Page 75 of Raze
I pick up the key that’s far too small for a door. “For what?”
“She’s wearing the cuff she’d told us about that has your gift in it. So, she couldn’t just break out and leave.”
If looks could kill, Aiden would be dead. I rush Kellan out the door before that can happen.
“Give me the key. I’ll get her out.”
I roll my eyes and keep walking. “Aiden said it has to be me.” My fist tightens on the small key I haven’t let go of since I picked it up off the table. We’re walking down the ‘nice’ prisoner corridor, which was originally meant for quarantine if needed, rather than as jail cells. It’s why they have nice beds, a closet, a private bathroom, and a table and chairs. They each have a television, books, and other randomthings to entertain the guests staying in them.
It’s sad that these rooms are bigger and nicer than the rooms we’re currently staying in at Old Red.
Which reminds me, I need to get back to renovating the place. Once the main areas were done, I’d had to focus on training. But there’s still the other half of the dorm rooms that need to be fixed up or torn down and used to expand our rooms. Then the truck bay and locker room after that, for whatever we plan on converting those into.
“He can say whatever he wants. But you are not manipulating her into talking to you. If she doesn’t want to talk, then she doesn’t fucking have to.” Kellan stops in front of me and holds out his hand.
I jerk to a halt and then glare at his hand and the expectation that I’ll just hand it over. I bring my gaze up to his face. “I’m not manipulating anyone.”
Kellan grins arrogantly at me. “Good. Then you’ll give me the key.”
“Me unlocking her cuffs isn’t manipulating her,” I argue hotly, keeping my fist at my side resolutely.
“No? Then why do you care about doing it? Since when do you care about setting her free?”
“I don’t—”
“Right. You don’t,” he interrupts before I can finish. Not that I have any clue what the fuck I was about to say anyway, so it’s actually for the best. “So. Give. Me. The. Key.”
My jaw clenches. He fucking has me.
Why am I clinging to the key so hard? Being the one with thekey to release her gift makes them her hero in that moment. Is that what I’m suddenly trying to be? Or am I going to give that to Kellan, who’s been at her side almost since she showed up here? He deserves it much more than I do.
But it’s my fault she tried to run away in the first place. If I hadn’t brought her out with me to Vera again…
I thrust the key into his hand and then move around him to keep walking.
Prick.
Movement in one of the rooms draws my attention, and I see Reid and Tinsley sitting in the same room together. Tinsley’s watching something on the TV while Reid reads a book in the other chair, though it’s pressed up right against hers, so their arms are almost touching. I pause to watch them through the glass and wonder if having them here was the best idea.
If Reid can teleport, he could leave that room at any time. He could scout out the Guild and report back to GE, and we would never know. They were both blindfolded and given headphones with loud music to block them from being able to track how we got here or from seeing anything outside of this room, but again, that doesn’t defend well against a transporter.
“Piece of shit…” Kellan mutters a handful of rooms down while jabbing his finger at the screen of his phone.
I sigh and pull out my phone to open the app Aiden and I worked on together for this place. I key in the number on the door to pull up the options, then press the button to unlock the door and remove the steel wall over the window.
Raegan’s still fast asleep in the bed. She’s lying on her side on top of the blankets, her shirt hiked up to expose her side and lower back while her arms are tucked in and her hands out. It isn’t until I’m inside the room that I see the cuffs on her wrists and the bar between them, forcing her hands apart from each other.
Her body rises and falls slowly in her sleep, and I’m mesmerized watching her. Like the sound of her breathing is hypnotic, or maybe just the peacefulness of her expression compared to when she’s awake. Her hair is a sheet of blonde above and behind her, with some of it falling over her face.
She was always the prettiest girl I’d ever seen on the island. Cute and sweet, with a little she-devil in her that Kellan usually brought out, but I’d been enamored with her from the moment we met. She’d been sixteen the last time I had seen her. Her body was almost fully grown, but seeing her now shows how much more she’s come into her own since then.
Strong. Beautiful. Fearless.
“Move,” Kellan commands, and I realize I’m standing near the bed as if I’d been drawn to her from the moment I walked into the room.
I step back out of the way to give him plenty of room. “Are you going to wake her up? She looks tired.”
“Well, I’m not going to stand here and stare at her like a creep until she wakes up on her own,” he drawls at me in an obvious taunt for what I’d just been doing. “She can go back to sleep at Old Red in her own bed if she wants.”
