Page 18 of Flawed Fate
Tara doesn’t like me.It doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out.
She’s been sitting in the chair Declan left behind, arms crossed, watching me the way you’d watch a spider you found in your shoe. Not scared, but not happy about it either. More like grossed out.
She hasn’t said a word since the others left. That’s fine. I don’t need her to talk to me. I don’t need any of them to talk to me.
I only need Declan to come back.
It doesn’t matter how many times I shove the thought down. It keeps floating back up. He left maybe ten minutes ago. Maybe longer.
All I know is a howl cut through the air and everything changed. The argument in the hallway stopped dead. Tara appeared out of nowhere, and then he was gone. Running down the stairs and out the door.
Toward whatever’s out there. Nobody bothered to explain what was happening. I’m wondering if they even know.
It’s insane to worry about him. I should be worried about myself. I’m the one tied to a bed. I’m the one surrounded bypeople who hate Dad and me. But when that howl hit the air, my chest seized up and hasn’t let go since.
Something crashes downstairs.
Tara is on her feet instantly, her body shifting from stillness to coiled tension so fast it’s almost inhuman. Which it is. I keep forgetting that, or maybe I keep choosing not to think about it too hard. It’s easy to forget who I’m really dealing with when they look so human.
More sounds from downstairs. A door being forced open. Boots on hardwood. More than one pair. Shit.
Tara’s eyes go to the bedroom door, and her upper lip pulls back from her teeth in a way that’s all animal, and even tied to a bed, as confused and messed up as I am, the sight sends a chill racing down my spine. I wouldn’t want to be the person she was looking at that way.
“Stay quiet,” she hisses at me without looking at me.
The footsteps are on the stairs now. Moving fast, heading straight for us. Tara positions herself between the door and the bed, feet planted, hands loose at her sides. She’s not big. Maybe my height, lean. But there’s something about the way she holds herself that says size isn’t the point.
The door flies open.
Two men. Tactical gear, helmets, the same kind of bulky rifles I’ve seen the facility’s security teams carry during drills but never thought much of becausethey were never supposed to actually use them, right? Tara launches herself at the first one before he’s fully through.
She’s scary fast. She catches him across the jaw with an elbow strike that makes his head snap sideways, then drives her knee into his gut with a vicious grunt. He doubles over, which lets her grab the back of his helmet and slam his face into the doorframe. He goes down.
The second one raises his rifle. I open my mouth to—what? Warn her? Give her a chance to get out of the way?
It’s too late. The sound it makes isn’t like a normal gun. It’s quieter. A pressurized hiss, a soft pop.
Tara jerks. Her hand goes to her neck, and I see the dart embedded just below her ear. She pulls it out, stares at it, and for a second, I think it didn’t work. She turns toward the second man, taking one step.
Her knees buckle. She catches herself on the nightstand. The water glass from this morning crashes to the floor. Her eyes are already glazing when she looks at me, and there’s something in her expression—not anger, not blame, just confusion—before she drops.
“Tara?” The word comes out of me before I can think about it. Before I can remember that she doesn’t like me, and I really shouldn’t care that she’s powerless now.
The first man is getting up with blood pouring from his nose. He and the second one sweep the room, check the bathroom, then turn their attention to me. I flinch when one of them reaches for the rope at my wrist, but he just cuts it with a knife from his belt without saying a word.
“On your feet,” he grunts once I’m free. His voice is muffled, thanks to his nose probably being broken. “Dr. Moore sent us.”
Dad.
The relief is so sudden and so overwhelming that my eyes sting. Dad sent them. He came for me, like I knew he would. Like I told Declan he would.
But the relief is tangled up with something I wasn’t expecting. Because if Dad sent these men, then the howl, the fight that pulled Declan and his brothers out of the house… that was Dad, too.
Which means something might be happening to Declan.
“What about her?” I look down at Tara, crumpled on the floor, her dark hair fanned around her face. She’s breathing, but she’s out cold.
“She comes with us.”
