The Taking (20 page)

Fire flowed through me while rain drizzled down my face. Our tongues teased and touched and danced together, and he crushed me against him in a way that made me believe he’d never, ever let me go.

I’d never been so alive, and I knew this was why I’d come back. To be here, right now, in this moment, with Tyler.

I clung to his shirt. Everything was dripping—me and him, our clothes. Water splashed up off the ground as soon as it struck.

Tyler’s hands were as impatient as mine as he made restless fists with my T-shirt. And then, slowly, painfully, he withdrew his lips from mine while his fingers moved up to clasp the back of my neck tenderly.

I blinked dazedly at him. An unhurried smile found my lips, which pulsed, throbbing to the beat of my pounding heart. “Damn,” I whispered.

Like some sort of idiot, I couldn’t stop grinning. I grinned almost the entire drive home. I grinned when Tyler pulled into my driveway to drop me off at my house—which was right across the street from his. I grinned more than I thought was possible when he kissed me again, and that kiss was even better than the first one, because it was slower and sweeter, and he lingered as he held my eyes with his. And then I grinned some more while I stripped out of my wet clothes and toweled my hair dry.

I was pretty sure my face was going to bust if I didn’t stop all this stupid grinning. But I couldn’t help it. How had I gone from completely displaced and struggling to find my way, to utter and unrestrained bliss in just six days flat?

Oh yeah, Tyler Wahl.

Damn.
The boy was that good.

After I’d changed into dry clothes and tossed my wet ones in the washer, I came back to my room and checked my phone. There was a message on it from my mom:

Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be home soon.

Weird.

I wondered if Grant had said something to her about me being in Logan’s room last night, and she’d taken it as a sign I was ready to become
one
with her perfect little family. I sighed. I seriously hoped that wasn’t the case. Sure, I was fine with taking a baby step toward getting to know them if it meant making things better—and by better I meant actually talking to my mom again. But I certainly wasn’t ready to don matching Christmas sweaters or go on family picnics or anything.

Besides, what was the rush? Even if I was softening toward them, we had all the time in the world. It wasn’t like I was planning to vanish again or anything.

I was just about to tell her as much, maybe something along the lines of
I’d rather poke my own eyes out with a fork than listen to you say “my brother” again
when a noise from out on the street drew my attention.

It wasn’t even two o’clock yet. My mom had just texted saying she was on her way, so it couldn’t be her, and Grant wasn’t due home for several more hours. Stuffing my phone into my pocket, I went to the front window to take a peek. I was grinning again because I was totally hoping it was Tyler, back in my driveway to pick up where we’d left off.

I never got the chance to find out, though, because before I got to the window, I was grabbed from behind. I felt a hand go around my mouth. And I almost-sorta-
absolutely
forgot to breathe for several beats too long. I was sure it had to be a guy because his hand was big and his grip was firm. It was horrifying, because I somehow knew it wasn’t a joke even before the guy started dragging me backward, which he did before I’d even remembered
how
to breathe again.

My eyes went wide as I was jerked away from the window and lugged down the hallway, all the way to the back of the house. I’d never really been a tough girl, not in the fighting sense, but had no intention of giving in without a fight. I kicked and thrashed like hell, flinging my legs as wide and as wildly as I could. I did my best to hook my feet through everything I could along the way, trying to stop him from dragging me. I knocked over a table in the living room, shattering a lamp when it hit the floor, and kicked over a chair once we reached the kitchen.

All I could think was that I didn’t want to vanish again.

Not again . . . not again . . . not again
. . .

“Stop it!”
a voice hissed against my ear. It was hushed and came from someone far younger than I’d imagined.

But it didn’t stop me from struggling, even though I wavered for just a moment.

Then he spoke again. “If you scream, they’ll know you’re in trouble and come busting in after you. We only have a few minutes.”

Yes,
I thought.
They’ll come in here and help me.
I had no idea who “they” were, but they had to be better than the guy who’d just assaulted me in my own home.

“You need to trust me, Kyra,” he whispered against my ear. “I swear I’m here to help you.”

This time I went still. Fainting-goat still.

We were in the kitchen now, and the moment I went limp in his arms, I questioned my own judgment. After I stopped struggling, he tentatively let go of my mouth, and when I didn’t scream—not that I wasn’t considering it still—he leaned over the top of me and revealed himself at last.

It was the coffee-shop boy with the strange-colored eyes.

Seeing him almost sent me over the edge again. How the hell did he, of all people, end up here in my house? And now, of all times?

His smirk was not at all reassuring. “I can see you have questions, but trust me, now isn’t the time. There are a bunch of people out there coming to get you—” And as if he’d coordinated the timing to confirm his ominous prediction perfectly, there was a thunderous crashing from the front room. It sounded like someone had just set off a bomb at my front door.

And before I could ask him what the hell was happening, and who “they” were and what they wanted from me, he was hauling me to my feet. “If we don’t get you out of here right now, they will take you.”

We heard footsteps and voices, and then we disappeared through the already-open back door.

He kept giving me hand signals, like we were part of some covert ops mission, but I didn’t understand any of them. Mostly we just snuck through the neighbors’ backyards, keeping low and moving fast. When we were finally far enough from my house, hiding between the overgrown shrubs of the O’Flannerys’ house, I stopped panting long enough to glare at him.

I was still shaking all over, barely able to contain myself. “I have no idea who you are or what the hell’s going on back there, but this better be the best explanation ever or I’m calling the cops myself.”

He told me, “I’m Simon.” And then he held his hand out to me like we were introducing ourselves at some sales convention.

I stood there looking at it like it was something strange and foreign. Was he kidding with this? He wanted to shake hands right now?

I shoved his hand away from me. “Is this some kind of joke or something? You’re the guy who left the note on my receipt, and now you come into my house and kidnap me?” I knew I was being too loud, but I could barely restrain myself. This was too much.

But Simon didn’t give me the chance to fall apart. “I get it. This is a shock. But let me show you something.”

He drew me out from the cover of the bushes . . . not far, but far enough so I could see all the way down the street. He kept his hand on my shoulder, ready to reel me back at any moment.

The scene unfolding on my front lawn looked like something straight out of a sci-fi movie. Car doors slammed as more and more people arrived. Many were covered from head to toe in what I could only assume were hazmat or some sort of biohazard suits. Whatever they were wearing, they were intended to protect their occupants from something harmful—something dangerous.

They seemed to be everywhere, with more arriving by the second. The street, for as far as I could see, was lined with polished black vehicles: cars, vans, SUVs, and something that resembled a small bus or an ambulance with doors in the back that were opened wide. Inside I could make out a stretcher and what appeared to be medical equipment.

Someone was unrolling a giant tarp, and someone else was assembling a metal frame that was surrounded on all sides by similar plastic sheeting. There was a table set up at the far end of the yard, near the road. And even from inside my house, I could make out the faint crackling of radio static and saw several people talking into black handhelds.

Seriously, the only thing missing was a squadron of armed soldiers and a helicopter flying overhead.

Whatever they were collecting must be extremely hazardous.

That was when I saw him coming down the front steps of my house. Agent Truman.

He paused long enough to talk to someone in one of the hazmat suits, and then he pointed at my house and shook his head.

“Jesus,” I whispered, pulling back again. I hadn’t even realizing I’d said it out loud. “What’s
he
doing here?”

Simon caught my expression, or maybe he’d heard the fear in my voice. “So you two’ve met already?”

Dazedly, I shook my head in disbelief and then nodded in answer to his question. “I . . . yeah . . .”

Shouting drew our attention again, and we both inched out of the shrubs in time to see Tyler running toward my house, calling my name. When he reached the sidewalk on my side of the street, he was stopped by two men who weren’t in hazmat suits. I could hear him arguing with a third man who had come to stand in front of him: Agent Truman.

Instinctively, I lurched toward him, but Simon stopped me. “You can’t. We have to get out of here. He’ll be okay. It’s not him they want.” He nodded at me solemnly, and my stomach dropped. And as much as I wanted to deny what he was telling me with that silent nod, all those people in biohazard gear said otherwise.

According to Simon, it was me they were after.

“Stay close, Kyra, and when I give you the signal . . . run.”

He raised his eyebrows as if to ask
Got it?

I glared back at him:
I have no idea what you mean.

Turns out Simon’s “signal” involved waving three fingers in front of his face and then pointing toward a car—a red one with tinted windows that stood out like a sore thumb on a street that was now teeming with black government vehicles. It was parked directly across the street from us.

Then he took off running without me. What about the whole no-man-left-behind thing?

Fortunately, years on the field had trained me to think fast.

Thankfully the red car’s doors were unlocked, and when we reached it we climbed inside the vehicle before I could question whether we were making a huge mistake or not.

“They’ll hear us,” I insisted in a shaky breath. “They’ll see us leaving and come after us.”

But Simon gave a brisk shake of his head and then nodded toward my house, which was down from where we were now. Several neighbors who were home during the day had made their way out to the sidewalk, wanting to see what all the fuss was about, and Tyler was still arguing with Agent Truman. “They’re way too occupied to notice us. But we have to go. Now.” And somehow, before I had the chance to second-guess him, the engine rumbled to life.

I stayed low, crouched in the passenger seat, and didn’t dare to peek above the dash to see if anyone had spotted us . . . or was running our way. My head was pounding and my chest ached and my breathing was coming in uneven gasps.

I don’t know how we made it out of there without anyone noticing us, but the next thing I knew we were driving. Above me, through the windows, I saw houses and trees, and eventually signs from businesses zipping past us. When I was sure I wasn’t going to pass out, I sat up and started checking behind us to see if anyone was coming after us.

But there was no one. Somehow, someway, Simon had pulled it off. He’d gotten me out of there.

I didn’t know how Agent Truman and his biohazard team expected to explain what they’d done when my mom and Grant got home to find their front door broken to smithereens, but that wasn’t really my problem.

To calm my beating heart, I dug my phone from my front pocket and checked the time. It was barely three in the afternoon, which meant that the schools were just letting out and most grown-ups were counting down the last hours of their workweek before the weekend.

Me, I was on the run from the NSA.

Simon’s eyes widened as he saw what I was doing. “You brought your phone? Jesus, Kyra? Have you used it? Did you call or text anyone since we left?”

Frowning, I shook my head. “No. I was just seeing what time it was.” But even as I said it, I realized what the problem was. Of course the NSA would be able to track my cell phone, the same way Agent Truman had been able to track down my phone number. Obviously, privacy wasn’t an issue for them. “Can they find us if I didn’t use it?”

Simon ran his hand over the top of his close-cropped hair. “They can do a lot of things.” He jerked the steering wheel hard to the right and slammed on the brakes, and then he held his hand out for it. “We can’t take the chance. We need to ditch it,” he demanded, but I was already ahead of him.

I’d taken a marker from his center console and was copying down on my hand the only two numbers—of the three in my contacts list—I didn’t have memorized. My mom’s number, which was new since I’d returned, and Tyler’s. My dad’s was the same as it had always been.

When I was finished, I handed him the phone. He opened his door and set it on the concrete, and then smashed it beneath the heel of his boot.

Simon pulled back onto the road and concentrated on driving, while I kept glancing behind us.

“Here,” Simon said, pulling down a side road that looked a little like the alley Tyler had taken me down the night we’d gone to the used books store. It was wider and seemed more warehousey, though, which turned out to be the point when Simon hopped out and unlocked a tall metal door like the ones you see on storage lockers, the kind that are hinged and rolled up.

When he got back in, he parked the car inside the garage-like space, flipped a switch that illuminated a single bare bulb overhead, and dragged the metal door closed again. It was all very cloak-and-dagger.

Now I was locked inside a storage facility with the stranger who’d just kidnapped me from the authorities and smashed my cell phone. Awesome.