Chapter 37
Cayden
Jesus Christ, I need a break.
Bella drops down to the floor, and Darlia screams, dropping down to her side. Four guards storm into the apartment, dropping dead instantly from Luke and Marcus’s gunfire.
I drop down to Darlia’s side, checking the wound myself, seeing that it barely grazed Bella’s thigh. I will hurt like a bitch, but not lethal.
“Darlia, she’s fine. But we need to go. Marcus will carry her. I need you by my side, okay? We need to clear the way for them.”
I watch the exact moment something snaps in Darlia, and she nods, her eyes losing the warmth only I’ve seen. I take her trembling hands in mine, seeing the tears running down Darlia’s cheeks and kiss them away. “She’s okay,” I promise.
Without blinking, Darlia stands, cocking her gun and grabbing a spare ammo mag. Her hand’s on her knife, walking to the one guard who isn’t dead yet, but dying slowly.
“Darlia.”
She doesn’t listen. Instead, Darlia unsheathes the knife, the metal glinting in the room as she plunges it through the guard’s throat. The sound of him choking on his own blood fills the room before silence.
“Your girl is terrifying.” Caleb laughs nervously, but Darlia is already taking off down the hall, all The Academy training kicking in.
Darlia uses the stair railing to her advantage, jumping onto the thin metal beam before wrapping her arm around a guard’s throat, throwing both her and the guard down the stairs, taking the two below with her before stabbing all three.
I don’t know whether to be turned on or terrified.
“Right, well that’s going to give me nightmares for weeks. Try not to piss off your girl, yeah? She’s fucking nightmare fuel.” Luke smirks as he loads his gun and walks down the stairs after Darlia, who’s already taken out two more guards while he was talking. This girl is too much.
“Marcus, carry Bella. The rest of you, follow Darlia.”
We make it down three more flights of stairs before Darlia steps back onto the railing and jumps down two flights of stairs, centring herself from the ground shock before taking off again.
“Jesus, your girl is a monster.”
“Say that again, and I’ll let her at you.”
Coming up behind Darlia are two guards she doesn’t notice. Immediately, I jump down behind her, shooting them both.
“Careful, baby.”
“Thanks, Cayden.” Darlia smiles sweetly, as if she’s not the most terrifying thing in this building.
My girl.
“No problem. How about we leave the rest to the others, yeah?” I need a break from seeing her be so…her. I know she’s been forced to be this way, it’s The Academy training not her, but I hate seeing this being so second nature to her.
“Okay. Did I do something wrong? I was just trying to help Bella and Marcus.” There’s an insecurity to Darlia’s voice I’ve never heard before, like she’s afraid of scaring me.
“No, baby, you were perfect. I just don’t want any more blood on your hands, okay? You’ve done enough, you can let us protect you now.”
Like I predicted, there’s a second wave of guards. I push Darlia behind me and wave Weston, Luke, and Caleb in front while Marcus walks down with Bella on his back, looking out of breath.
Serves him right for laughing at me when I was out of breath after carrying Darlia.
Weston takes down the guard coming up the stairs next while Luke focuses on the ones below, leaning over the railing. We still have around seventeen flights left to go before we can even get out.
This is going to be one long morning.
A flash grenade is thrown up onto the stairs and I barely get time to grab Darlia, running up the stairs as fast as I can and pushing Darlia’s head into the crook of my neck before it explodes.
The blinding light fills the staircase and the bang so loud I stumble falling to the ground with just enough time to turn Darlia on top of me instead of underneath.
My ears are ringing so badly that I can’t hear or see anything. Fuck.
I can hear muffled screams, but they sound so far away. I can’t fucking see anything. Everything is so fucking far away, disoriented.
“Cayden!” Darlia’s voice.
“Ah fuck!” Caleb.
“Is everyone okay?” Weston.
Someone’s crying. I can hear it, but I can’t see who or why. Something’s wrong. A flash bang should only blind for a few seconds, not this long.
“Shit, Cayden is down.” Luke.
“No shit, Sherlock.” Marcus.
Someone shakes my head, which is a very shitty thing to do. I groan, though I can’t be sure, before someone pulls at my arms, lifting me up.
“Come on, asshole,” someone says, and I feel a small body wrap around mine. Darlia.
“I’m okay, baby,” I mumble, very much not okay.
“You’re yelling,” she says softly, her voice full of worry as my vision starts to return. Thank fuck.
“Sorry.” I hope that wasn’t yelling. It sounded like a whisper, I think?
“Don’t be sorry, just be okay.” Anything for you.
Then a splash of cold water hits my face, and I have to blink my eyes a few times before seeing Luke holding a bottle of water, looking guilty.
“You asshole!”
“Told you water would work,” he says to Weston. I don’t have the ability to be mad when I look down at the girl in my arms, looking terrified.
“I’m good, baby, see?” Lifting her chin with my thumb and forefinger, I press a gentle kiss to her lips, trying to say all the words I know she won’t believe.
“You won’t lose me Darlia, I promise. I’m here to stay.”
“Okay, I believe you.” Darlia’s voice trembles, but I don’t have the time I need to reassure her in the way she needs me to as the guards start to ascend on the stairs again.
“Luke, Caleb, go ahead of us. Darlia, Weston, and I will follow with Marcus behind us.” Marcus is the most exposed, which I know he is hating. Bella is finally starting to wake up, but it’s easier to carry her instead of slowing us down.
“Baby, stay behind me.” I don’t want any more blood on her hands. Not because she can’t do it; Darlia has proved she can kill, but because of what it will do to her when she finds out everything.
I’ve been holding back and giving her time to adjust to some normality after being in The Academy for so long, but soon we won’t have that privilege anymore, and we’ll be forced to tell her.
Darlia thinks her targets harmed the citizens.
She has no idea they were trying to save her, and everyone else. They’re the rebels, but they would never hurt anyone, I would know.
Target 87 was someone I knew well, Darlia’s kill. Whether it was Lauren or Darlia, I have no idea, but I knew she wasn’t told the truth either way. So I’ll tell her everything The Academy won’t.
Including the parts she doesn’t want to know, because Darlia has to know everything before she decides where she stands. Either way, she can’t go back to The Academy. My only fear is that she won’t want to stay with me, either.
“Cayden, my stitches hurt.”
Oh for fuck’s sake. “I’ll check them when we get to the car, okay?” There’s always something, isn’t there? I know there are painkillers in the car, thank god I thought ahead and put them in there. But we have to get there first.
Descending the stairs again, this time behind the boys, Darlia stays behind me, her hands on her gun, finger on the trigger, ready for anything.
Not that she needs to be. The boys will handle everything, and I’ll get the ones they can’t.
There are four more guards we kill before finally reaching the exit, no doubt at least twenty more on their way. If it wasn’t for the semi-automatic rifle in Darlia’s hands, then she could almost pass as a citizen in the jumpsuit I stop myself from tearing off her.
She doesn’t need any more government bullshit; Darlia just needs to be a girl. And that jumpsuit is really pissing me off.
We all take off in a sprint, Marcus is now red and puffing as he follows behind us, Bella now awake and wrapped around his back.
“I can take her if you need a break,” I offer, but Marcus shakes his head.
“I’m good. Worry about your killer, and I’ll worry about mine.” Damn right I will.
Taking off down the alleyways in between the standard apartment complexes, Darlia runs ahead of me, her long brown hair blowing behind her.
It’s nothing like at the beach. There she was happy, excited. Right now Darlia is acting like she’s still in The Academy, like she’s still being hunted.
A guard truck sounds from somewhere behind us. Acting on instinct, I grab Darlia’s waist and pull us both into a doorway, covering her mouth with my hand.
“Shhh.” Whispering in her ear, I remove my hand from Darlia’s mouth, still holding her against me and place a gentle kiss to her neck, trying to calm her racing heart.
“How far?” Her voice shakes. She’s scared.
“Three blocks, baby. You’ve got this.”
Waiting for the truck to pass, we leave the doorway before running again. I know the boys would’ve hidden as well, but I don’t know where.
My priority was Darlia.
I lead her two more blocks before we spot a patrol. I scan the area to find somewhere to hide, but there’s nothing. No doorway, no dumpster, nothing.
“Cayden…”
Let me think baby, I’ll protect you. Taking Darlia’s hand, I pull her into the apartment complex beside us. They’ll see us, but they’ll see my clothes, too. As long as I can hide Darlia’s face, all they’ll see is an elite somewhere he shouldn’t be.
So I kiss her.
I kiss her deeply, my lips moving against hers like it’s a dance. And then I do something I’ve never done to her before: I part her lips with my tongue and taste her mouth.
Darlia moves her tongue with mine. It’s obvious she doesn’t know what to do, but I only find it more adorable. My beautiful girl, so innocent.
I press my knee between her legs, and she whimpers. At the same time, the guard patrol spots us and walks inside. “Put your head on my shoulder.”
Darlia doesn’t argue, and I turn to the guards, putting on the cocky attitude everyone knows me for. “Is there a problem?”
“The girl, why isn’t she at her station?”
“She decided to take a vacation.”
That makes two out of five guards chuckle, and honestly the other three are just stuck up. That was a good joke, great even.
“Why are you in Zone Two?” one of the guards asks, clearly on a power trip.
“Vacation.”
“Papers?”
“You know the elites don’t have papers.” I’m starting to get pissed off, but if any of them see Darlia’s face, I know we’re screwed, so I play along.
“Maybe your Commander would like to know you’re harassing an elite instead of doing your job. I’m still above you, I could have your job or your life with a single phone call. So I would ask yourself how important this citizen is, or if you’re willing to let me have my fun and move on.”
I hate myself for saying that, but it works. The guard uniform covers everything but their eyes, and I see the fear flash in them. Bingo.
“Apologies for the interruption, sir. Please make sure she’s back at her station tomorrow.”
“Get out of my face,” I growl, and thank the gods he turns to walk away before one of his buddies sees the knife strapped to Darlia’s thigh, and immediately raises his gun.
“She’s armed!”
Panic mode sets in, but making sure to keep my face blank, I respond, “It’s mine, she’s just keeping the straps warm for me like a good pet. It will return back to the elite sector with me later.”
Kill me now, slowly, by Darlia’s hand.
“You know contraband is not allowed in the lower sectors.”
“I didn’t ask for your approval, and my threat still stands.”
“I’ll have to call this in. This is above me, mate,” big boss guard says, and before I can even process his words, Darlia raises her gun and shoots all five of them dead without a care in the world.
“Let’s take their guns and go.”