Page 125 of Delinquents Turned Fugitives
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I started to scream.
But I blinked.
Then, my hands were empty, I was ten feet from the wall. Andros was beside me in under a second, his thick hand coming to rest on my shoulder. And all the lights around us were back on. I squinted up at the lights, disoriented.
Fuck me.
What happened? Did I lose control of my power?
“I rewound you,” Andros whispered.
Why? What happened? Doesn’t matter. Lights. Deal with the lights.
Immediately, I killed the lights again, but this time, just inside the building, not straining my magic to quell the surrounding areas and make it look like an issue with the local magical power company again. Now, it would be obvious that we were targeting the institute. The cameras would have come back up if I lost control—even for a second. “Pinheads will be on their way,” I said in a low voice. “Guards too.”
We had to move.
“Let’s come back for this guy,” I gestured to whomever was behind door 33. It was better for us to get out of here, away from the scene.
Callum took a step closer to me, his eyes growing black as his pupils swallowed up the pale rim of color around them. “No.”
Fuck.
Fuck me and my stupid damn alliance idea.
My heart jumped inside my chest faster than a jackrabbit fleeing a fox.
Evan took a step forward. “Just give me a minute to unravel that amulet. I’m pretty sure it was a Delusion Amulet.”
He knelt on the tile floor while we surrounded him. I could hear the little scratch of parchment rubbing the tile as he unrolled it.
Go fast,I willed him. But I didn’t say anything aloud. I didn’t want to distract him.
My fingers tingled with anticipation and the silence grew thick and hard to breathe, as though it were humid.
“I smell blood,” Jordan whispered.
A dripping noise came to my attention. And I turned to see a puddle forming at the base of the stairs … a dark puddle.
Jordan charged past me before I could stop him. He knelt at the puddle of blood and stuck his face directly into it. A second later, he started seizing.
“What the hell?” I gasped.
“Blood trap. The Pinnacle has set them out in every institute, trying to prevent the vamps from leaving. They’d rather poison them like rats then let them escape,” Malcolm informed us all.
I ran a hand over my face as the vampires gave guttural, animalistic growls of fury behind me.
“Leave him,” Callum growled as Evan finished unraveling the amulet. I watched as orange sparkles floated through the air over to the telltale crack in the wall. Slowly, the amulet faded, its glow ceased. I whispered, “Amulet’s dead.”
Callum shoved open the door to 33.
“But …” He’d really leave one of his own crew? He was that heartless.
Callum scoffed at the look on my face. “The bloody idiot won’t die. But if they’re setting out poisoned blood and he’s daft enough to drink it, he can lay in a puddle of his own stupidity until he drinks it all or decides to slither out of it. I have no need of that.”
The rest of the vampires tossed solemn looks in Jordan’s direction, but then they followed him inside. Callum shut the door in my face, saying, “Watch our backs or we’ll eat yours.”
