice his body was. With the baggy clothes he wore, I’d had no idea. I blushed, a mixture of embarrassment for looking and anger at my thoughts. How I’d stared so lustfully at the empaths’ attractive bodies. Them and their workout routines, creating those pretty shells.

  “You work out?” I asked, sounding cattier than I meant to.

  Dean finally had the shirt over his shoulders and let it drop loosely to cover his chest. He turned back toward me. “I work. I do some cash-in-hand jobs for a construction company. Manual labor stuff. Keeps me fit.”

  He reached into the drawer again and seemed to dig down through to the back to extract a packed of painkillers. He popped a couple out and swallowed them without water.

  My thoughts became ragged. I was so angry at myself it overflowed onto Dean. I had no one to blame for my part in that messed up situation but myself, but if Dean hadn’t been at the bank, maybe guns would never have come out. It would have been in and out. Easy pickings, like Emma had said. No one would have gotten shot.

  No one would have died.

  “Why were you even at the bank? Were you following me?” I snapped.

  Even without being able to read his emotions, I could tell from Dean’s frown just how dumb I’d been. The bank wasn’t far from the mall and park, but we drove and went around in circles for ages while I got my wig right and panic buckled down. Dean could have walked to the bank in that time, but it was unlikely he’d followed us in Donny’s jeep.

  “The world doesn’t revolve around you,” he said. “I don’t know where you’re from, but this is my town; that was my bank. I was in to cash my dad’s welfare check. I try and do it myself if I can so it doesn’t all go on... my dad.”

  The shake in my hands had spread up my back, up my throat, and my head shook. “I’m sorry, I—”

  “Who were those guys? What was the trigger-happy fashion model talking about, about blockers and powers? Why was he set on shooting me? And don’t tell me it’s complicated.”

  “They’re empaths, like superheroes, but they weren’t superheroes. I just thought they were superheroes and that I was like them and I went with them but they weren’t. They were the bad guys, and you’re something else as well that does stuff to our superpowers...” I kept babbling. I shook and tears streamed down my face, stinging the graze on my cheek.

  Dean put his hands on my shoulders and I rattled under his touch. “Okay, you’re really freaking out.”

  He steered me to the unmade bed and sat me down. I scooted across to sit with my back against the wall and pulled the covers up around my shoulders, trying to fight the chill racing through me.

  “You’re in shock. Maybe something hot will help. I’ll go see what we’ve got. Put the TV on and just try and relax a bit.”

  I squinted at the small, blocky television sitting on the cluttered top of the drawers. “Where’s the remote?”

  “Doesn’t have one.”

  “Really? Retro much? You can’t even give this kind of box away anymore. I know. My mom has tried.” I tried to smile a bit and lighten the mood, but my teeth chattered and I must have looked a little insane. I imagined how my hair must look after its release from under the wig and the mental image rounded out nicely.

  “It’s a whole two feet away. I’m sure you can manage.”

  I tried to follow his instructions and not be completely useless as the guy with the bullet wound looked after me. Dean had made me a hot chocolate by the time I worked out how to get the television on. I set the volume extra low, worried I’d wake his dad.

  Dean went to take a shower, to shake off his own shock and clean up some more blood. I told him to keep his bandages dry if he could, but didn’t know if that would help.

  I settled into the blankets with the mug of hot goodness balanced on my knees, and my shaking became less intense. I still felt teary, confused, and sick to my stomach. The news report on the TV didn’t help.

  The bank robbery was the top story.

  They showed some security-camera footage, but it was too distant and grainy to make out any details. I had been right, though. The old woman Jake shot was dead.

  Was that my fault? If I hadn’t stepped in front of Jake and he hadn’t swung the gun away... no, then Dean would be dead. If Dean wasn’t there, they might never have brought out the guns. But if I hadn’t drawn attention to him, they might not have spotted him in the crowd. If I’d refused to go at all, the whole thing might not have escalated. Or Dean would have been dead. I was like a hamster on a wheel, going round and round. I could go crazy thinking like this.

  I thought the news report was over, but it continued. Footage from another scene I recognized, the warehouse fire. Warehouse fire and theft, apparently. While one building burned, valuable goods had been taken from others nearby. There was evidence of arson. The news reporter said police felt confident linking this event with the bank robbery and other crimes in the area over the last month. The pattern also matched crimes from a number of cities previously. They used the term ‘terrorist cell’ and I pulled the blankets up closer around my face.

  I hadn’t even questioned Donny and Jamie loading the car at the fire, or the extra luggage when we flew back from my earthquake-stricken hometown.

  They were looters, but worse, even setting up disasters to take advantage of the emotions, making bad stuff happen on purpose. Not once had I seen them do anything heroic. I’d just assumed they did and they’d let me believe.

  Even Jake. Would he have even saved me if I wasn’t one of them? He said he saw some of the fight before he helped. How long did he wait and watch until he decided to step in, to make sure I was one of them, just because he wanted another ’path on his team? What if I’d just been a regular girl in trouble?

  I heard the shower still running through the thin wall between Dean’s room and the bathroom. Dean was shot. I was shot. Someone had died. It was a nightmare and it didn’t even faze Jake.

  Just what else had he done in the past? What was he capable of?

  I had to stop them. The only way Dean and any other victims of these villains could be safe was to shut the team down. Permanently. Block off their powers for good.

  Jake said Dean could do that.

  How? I had no idea. Dean probably didn’t know either. He didn’t seem to know what was going on at all. He might not even want to help.

  I finished the hot chocolate and put the mug on the drawers next to the TV. My eyelids felt leaden and sound of the running water calmed me.

  But maybe Dean could learn how to shut down empaths. He could practice on me. I would give up my powers.

  I’d give up the whole superhero fantasy if it meant everyone was safe again
.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I stared at the screen of my phone.

  I’d been staring at it since I woke up. Half an hour, according to the clock. I’d tapped in my home number but couldn’t hit Call.

  Dean slept across from me on the beanbag. I’d fallen asleep in his bed before he got out of the shower and the idiot hadn’t kicked me out like he should have.

  He curled on one side, holding the bandage on his arm with the other hand. It didn’t look comfortable. I noticed no coldness from him while he slept, but couldn’t read any emotion from him either. That could have just been because he was asleep. What did I know? It wasn’t like I’d had training with this stuff.

  I sighed and looked at my phone again. I should call my parents, but at this point what could I say? Sorry for leaving, I’ll be back as soon as I take down a bunch of superpowered criminals. Yeah, that wouldn’t freak them out at all.

  The beans in the beanbag rustled and hissed like a snake. Dean shifted and opened his eyes. I gave him a shy smile in return. He probably felt more awkward with me here in his bed than I felt. If he felt anything at all. His expression was blank. The coldness crept into me again.

  I turned the phone off to save battery and put it down on top of the drawers.

  “Morning. You calling someone?” he asked.

  “I was going to call my parents.” I took a deep breath. Time to sell Dean on my plan. “But I want to finish all of this first.”

  As calmly and as rationally as I could, I started from the top, trying again to explain the empath powers, who Jake and the team were, and what Jake had said about Dean being a blocker.

  Dean looked skeptical.

  “I know you think I was babbling like a crazy thing last night, but it’s real, the powers, the whole thing. I need you to believe me.”

  Dean seemed to think for a moment. “Then show me.”

  “I can’t. You’re a blocker, remember? When you’re around, you stop my powers from working.”