Kaylee couldn’t use up any space in her mind for that kind of thinking, and she couldn’t give away to mind-reading Carter how intimidated and outnumbered she felt. She held Nate off. She held April off.
As Violet slammed and locked the door behind all of them with her mind, Kaylee called boldly, “Did Isaac send you? Too scared to face me himself?”
Violet called back, “We want Holly and Elijah. Give them to us and we’ll leave the casino alone. For a while.”
Not daring to take her eyes off April and Nate, Kaylee blindly felt in front of her until she touched Holly, who hadn’t spoken or moved a muscle. She seemed paralyzed with fear, plastered against the front of the desk. Kaylee gripped Holly’s arm and hurled at the intruders, “Go get Elijah yourselves if you can. Good luck with that. But you’re getting Holly over my dead body. And yours.” With her other hand she reached into her holster, pulled out her Beretta, and pointed it at April. “See if you can change my mind about this.”
“Don’t,” Holly whispered. “Let me.”
The chair Holly had been sitting in launched across the room and hit Violet in the chest, knocking her against the wall, her gauzy purple skirts a swirling riot.
“Let’s go,” Carter said quietly, offering a hand to help Violet up, watching Kaylee.
Violet waved off Carter’s hand.
Carter and April and Nate flattened themselves against the wooden paneling. Kaylee ducked behind her desk. People with power knew better than to come between two levitators in an argument.
The chair flew toward Holly. Score one for Violet. Suddenly it diverted to one side, tumbled over the end of the desk, and thudded to the carpet. Score one for Holly.
Violet rose into the air unaided. Toes barely brushing the ground, she pointed at Holly. “That’s twice, bitch. Third time’s the charm.”
Holly hurled the chair back at the intruders. Next she threw Kaylee’s desk chair. Papers. Pens. Kaylee’s computer screen and keyboard. All these objects seemed to bounce off a force field around the intruders as Violet protected them.
Violet opened the door behind her and hovered in the doorway. Carter slipped past her, then Nate. She and April exited at the same time, Violet shielding both of them from Holly’s wrath while April shielded them from Kaylee changing their minds. The last thing Kaylee saw was April’s cherry-red hair before the door slammed shut.
Holly had run out of loose objects to throw and was proceeding to remove the framed and autographed photos of Elvis and Sammy Davis Jr. from the walls when Kaylee popped up from behind her desk. “Stop! Coast is clear.” With a sigh of relief, she released her death-grip and reholstered her Beretta. Her fingers ached. Then her adrenaline spiked higher at the memory of what Violet had said to Holly. “What did Violet mean when she said this was twice?” Had Holly been to the Res already?
“They came after Elijah and me in Icarus,” Holly said.
“Oh, God.” Kaylee’s mind spun. Not many people had known where Holly and Elijah had gone. To get that information, the Res had read someone’s mind. Possibly her own. She turned once more to the bank of camera monitors. “Where did you go, you bastards?”
“Elijah!” Holly cried, rushing to the monitor where they’d seen him sit down at his mom’s table. But as they watched, he threw down his cards, nodded to his mom, and headed for the door. The Res hadn’t had time to reach him. He was safe. For now. Then a strange movement on a monitor caught Kaylee’s eye. “Oh, no.”
April walked unchallenged across the casino floor, clearing the way, followed by Nate in his cowboy hat, then Carter. Violet brought up the rear. It was hard to see exactly what she was doing because the cameras were mounted high in the ceiling, and the matchbooks were small. But Kaylee knew what Violet was doing. It was an age-old game at the Res. With her mind, Violet struck matches and raised them high to the luxurious draperies framing the arched doorways. The strange movement Kaylee had seen was flames.
The fire alarm clanged overhead.
Holly dashed for the door.
Kaylee made Holly think going out that door was not a good idea.
Holly stopped short in confusion. Then she whirled to face Kaylee, her brunette curls flying. Kaylee could tell from the outrage in Holly’s eyes, accentuated by the wild green eye shadow, that she’d figured out the mind-changing game. “Kaylee, not now!” she wailed over the clamor of the fire alarm. “The casino is on fire! All those people! Elijah’s mom is down there!”
Kaylee divided her mind into three compartments. In the first compartment, she maintained her hold on Holly. Holly would not go out that door.
In the second compartment, Kaylee played casino administrator. The sprinklers would put out the fire shortly. Extra curtains and lengths of carpet were rolled up in storage for an emergency such as this. She calculated how many minutes it would take to reopen the casino.
In the third compartment, she worried about the Res. The monitors showed the last of the gamblers hurrying toward the exits with their arms over their heads to shield themselves from the sprinkler shower. Security guards ushered them out. Elijah’s mom, Jasmine, gave the camera a thumbs-up, meaning she didn’t sense anyone with power on the casino floor. The Res was gone.
But they would be back. They’d already killed Mr. Diamond and set the curtains on fire. Next time would be worse. Kaylee wasn’t sure how many more assaults the casino could stand before their loose confederation of people with power started to fall apart.
And she had no idea how to stop it. She’d been away from the Res and Isaac a whole year, and he was still able to toy with her like a cat playing with a mouse before he killed her.
She ran her hands back through her hair, a nervous gesture she never allowed herself in public, as she surveyed the wreck Holly and Violet had made of her office. Kaylee would outmaneuver Isaac. She had to. But until she figured out how, all she could do was buy time.
She waved to the monitors showing the casino floor. “The fire is out,” she told Holly. “But I’ve got bigger problems. I’m putting you under house arrest until I solve them.”
“What!”
Just in case, Kaylee changed Holly’s mind about hurting her. At the door she put her hand on Holly’s bare arm. “People with power don’t like to have their minds changed. I understand that. I use it as a last resort. I’m in a difficult position right now. I hope someday you’ll forgive me.”