But there was a greater truth to Marguerite, something that only he knew. Above all things she craved her freedom, to do what she wanted to do, to go where she wanted to go, to be with other men. For a long, terrible moment, he wished she was locked up back at the Creator’s Convent, where he could keep her to himself.
Fuck.
Endelle stared at him hard. “Bring her back to me, Thorne. We’ll get her set up in some new place, a place of her choosing, but God help me, I need her. I’ve got to have the use of the future streams. What happened here tonight, well, we were damn lucky. If Fiona hadn’t been in the right place at the right time, if she hadn’t had her powers come online like that, Jesus H. Christ, we’d be in Las Vegas picking up body parts instead of sending people back to their homes.”
He nodded, but his gaze fell to the dirt.
“We need her, Thorne. Tell me you intend to bring her to me.”
He lifted his gaze to her, but his heart felt like it was being held in the fist of a giant and squeezed. “You know I will,” he said. And he meant it. But didn’t that make him a selfish bastard—because in the most secret place of his selfish heart he was hoping that Endelle would lock her up again.
Jean-Pierre nodded to Thorne. “Jeannie can send us now.”
Thorne nodded, his gaze still on Endelle. “Let’s do it.” As he slid through nether-space, he had one last view of Endelle, her lips curved about a quarter of an inch as she flipped him off.
He arrived at the doors to the fortress, the tall, arched iron doors, rusted from the weather. If this was any indication of the state of the facility inside, his stomach lurched.
“Back up with me,” Thorne said. “There’s only one way to do this.”
Jean-Pierre moved about twenty feet away, and Thorne laughed as he joined him. Jean-Pierre knew Thorne’s style. This wasn’t going to be a gentle break-in.
Thorne didn’t do the blast first thing, though. He knew better than that. He called Jeannie and asked her to scan for life-forms near the entrance. He didn’t want one of the Seers accidentally hurt or even killed because he was so anxious to get this job done.
He held his phone to his ear. A moment later Jeannie gave him the all-clear.
He put his phone away and aimed his palm at the door. He didn’t mess around. He gathered energy from all around him, let it sing through his arm, and in a quick flying bolt blasted the damn thing off the hinges.
To Marguerite, he sent, Honey, I’m home.
* * *
Marguerite heard the explosion and instinctively backed up against the wall of her room. She was hungry as hell and a couple of flies were enjoying the second tray of food she’d refused to touch. She’d just been wondering how long she could go without eating, or how soon she could expect Stannett to visit her with some serious muscle in tow to subdue her, when the vibration of the explosion shook her sad little platform bed.
Then Thorne’s voice rang through her mind, Honey, I’m home, and she smiled. Well, dayam! Her man had come to bust her out of this shithole. But wasn’t that like some kind of death sentence or something? Didn’t COPASS frown on trespassing in Seers Fortresses?
Aw, what the hell did she care? The cavalry had come.
I have no idea where I am in this place, she sent.
Honey, we’re checking every cell … except, oh, God, Jean-Pierre, is she alive? He just nodded back at me.
What is it? Tell me? Is who alive?
The first cell we opened has this godawful smell and there’s a woman curled up into a ball, thin as a stick, except, shit, she’s pregnant. Oh, my God. I’m getting Horace and his team over here. I’m coming for you. Oh, my God.
She felt him shut down and now she sat with her arms hooked around her knees and her forehead pressed against her legs. What a nightmare, what a goddam, f**king nightmare.
She’d always hated Owen. She’d always known he had sociopathic tendencies. But to be impregnating women just to make a super-race? Her stomach turned over a couple of times.
“Your boyfriend’s here,” Stannett said.
She looked up. Stanny stood there, calm as you please, as though he’d foreseen this moment.
“So what happens next?” she asked. “You must know.”
He shrugged. “I’m not as good as you. Why don’t you check into the future streams then you tell me?”
“Why are you so calm? Don’t you realize that your life, all these plans, has just been blown to hell?”
But he just smiled. “Do you seriously think this place is the beginning and end of my vision?” He smirked. “I’ll be seeing you real soon, Marguerite.” And with that, he lifted his arm and vanished.
Marguerite unfolded her legs and slid them over the side of the platform. She dropped the few remaining inches to the floor, walked to the door, her mind dizzy and full of thoughts about freedom. This was just too easy. Too damn easy.
But she opened her door and looked left down the long hall. Others were emerging from their rooms. She looked right and standing at the end, like a god, was her man.
She stepped into the hall, turned in his direction, and planted her hands on her hips. “About time, ass**le.”
He grinned. She’d never seen him look so young.
He didn’t walk to her, though. Instead he folded straight in front of her and took her in his big powerful arms, lifting her straight up off the cold cement floor.
“This your room?”
She nodded. He carried her backward, her feet dangling. She was too short for him, but he always made it work. He didn’t close the door but he kissed her in that warrior way of his, the way he had from the first—like he was going to devour her from the inside out.
She loved it, that hard tongue of his driving into her mouth. She whimpered and threw her arms around his neck. She kissed him back, biting his lip and making him bleed.
He laughed. “Wildcat,” he said, but he kissed her again.
“Does this mean I’m free?” she asked against lips that kept pushing at her mouth.
“Please stay,” he said. “Not here. I mean on Second. Please come back with me to Endelle’s office. She wants to talk to you, then please stay.”
“Of course I’m staying.” Not.
He kissed her again. “I want you to stay. Please. I need you, Marguerite. I don’t know what I’ll do if you go.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” She didn’t know exactly why she was lying to him. Maybe the piercing desperation in his voice, or the trembling of his arms as he about squeezed the life out of her.