Toxic Part One (Celestra Series Book 7) Read online

  He touches his cheek to mine. I hate myself more than I could ever tell you.

  “Don’t.” It comes out an anguished cry. If our hatred should be directed anywhere, it’s toward the Counts.

  “Instruct her not to speak.” Ingram peruses his notes as if looking at me would be cause of some gross violation.

  “Don’t speak.” Logan says it sharp and commanding then dots my lips with a kiss. I’m so sorry. I don’t know how, but I’ll make this up to you.

  Ingram barks at him to step aside. Logan leaves his hand gently cupped over my cheek until he’s forced to remove it.

  The dark-haired boy with the wide, serious eyes appears. Wesley. He gives a placid smile as he approaches, ignoring both Logan and Ingram. Wesley just has eyes for me and the blood boiling in my body.

  What’s your name? he asks as he rubs over my neck with his lips.

  I close my eyes, ignoring him like he chose to ignore Logan, and block the world out of view. I can feel his bite, then the hard suction of the first pull. Wesley takes in long, slow drags, sending a dull ache vibrating from the puncture.

  His thoughts revert to Laken, his girlfriend: her long glassy hair, her enthusiastic smile. He tells her he loves her, that he would never hurt her. He wishes she would just wake up, realize who she is and the promise the future holds for her, for both of them.

  The world shifts and spins until the darkness bleeds to red.

  Wesley, you’re hurting me.

  Just a little bit more. He groans.

  You’re a bastard—you know that? Every one of you. I gasp for breath. I hope Laken finds a better man. I hope she leaves you and never looks back.

  A thought bounces through his mind—a football player with a shy smile. Laken has her arms strapped around his waist, and he’s whispering in her ear. He has a comely face and enough lust in his eyes to set the field on fire.

  That’s who she’ll choose, I taunt. She’d never want you—not like this.

  Wesley pulls away abruptly.

  I open my eyes and glare at this cheap replica of the boy I once loved, and the world explodes around me.

  Chapter 19

  Bad Romance

  A trickle of light penetrates my eyelids as familiar voices boom all around—nothing but shouting and laughter intermingled with my name given in heated whispers from above.

  “Skyla,” Gage pants. I can feel his breath pulse in and out of my ear, his rapid breathing agitating the side of my face. “Skyla, wake up.”

  My lids flutter open to Demetri’s emerald lawn, the football game still underway as legs swish back and forth farther down the field. Chloe spits repeatedly on the sidelines, washing her face down with a water bottle as Em supervises.

  “What happened?” Gage picks me up and sits me on his lap. I’d resist the effort, struggle to get away if I could, but my muscles don’t respond—my entire body feels incapable of functioning on a rudimentary level.

  “Can’t move,” I mouth.

  “That bastard took you again,” he seethes.

  It takes all of my effort to look up at him. For a moment, I lose myself in the intense blue flame brewing in his eyes. How can he feel so much hatred toward my enemy, if he’s one of them himself?

  “Skyla!” Logan runs over and falls to his knees. He extricates me free from Gage just as a hammer of darkness falls over the world.

  ***

  The ground shakes.

  A purple film lines the sky, and it takes a moment for me to realize round four of the faction war is well under way.

  “No,” I breathe it.

  I find myself lying supine on soggy soil, staring up at the unnatural velveteen sky. I try to clutch at the balding grass, but my fingers slip, limp and useless as the rest of my drained body.

  “Mother,” I rasp. Honest to God, she is not an ally in this campaign if she thinks sending me into the faction war after having my blood sucked dry is a winning idea.

  The ground gives a violent jolt.

  “Shit,” I hiss.

  It takes more than a concerted effort to lift my head and peer out at my surroundings. A hillside sits off in the distance. The thick cover of evergreens carpets the majority of the landscape. Grunts and cries of agony echo throughout the ethereal plane as I struggle to my elbows.

  The thick metallic disc protrudes from my pocket, taunting me with the lack of energy to retrieve it, should the need arise.

  An explosion of light goes off in the distance, as I sink my head back onto the damp soil. I’m helpless. Death can certainly come for me here. What enemy is death when everything seems to be falling to crap anyway? With a celestial mother like mine, who only seems to initiate trouble, a boyfriend who swore forever then proved nothing but a liar, and no blood left to run this Celestra machine God saw fit to gift me with—why is life important to me? Why do I find it so worth living? Why does a ray of hope flicker, despite this constant curtain of darkness that’s enveloped my existence?

  A flash of all those Celestra crying out in anguish down in the tunnels filters through my mind. Lacey’s face brands itself over my heart. If I do one good thing in my life, it’ll be freeing those souls and stopping the Counts from taking any more prisoners. Losing my life would be an honor, if I died fighting for my people. God—I hate the Counts.

  “Skyla!” Logan’s voice booms like a riot.

  I muster the strength to get up on all fours, then fall down again.

  “We need to get you somewhere safe.” Logan lands by my side. His hot breath streaks across my face like a nuclear winter as he sits me in his arms.

  The ground thumps as a couple of people run over. I can only assume it’s Ellis and Gage, but when I look up, I’m horrified to find it’s not. A boy with a broad chest and a familiar-looking face crouches next to Logan. He’s holding a huge black rifle with a menacing series of barrels. His friend stays a good distance away as if keeping watch over the situation.

  “What’s going on?” Logan says it calm, but I can tell he’s ready to snatch the monstrosity of a weapon from him and use it against the two of them.

  “Who are you fighting for?” He looks from me to Logan.

  I hesitate. And for a pathetic moment, I think of lying and saying the Counts. But I’ll be damned if I’m going down that way.

  “Celestra.” It huffs out of me.

  He gives a sly smile. “I knew that. And I know you.” He presses his gaze into me and his face sparks a fire in my memory bank as I frantically try to place him. “Cooper Flanders.” He holds a hand out to Logan and they shake. “There’s a hostile battle just north of here. The Counts have assault weaponry—some kind of alien equipment.” He holds up the missile launcher strapped to his chest.

  “How?” It’s all I can push out thanks to Wesley the weasel and his sudden urge to hydrate himself.

  “I don’t know,” Cooper answers, assuming I’m talking about his gun. “But all they’ve outfitted Celestra with are primitive bows—broken arrows.”

  “If you’re fighting with Celestra, how’d you get your hands on that?” Logan is slow to embrace this new ally and I’ve yet to figure out how Cooper “knows” me.

  “Flynn’s a Count.” He glances back at the tall sandy-haired boy with a friendly face.

  A roar of voices, a cacophony of gunfire erupts from the ridge.

  “We’ll keep them at bay,” Cooper says, panning the vicinity. “Get her somewhere safe.”

  We watch as they take off toward a thicket in the distance. A barrage of bullets explode in the dirt just shy of their path, bringing home the fact those boys could lose everything today for a war declared in my honor. Really, it’s the Sectors and the Fems, but nevertheless, they’ve landed us here in the heart of mortar-based danger.

  I turn to tell Logan how much I hate this and all I accomplish is brushing my lips over his cheek.

  Logan’s face contorts with heartbreak. He touches his hand to my neck, crestfallen at what he sees.

  “I can�
�t do this.” He shakes his head in grief. “I need to kill them all, Skyla.”

  “They’ll kill you before you can off a second Count. It’s futile. I don’t want them to touch you.”

  He sets his eyes over mine. Logan feels as limp and helpless as my own body.

  “You have sacrificed and loved beyond measure,” I say, gathering the strength to pull his head in close to mine. His concern for my well-being has magnified to unimaginable levels. The allowances he’d make for me know no bounds. “I’ll be damned if I let you make the ultimate sacrifice and lose your life.”

  “If it meant you’d be safe.” He shakes his head. “There’s nothing you could do to stop me.”

  “You wouldn’t be helping me.” Uninvited tears blur my vision. Another explosion lights up the sky like the Fourth of July. Smoke congests the area, penetrates it with a milky white fog. “Logan, if you die, I die. I would let them have me— kill me—I would beg them to. You’re the only good thing in my life, and if you let them take that away, they win.”

  The ethereal plane rattles, violent screams ignite nearby—but for Logan and I, the world stands still as we lock onto one another, sunk with the prospect of death smothering us in every realm.

  “Love me, Logan,” I whisper. “Live for me.”

  He presses a kiss over my lips, and a warm tear glides from his cheek to mine.

  “I’ll keep fighting for us, Skyla. I’ll find a way to end the misery the Counts keep inflicting.”

  Something quickens in me for Logan, and my heart picks up pace.

  He runs his arm around my waist, slow and methodical. “How I wish we could go back to the start.” A sweet smile plays on his lips.

  A round of detonations goes off in the distance—followed by a choir of screams, then smoke like a furnace.

  “I love you, Logan.” It sounds more like a desperate plea from a child than a declaration of love from a girl hell bent on becoming a woman. “I can feel how much you care for me. I’m desperately afraid, but you calm me. Thank you for that.”

  Logan tilts his head as the smoke circles around us, stings our eyes with its penetrative bite. He touches his forehead to mine, warms my chest with his. I can feel him aching for me. Logan wants to fix things, but can’t figure out how.

  “I love you too, Skyla.”

  His lips brush against mine. Logan jerks before he’s knocked away by a giant blur of limbs and I fall to my elbows, barely able to sustain my weight.

  A dark head looms ahead—a wall of shoulders—I recognize them as belonging to Gage.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Logan roars as he wrestles Gage away from his person. He touches the back of his arm to his split lip and examines the stain of crimson.

  Gage pants beside him, his chest pumping with adrenaline, a look of bitterness and contempt locked on his features. He lunges at Logan with the ferocity of a lion, and they rotate in a ball of fists, nothing but a tangle of arms and legs as the battle rages on around us.

  “Gage! Stop.” I struggle to my knees and falter, landing back on the ground, kissing the dirt like I mean it.

  I command my body, my partial Caelestis being, my unearthly Celestra strength to rile up, but it doesn’t. I crawl up on my knees, my hands shake trying to hold up my body. Something slips from my pocket and lands on the dirt with a solid thump.

  “Oh God.” I breathe as the shiny flat disc of failure stares up at me. I’ve done it. I’ve accidentally forfeited the region to the Counts.

  The enemy gives a wild shout of victory as the ethereal plane claps into darkness.

  Fuck.

  Just fuck.

  Chapter 20

  Divine Intervention

  “I’m going to beat the shit out you!” Logan roars at Gage as he picks me up off the makeshift football field.

  Demetri’s backyard expands around us as a sea of darkness rolls overhead. A veil of grey clouds submerges the sunshine, scolding it for recklessly shining down over Paragon.

  “Take her to my home at once,” Marshall says in passing. I track him with my gaze as Logan picks me up in his arms and jostles me over to the side yard. Marshall walks past the hedges, and I see him dissipate easy as a vapor.

  “He’s going to poison me again,” I whisper, mostly to myself. It’s difficult to embrace the fact the only thing that can make me feel better is a good dose of cyanide, not to mention the horrid effects it had on me last time. “I don’t want it.” I gasp for breath. I’m so light-headed, it takes everything in me to keep myself breathing. If I stop, I swear my lungs won’t continue the effort. This is all too hard.

  Demetri appears from nowhere as we round out the side gate. “Leaving so soon?”

  Logan doesn’t bother to play his head games. He simply goes around him and darts us across the street where his truck is parked.

  “I have something of yours, Skyla,” he calls, but we don’t turn around and give him the pleasure.

  “Wait!” Gage booms from the side of the Edinger estate, just as Logan opens the passenger door. Gage appears by my side, looking at me with a deep sense of sorrow. His beautiful lips hold a smile all their own. “I’ll take you.” He puts a hand over my mine, clasps onto Logan’s shoulder, and blinks us away.

  ***

  “I have had enough!” Marshall roars in a dark, horrible voice I have never heard him evoke before and it inspires an echo throughout his cavernous estate. He picks up a metallic vase from off the sofa table and hurls it into the fireplace, igniting a wall of flames in its cavity that lick up to the ceiling.

  Quite frankly, I’m not entirely certain about whatever the hell has Marshall up in inferno-inducing arms. It could just as easily be the fact I’ve squandered the last lifesaving disc, as it could be the fact Demetri let some guy who looks suspiciously like Gage suckle off an artery. I’d rather he be pissed off about the latter, since dropping the disc was a total freak accident.

  “Lay her on the couch.” Marshall speeds over and collects me with a sharp breath. “You!” He darts a finger at Gage. “Extricate your father from his poolside lounging and return at once.”

  Gage disintegrates slowly, his ghostly frame whispers I love you as his words wash over me with heartbreak.

  “You, my friend, are useless.” Logan belts it out at Marshall with aggressive sarcasm, and apparently, without any regard for his own personal safety.

  “That you, of all people, should question my capabilities astounds me.” Marshall broadens his chest as he rises. “Stand clear of Skyla so I might dispense the proper amount of retribution for such a foolish remark.”

  “No.” I try to shield my hand over Logan’s person, but it sinks back to the couch with a thud. “He’s right. You are useless.” I pant from the effort.

  “Skyla!” Marshall sounds stupefied by my accusation, as his features dim to pitch. I can see his frustration building like a wave that’s about to crest.

  Gage and Dr. Oliver blink into the room.

  “Let me see her.” Dr. Oliver speeds over and places his hand over the tender area of my neck. “Looks like they’ve taken more than last time.”

  “It’s a punishment.” Marshall stands over me with his finger to his lips.

  “For what?” Gage looks wild with fury.

  “For flaunting the fact we’ve the ability to build her up so quickly.” Marshall snaps. “And really? Football? Could you have chosen a more subtle way to rub it in their face? Just because we’ve harnessed the power to reconstitute your levels doesn’t mean you should slit your wrist and hose down every Count in the vicinity with a spray of your bloody affection.” He turns to Barron. “Where’s the antidote?”

  “I haven’t had the chance to replenish the supply. I had no idea they’d come after her so soon.” Dr. Oliver’s glasses slide to the tip of his nose. His salt and pepper hair reflects a strange orange hue from the inferno raging out of control.

  “Get used to it.” Marshall reduces the flames in the fireplace with the flick of his
finger. “We’ll need to have three vials ready at any given time. Logan”—he pauses—“I’d banish you from her side, but seeing that you are the Elysian, I assume that’s torment enough.” Marshall speeds toward the kitchen.

  “What’s an Elysian?” Gage falls to his knees beside me and picks up my hand. I try to squirm out of his grasp, but I’m so weak he thinks I’ve just given him an affirming squeeze of affection.

  “The Counts are using me,” Logan begins. “I’m overseeing her blood withdrawals.”

  “How are they taking it?” Gage leans into me as Dr. Oliver and Barron grapple over something in the distance.

  “Some guy comes in.” Logan brushes the loose hairs from my face. “He takes it right from her neck the way Kragger used to.”

  “Shit.” Gage looks good and pissed.

  “Why do you care?” I ask in a broken whisper.

  Gage pauses and darts a look into me that holds a patina of rage. “I love you, Skyla. I know how it looks and I know you can’t stand the sight of me…” He bites down on his lip to keep from choking up. “When you’re better, I think we should talk.”

  Chloe’s face stains me from the inside, her effigy a permanent fixture in the back of my mind. I see her all over again at the stone of sacrifice with that look of glee on her face after letting their little secret slip on prom night. A slow, brewing rage heats through my bones, stealing all of my healing energy by singeing me with hatred.

  “Marshall,” I whisper, and he appears without hesitation.

  “Barron is working on the formula now.” He strums from above. “It should only be a few minutes before we can administer it.”

  “Oh, that’s good.” Shit. “Can you do me a favor?”

  “Anything.” He implores me to continue with a brief nod.

  “Get rid of Gage.” I cast my gaze to the ground when I say it. It’s taking too much out of me to deal with this heartache. It removes all of my will to get better—to live. He’s cursed me with the desire to have him, and now he’s killing me softly with his presence.