Discovering Synergy, page 17
“The little lamb can run. But for how long?” the voice laughed, sending pin pricks of pain all over my body.
Ignoring the taunt, I ran. Jay had been pushing me hard the past few weeks and I knew I couldn’t keep this speed up forever, but I could do it long enough to come up with a better plan. Wracking my brain, I kept trying to figure out some way that I could get out of this alive. The only problem was that I didn’t know what I was dealing with. Was I dreaming? Was I trapped in a building? Was I still at the school? Had I been kidnapped? Why the fuck was this happening and what the hell was this creepy fuck talking about?
My thoughts drifted back to Jay and the conversation we’d had at the waterfall. He’d promised to come help me whenever I needed it, no matter what he was doing. I checked my pockets to see if by chance they had forgotten about my cell, but I wasn’t so lucky. I kept my legs pumping keeping the distance between me and the psycho killer behind me. I cried out as I took a misstep and twisted my ankle crashing to the floor.
“No, no, no, no this can’t be happening,” I said trying to get back on my feet, but crashed back to the floor when my ankle gave out.
I started to crawl, anything to keep me moving forward. I wept as I called out for Jay, begging with everything I had that he would be able to find me and save me. A warm breeze stirred in the darkness wrapping me with its comfort. It felt like being surrounded by the waterfall’s mist. I sobbed knowing deep in my soul that Jay had heard me and was coming to help me. A flare of blinding light surrounded me; I covered my eyes, seeing stars from the sudden shock of light. I blinked as fast as I could to clear my vision. When I looked up, I found Micah standing in front of me. His eyes flashed with a fury that I’d never seen in anyone before. At first, I thought he was pissed at me for something, but he scooped me up, and I knew I was safe.
I clung to him, and the heat from his body seeped into me, chasing away the rest of the fear that had been clinging to me. Brayden stepped up on his right, followed by Parker. On Micah’s left Jay materialized with Hudson next to him. They all looked ready to kill, bodies rigid with anger. I looked forward and saw a shifting apparition of black smoke on the edge of the light that was emanating from Micah.
“Begone demon, you are not welcome here. She is under our protection and you will not touch one hair on her head,” Micah declared his voice vibrating through his chest.
The shadow hissed at this. “My master won’t lose to the likes of you, even if you have your sixth. We will come for her again, and the next time you won’t be so lucky.”
“Luck has nothing to do with it. We are her protectors to call, and we will always answer,” Brayden said stepping forward closer to me.
“The lamb will die before you can truly take that role Elementi. You are not as safe as you think you are,” the demon said before he vanished into the darkness.
I clung to Micah and cried. I let the tears stream down my face as he just stood there holding me tightly to him. I felt the others come around me, someone touched my shoulder, another petting the top of my head, then a hand wrapping around my ankle, followed by one on my calf. I felt their energy hum along my skin, filling me with comfort and assurance. My tears slowed, then stopped, and I relaxed being held and cared for by them. The rightness of it all settled my soul making me feel more complete than I ever had in my life.
“It’s time to wake up now,” Brayden said whispering in my ear, then placed a gentle kiss on my cheek.
With those words, my eyes flew open and I found myself in my dorm room. I lay there taking a few deep breaths to calm my heart rate before making my next move. I sat up slowly and looked around my room, noticing Cami who was sleeping on the couch wrapped in my elephant blanket. I slipped out of my bed and stood up carefully, not really believing that my ankle could be okay. There was no pain or sign that I’d done anything to hurt my leg. Silently, I walked over to Cami, sat on the coffee table next to the couch, and shook her awake gently.
“Cami,” I said gently. “Hey, wake up. I need to talk to you.”
Cami grumbled and pulled the blanket over her head. I looked over at my nightstand and saw that it was three in the morning. I shook her harder this time, pulling the blanket off of her.
“Cami!”
This time she shot up looking around bleary eyed till she focused on me. “Lala, what’s wrong?” She slid her feet to the floor, so she was sitting looking at me rubbing her eyes clear of sleep.
“Why are you in my room?” I asked feeling like I’d missed something important.
“What do you remember about last night?” she countered.
I rubbed my forehead trying to organize my thoughts. “I was eating dinner and some girls were giving me a hard time about the Halloween party. Micah was there too. We argued and I left. After that, I don’t really remember much. I think Parker and Brayden might have shown up at some point, then it all goes blank.”
Cami took my hands in hers drawing my attention back to her. “You passed out in the middle of the quad. We don’t know why, but thankfully Micah, Brayden, and Parker were close by. They brought you back to your dorm and waited till I could get back to look after you.”
I frowned, “I passed out? That’s so odd. I don’t remember ever doing that before.” I could feel a headache building with all this confusing information. “I also just had the worst nightmare of my life.”
“Want to talk about it?” Cami asked squeezing my hands.
I shook my head as I stood up. Walking over to my backpack, I pulled out some pain meds. “Not really, I just want to go back to sleep and hope to God that I don’t dream again.”
“Would a snuggle buddy help?” Cami asked as I swallowed the pills.
I smiled at her, glad that she was here and I didn’t have to wake up alone. “Sure, I’ll take whatever defense I can get.”
I crawled back into bed clutching Elle to my chest. Cami joined me laying on her side, so I had her back and she faced the rest of the room. I let my head lean against her back so I could hear her heartbeat. The steady rhythm lulled me to sleep faster than I thought it would happen. Thankfully, I didn’t have any other nightmares and slept deeply.
“Lala, you gotta get up or you’re not gonna to have time to get ready for class,” Cami said as she poked me gently.
I groaned not wanting to leave my bed just yet. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and looked up at her. “How are you awake before me?”
“It’s ten o’clock, silly.”
That had me sitting up and tossing the blankets off me. “What? How is it so late already? I never sleep that late. Oh God, I stood Jay up. I have to call him.”
I hopped out of bed and started looking for my phone, but couldn't remember the last place I had put it. Cami stepped in front of me holding out my phone, her face telling me I was being a weirdo.
“I already texted Jay and told him you had a rough night and needed sleep. Besides, you passed out yesterday, your body must’ve been exhausted from everything you’ve been doing,” Cami said as she gathered up her stuff. “Oh, he also said that he’s going on a work trip and will be gone until the weekend.”
I felt my shoulders sag at that. Running with Jay had become one of my favorite parts of my day. I knew I couldn’t slack off and wait till he came back, he would expect me to still keep training to be able to keep up with him when he got back.
“What if you switched up your workout for the week?” Cami said.
“What did you have in mind?” I asked surprised. I knew how much Cami hated to work out.
“There is a kickboxing class that I like to go to off campus if you want to join me. There is a class tonight if you feel up to it.”
“I should have guessed that if you did work out, it would involve you hitting something. Check in with me at dinner and I’ll let you know how I’m feeling.”
“Works for me! See you later Lala. Text me if you need anything,” Cami said as she headed out so I could get ready.
I looked down at my watch and I cursed, seeing I had just thirty minutes to get ready and make it to class. I threw on a random t-shirt and a pair of jeans and ran out the door with my backpack. I made it to my labs on time, but it took me a few minutes to calm down and concentrate. I could tell that the time I spent with Hudson was making a major change in my Chem class. When the teacher was talking, I no longer felt as lost as I once did and I followed along more confidently.
Thankfully, Tuesdays were easy days and I made it through classes easily enough though I’d skipped breakfast. Cami waved to me from our table in the cafe, I dropped my stuff off and headed to order some food along with my chai. As I was waiting for my muffin to be warmed, I felt my phone vibrate. Pulling it out of my pocket, I saw it was a text from Hudson.
‘Hey I won’t be able to meet up this week. If you have any questions feel free to reach out. I’ll try and get back to you when I get the chance.’
I didn’t respond right away, unsure of what to say to him. Going a week without him helping would be a good test to see how I was really doing, but I was bummed. Working with Hudson in his lab was always a good time. We seemed to work well together and I was always blown away by his intelligence. I took a deep breath and wrote out my response.
‘Sure thing! Hope our teacher isn’t working you too hard. Will I still see you this weekend?’
‘Of course I wouldn’t miss going to the party.’ he answered fairly quickly.
For some reason, his answer wasn’t what I wanted him to say. He was still going to be at the party and I was already going with Brayden, but I wanted to hang out with him, too.
‘I didn’t forget my promise to show you that I can have fun once in a while.’ Hudson added a second later.
Unable to stop myself, I grinned at my phone with a warm feeling fluttering in my stomach. He hadn’t forgotten the conversation we’d had when I found out he’d never gone to any kind of party. Well, after I told him birthday parties didn’t count. Now that I had one collage rager under my belt it was time to share the love.
“Large chai latte with a pumpkin muffin!” the barista called out, sounding like she had called the order more than once. Shaking myself out of my daze, I grabbed my items and headed back to Cami.
“You okay? They called your order twice before you responded.”
“Fine. I was just texting Hudson and got distracted,” I said breaking apart my muffin.
Cami’s fingers darted out snatching a piece. “What’s that nerdy wizard up too?”
I scowled at Cami for stealing my food and moved it out of her reach. “Get your own. He was just letting me know we wouldn’t be meeting this week.”
“Hmm,” Cami said mouth full of muffin.
“Seems like my week is freeing up, just when I got into a routine,” I said munching on my muffin.
“Sounds like the perfect time to have a girls-only week. I know we‘ve both been busy with things going on, but I would love to get a chance to hang with you and Maggs,” Cami said unable to look me in the eyes.
I felt my brows rise in surprise. “Are we at the point where you’re going to finally admit that Maggs is your girlfriend?”
“Yeah I guess you could say we made it Facebook official yesterday,” Cami said ginning at me.
I clapped my hands excitedly at this news and slid my muffin back between us. “In celebration you may share my muffin with me.”
“Oh-kay let’s not make this a major thing Lala.”
“Why? It is a major thing! I am so excited for you, and now that I have more friends to hang out with, you don’t have to worry about leaving me alone all the time.”
“Fat chance. You can’t get rid of me that easily. Just because I have a lady friend doesn’t mean that we won’t be best friends.”
“I wasn’t thinking that Cami. I just know that you worry about me and now you’re going to have someone else to worry about besides me.”
Cami laughed at that. “Trust me. One of the most attractive things about Maggs is that she can take care of herself just fine.”
“Should have guessed that a damsel in distress wouldn’t be your type.”
“If you come to kickboxing tonight, you’ll see just how well she can manage,” Cami said wagging her eyebrows suggestively.
“Alright you talked me into it. I’ll go with you.”
“Awesome! I’ll let Maggs know, and we’ll head over around six-thirty.”
“Works for me. I’m heading to the library to get some homework done before we go,” I said grabbing my backpack
“That’s my cue, see you later,” Cami said grabbing her coffee and heading out of the cafe.
Crossing the quad to the library, I found an open spot to camp out in for the next few hours. I popped on my headphones, selected my favorites playlist on my phone, and got down to business. I was working on the edits for the second draft of my English paper, totally absorbed, ignoring the world around me. Needing to reference something from my notebook, I bent down to grab it when someone ripped the headphones off my head and let them clatter to the ground. Jerking back up, anger swirling in me for being treated so rudely, I shouldn’t have been surprised by who I saw standing in front of me.
Mallory. Of course, her posse was with her, ready to back her up. “We have some unfinished business with you.”
I sighed; I’d never been very good at dealing with situations like this. I always ran from my problems rather than confronting them. The need to make friends and have people like me always turned me into a door mat. At some point over the past few months something in me had changed. Maybe it was Cami’s confident influence or possibly the fact that I now had more friends than I’d ever had in my life, but I was getting tired of running from these girls.
“What do you want, Mallory?” I asked closing my laptop.
Mallory glared down at me hands on her hips like she was some kind of super villain. “We want ‘The Manor’ boys back. Ever since you became friends with them, they have been blowing every other girl off.”
I shook my head and let out a heavy breath. “What makes you think I can control what they do? I don’t force them to hang out with me over you and your crew.”
“Listen you little bitch, no one has ever been able to grab the attention of more than one of them. There is something you’re not sharing with the rest of us that gives you some hold on them.” Mallory bent at the waist, so we were now at eye level. “Either share your secret or we will have to do something more... drastic.”
I laughed in her face unable to stop myself. I couldn’t believe this was happening to me. Some of the most popular girls at school were threatened by little old me. This was a twist that I never saw coming in my wildest dreams.
“Let's say I tell you what I did to get them to like me. What would you do with that information? You don’t seem like the type to share well with others,” I said my voice filled with my disdain.
Mallory looked at me with a glint in her eyes telling me everything I needed to know. Once she had the information, she was going to use it as she saw fit. I could just see the guys like magic genies bending to her will, enslaved to her need to have what people wanted.
“You let me worry about that because once you tell me, they won’t be any of your concern.”
I leaned in, closing the small distance between us so I could whisper in her ear, “Make sure you’re paying attention Mallory, I am only going to say this once.”
I paused feeling the tension in her body, desperate for what I was going to tell her. The power I held in the situation blazed through my veins. I knew deep down in my soul that the next words out of my mouth where the truth, even if I wasn’t ready to act on it yet.
“They are mine,” I hissed in her ear, causing her to rear back from me. “Trust me when I say I will never hand them over to a conniving cunt like you. Stay the fuck away from them or I might have to do something drastic.”
Lightning fast she whipped out with her hand and slapped me across the face so hard I knew my cheek glowed with her handprint. I closed my eyes and took a breath before I shot out of my seat and returned the favor, but I did it with a closed fist. The impact of my knuckles meeting her jaw hurt, but the terrified look on her face made it worth it.
“That’s the last warning I’ll give you Mallory. Stay the hell away from me and the fuck away from my guys.” I swept up the rest of my stuff and headed out of the library before anyone could react.
Once outside, I wasn’t sure if I was horrified at my action or wanted to jump for joy. I felt electric. I’d never stood up form myself like that. It was exhilarating and empowering, but once that faded I realized what I’d done. What the fuck did I just do? I had no right to claim those guys. Not only did I deck a girl for going after them, I declared to the whole school that they were mine. Oh, God they’re going to hate me. I can’t claim ownership of five guys. I’m not even romantically involved with any of them. Sure, Brayden and I went on a date, kind of, I think. Then it was crashed by Parker and Hudson. So I’m not sure what that turned it into. A triple date? Ha! Who am I kidding? There is no way those guys could ever share a woman when they can’t share the same room without arguing.
I made it to the dorm and I raced up to my room, dumped my stuff, then ran down to Cami’s room. I knocked on the door and waited, tapping my foot and biting my thumb nail.
“Lala? I thought you were studying?” Cami said when she opened the door. She took a moment to look and then her face sobered. “What’s wrong? What happened? Did someone slap you!?”
Cami grabbed my face with a hand to look at my cheek, then dragged me into her room. She sat me down on her couch, which was amazingly clear of clothes.
“Maggs, can you grab an ice pack from my fridge?” Cami asked.
It was then that I noticed Cami was only wearing a big t-shirt and nothing else. I felt my face flush with my embarrassment as I noticed Maggs slipping out of Cami’s bed.
“Oh, God Cami I’m so sorry I didn’t mean to...”
“Shut up Lala. Someone hit you, you did the right thing coming to me,” Cami said gently placing the icepack on my cheek. “Now tell me what happened.”
