Damien shook himself a little and then met my gaze. “Okay. What’s your plan?”
My eyes flicked up to the corner of the room where a small camera was mounted on the wall.
‘I’m going to open a portal or whatever into the Dream War. We fall backwards into it, and then I close it.’
His eyes widened. “Are you crazy?”
I nodded. ‘Probably, but we can run a quarter mile and then I’ll open it back up and we will be back on Earth. Easy peasy.’
He gave me a look that said it would be anything but easy peasy.
The door handle turned then and Damien scooched closer to me, jumping up and down in his chair until he was right next to me.
The second I saw the man in the crisp black suit enter the room with two armed soldiers, I knew he was the one in charge. Not President Buckley, no. Someone else was pulling the strings. Unlike the man who had come to get us, this man looked familiar… tall, overweight, with greasy skin. I’d seen him before.
It came to me then. He was a congressman who’d been on the news for getting caught up in some hooker bust up. It didn’t affect his career at all of course, and his wife stayed.
“Kit Steele, it’s nice to finally meet you,” he sneered.
The men beside him pulled their firearms and hung them loosely at their sides. These were not stun guns. This man meant business.
I cut to the chase. “What do you want?”
His gaze narrowed at me. “I have some very interesting footage of you on the docks in Boston opening a hole from our world into the Dream War.”
Shit.
I decided to play hardball. “And I have some very interesting documents showing just how badly you’ve sold out the human race.”
Not an ounce of fear crossed his face, but I noticed the subtle way his muscles tightened at my mention of the documents.
“Things have changed since then.” He stepped closer. “It’s clear that ghouls will now no longer entertain our agreement.”
I frowned. “Aww, poor baby, gonna have to die in the Dream Wars with the rest of us.”
His hand shot out lightning-quick. Pain exploded in my jaw and Damien shot forward, but the chair threw him off balance so he stumbled to the side. One of the soldiers aimed the gun right at him.
“Move and die,” the soldier grit out.
Damien was on his side, throwing death glares at the congressmen, and I prayed he stayed there.
“I’m fine. He hits like Lucy,” I told Damien, who grinned.
Being a prisoner of war or being held hostage was all about the mental game. I had no idea how long I was going to be stuck here, but I needed to keep strong mentally, and talking shit was the way I did that.
The dude in charge stepped closer and bent down. “Here’s the deal. You’re going to do what I want or I’m going to round up every person you care about and put a bullet in their head.”
Adrenaline pumped through my body at his threat, but I stayed silent. Did he know who I cared about?
“Your mother and her roommates just sat down to dinner in Miami. Tatum is—”
“Okay. What do you want?”
He’d found my freaking weakness. Family and friends. I would do anything to protect them. I was screwed.
“I should think it obvious,” the man drawled. “I want to hire your team for protection. I haven’t slept in four days and I no longer have the safety the ghoul females promised.”
I looked at him like he’d sprouted two heads. This asshole had just kidnapped me and smacked me in the face and he thought I’d work for him?
“I’m already on a job assignment and my waitlist is a year long. Sorry.”
He sighed. “I thought you might say that.” Pulling a phone out of his pocket, he dialed a number.
Oh God. Who was he calling?
Damien cleared his throat extra loud and I looked over to see him wide-eyed, trying to give me a message. Opening my mind to him, his voice came through loud and clear.
‘Open a portal behind him and kick him through!’
It was genius. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it already. Instead of us running, we could just trap them inside the Dream War until we could figure everything else out.
“Do you have eyes on her mother?” the congressman asked into the phone.
Fear washed over me like ice water and I had to work to calm myself. Taking a deep breath, I started to feel for the space between our two worlds like Master Aki taught me.
“Wait!” I cried out to the asshole who was about to off my mother.
He grinned, holding the phone away from his ear.
I slowly started to open the portal behind him and his men.
“I’ll do it, just don’t hurt my mom.” Damien and I had to school our features as the opening behind them grew bigger and bigger. A sentry was off in the distance. I could see the glint of the metal armor they wore, and I prayed it didn’t see us and start shooting. The bullets would probably slice right into Damien and I.
“Forget it,” he said into the phone and hung up.
Relief crashed through me and I used all of my concentration to pull the opening wider and wider.
“I’m exhausted,” he said. “I’ve got a room set up. We can go in now.”
He went to turn around.
“Wait!” I cried out, and he and both of his men froze and turned to face me. They hadn’t yet seen the portal I was creating and I needed to distract them a moment longer while I opened it wide enough. “You want me to take you into the Dream War… now?” Using every ounce of my strength to open the hole bigger, it went from the size of a bean bag to the size of
