Into the Fire (Flame in the Shadows Trilogy #1)

9. Mel

CHAPTER NINE

MEL

I sigh as I walk, my insides gloomier than the chilly mist that swirls over my cheeks and clings to my hair. I’ve been out here long enough for the rain-washed night to fade into a drizzly gray morning, yet I’m no closer to finding the Resistance than I was back in my warm, dry kitchen.

It’s all the same. Trees, trees, and more trees. I don’t know why I thought this was a good idea. I’ll never find Tommy. I’ll probably never find my way home again, either.

I lurch to a halt, wiping my face with the back of my hand. The rain pings loudly on the leaves above.

If I could just get some quiet, a moment to concentrate, to plan my next?—

Bang!

I drop into the underbrush, my throat-shredding scream muted, distant in my ringing ears. Terror buzzes like a swarm of bees in my brain.

That was a gunshot.

My tail must be here.

I peer through the shifting mist, heart crashing against my ribs. A flicker of movement catches my attention.

Only yards away, a slender girl about my age is examining something obscured in the underbrush. She’s gripping a gun tightly with both hands, arms stiff. A wicked-looking dagger glints at her thigh.

Weapon pointed into the ferns, the girl prods at the thing with her toe. Without warning, she fires again.

The thing on the ground—a body, I realize with horror—jerks, and I throw myself back through the brambles.

Someone’s dead.

The girl glances my way. She’s shorter than I am, small and thin, with long blond hair and a smattering of golden freckles sprinkled over her nose and cheeks. She looks innocent. I almost can’t believe she’s my tail, that someone my age could be Organization.

But she just killed someone.

No, not someone. Tommy. Who else would be way out here in this weather?

My head throbs and my eyes sting as she chews her lip, her gaze fixed on my face, the gun still pointed at the body. At Tommy.

My fault.

I was being watched. I followed him out here anyway. I led the Organization straight to him.

A hot wave of sickness engulfs me, sharpens into a terror so powerful it hurts. Tommy’s dead. If I don’t do something now, so am I.

Forcing down the guilt, the impending hysteria, I jump to my feet and rip Tommy’s gun from my waistband. “Stop right there!”

The command rings hollow, even to me. The gun wobbles in my slick, shaky hands.

With her weapon trained on my forehead, the girl drops into a lethal-looking crouch. “Put your hands up!”

Her voice is like a frigid stream of water. Smooth and cold as ice. “Drop the gun. Don’t move. Don’t speak.”

I won’t win a shootout, so I reach up, Tommy’s gun limp in my hand.

Her lip curls. “I said, drop the gun.”

It’s clear as crystal in those hard eyes. One wrong move and I’m dead. So the question becomes this: which is better, dying now, or letting the Organization have me?

Nausea swirls in my stomach. Death by bullet would be kinder than interrogation by terrorists, but maybe I can still get out of this. Dad always said, if an attacker ever tries to hurt you, fight back. Make noise. Don’t let them get you.

I won’t let them get me, Dad.

Slow and steady, I toss Tommy’s gun into the dripping ferns. Without lowering her weapon, the girl gets to her feet and stalks through the underbrush to retrieve it.

I don’t have a prayer of overpowering her, but I’m good with words. They’re my best defense now.

“I know who you are.”

“Shut up.”

I clear my throat, throw some steel into my tone. “I’ll run away. I won’t tell anyone about this. I won’t come back. I swear.”

My stomach turns to lead as the words leave my lips. I’m pleading with Tommy’s murderer, promising to keep his death quiet to save myself. How gross.

But if it means I can live, I’ll do it.

The girl tucks Tommy’s gun into her waistband, her own weapon still trained between my eyes. “I thought I told you to shut up.”

“I mean it.”

Suddenly she’s in my face, her silver eyes fierce. The barrel of her gun presses into my temple. “Shut. Up.”

A small, terrified whimper breaks through my self-control.

“No talking,” the girl snaps.

She twists my arms behind my back and binds my wrists together with a length of scratchy rope. Then she pulls a wad of thick black cloth from her pocket. Pressing it over my eyes, she yanks it tight and secures it behind my head.

I can’t see a thing.

Cold fingers grip my elbows. “Walk.”

Time leaps and drags. I trip blindly through the wet forest, my thoughts a riot of guilt and panic, the girl and her gun at my back.

I killed Tommy. I may not have pulled the trigger, but he is dead because of choices I made.

Worse, he died trying to save my life, and look how I repaid him. I’m fodder in the Organization’s hands. They must think I know something, or I’d be dead too.

If I pretend to have information, maybe they’ll keep me alive long enough for me to escape. Even a few extra hours could make a difference.

Without warning, the girl shoves me down into the muck. I bite back a yelp.

“There’s a tunnel in front of you. Crawl in.”

I lean back, scraping my boots over what feels like a jumble of boulders. Where are we going? A cave? An underground lair?

When I find the opening, I pause.

This is it. Once I go in, I’ll probably never come back out.

The girl jabs me between the shoulders with her gun, and I shimmy forward, feet first. A thin hand pushes my head down as she crams in after me.

Abrasive stone scrapes my exposed skin on all sides. It’s tiny in here. My shoes hit a dead end. I’m crunched into a ball, the girl tight against my back.

I start to gasp, fear squeezing my heart, pumping it faster.

Focus. Breathe.

The girl’s warm breath hits my cheek as she taps the wall next to my face. It sounds like a pattern. A code?

My boots tug down. The wall. It’s moving! Sinking!

As it disappears, my legs spring free of their cramped position. They’re left dangling, like I’m a child in an adult-sized chair. Air rasps up and down my throat.

“There will be a drop. Scoot down, or I’ll push you.”

I perch on the edge, afraid. What’s waiting down there? How far is the drop? This must be a secret Organization lair.

“I can’t see.”

“I don’t care. Do it.” Hard metal pokes into my back. Trembling, I scoot toward the void.

My stomach jolts when I topple over, my loud scream echoing around me. I crash heavily to my knees. Ow.

Large, calloused hands close around my upper arms, and I’m hauled to my feet, frantic heart a drum in my chest.

“Cait!”

A woman’s voice, inches to the left. She’s not the one gripping me.

“Mom!” I didn’t hear the girl—Cait, I guess—land, but she’s here now. “We need to get Lisa. Right away.”

“Go.” A man this time. He’s the one bruising my biceps. His curtness surpasses even that of the girl. Of Cait. “She’ll be in her office. Meet us in the cells.”

The cells.

My only desperate hope hinges on them believing I have information, but hideous fear clogs my airway.

They’re going to torture me.

I can’t do this.

Tears start to spill over. My blindfold is drenched in seconds.

I’m guided down a straight path with a flat, even floor. Through my sobs, I try to catalogue my surroundings, in case I get a chance to bolt. The air is cool and still. It smells … earthy.

We bear left, then turn a corner in the same direction. About thirty feet along, my captors halt. A metallic scraping reaches my ears. A key in a lock.

A cell.

I’m marched to the right, presumably through a door, and forced onto a hard wooden chair. I struggle against my restraints, panic searing through my chest.

Gentle fingers tug at the knot on my blindfold. As the wet cloth falls away, I glance around, blinking in the dim light.

What I see is not encouraging.