Teddy watched the bullet as it sliced through the air. She focused on extending her astral self toward the piece of deadly metal as if she could knock the bullet off course. Panic gripped her, and she felt the film reels speed up. She was losing her grip on time. The bullet was hurtling toward Clint’s chest. It was two feet away, now one.
With all the energy she had left, she reached out her astral hand and felt her fingers touch hot metal. Horror gripped her as she heard Clint give a grunt of pain. His body fell against the wall of the tent, then collapsed on the ground. Then the reels, and time, spun out of her control.
Teddy jerked free of Brett’s grasp as the sound of the gun blast caused chaos to erupt around them. Dimly, she was aware of screaming, running, crashing glass as guests overturned trays and tables in their rush to flee.
She threw herself against the tent wall, and landed on the ground beside Clint. The bullet had missed his heart but hit his shoulder. Still, he was alive. Brett hadn’t killed him.
“Stop him,” Clint said, breathing hard. “Don’t let him leave the island.”
Teddy felt the brush of cold steel against her palm and looked down to see Clint pushing his gun at her. “Go, Teddy. Now.”
Teddy grabbed the gun and ran.
* * *
All around her, the reception dissolved into mayhem. Boyd stood at the center of it all, issuing orders.
Brett had said that Jeremy was here. If Jeremy had come to Angel Island, he’d come by boat. And Teddy knew exactly where that boat was docked. Spying Jillian, she yelled out, “Jeremy’s boat! Get help and meet me there!”
Jillian nodded and took off in the opposite direction.
Unwilling to waste the seconds it would take to wait for her friends, Teddy raced past Harris Hall, then past the infirmary. She hurled herself over a low stone wall, stumbling, sliding, plunging down the steep incline that led to the jogging path. She edged toward a cliff that towered above the cove.
Jeremy’s speedboat bobbed on the incoming tide. But the boat itself was empty.
Clint’s gun still clenched in one hand, Teddy braced her hands on her knees and gulped in air as she considered her options.
It was a sharp descent—almost vertical—from her current position to the cove. A bit farther along the path was a switchback trail leading down to the water, but that took—
She heard the sound of pounding feet and skittering pebbles. She turned to level her weapon directly at Brett’s chest as he came barreling around the corner, his own gun loose by his side.
“Drop your weapon,” she ordered.
“What the—”
“Drop your weapon now!” She clicked off the safety and tightened her grip. Her hands were slick with blood and sweat, but they didn’t shake. The tension of her finger against the trigger was whisper-thin.
Moving with exaggerated care, Brett extended his arms from his sides, palms facing Teddy, and let the gun slip from his hand.
“Kick it toward me,” she said.
He did. Keeping her gaze fixed on Brett, she gave it another kick, sending it skidding behind her.
“It doesn’t have to be this way, Teddy.” Jeremy. He walked, unarmed, to stand next to Brett.
She was outnumbered, even if armed. Her advantage was so slight as to be almost nonexistent. Teddy was poised over a cliff with her gun pointed at Brett and Jeremy, but she had no way to subdue either of them. The only thing she could do now was stall until Jillian, Pyro, and Dara arrived.
“What are you doing, Jeremy?” she asked, buying time.
He gestured to the space between them. “We shouldn’t be enemies. We’re working toward the same goal. We both want to use our psychic gifts to keep people safe.”
“Safe?” Teddy’s anger flared. She couldn’t help but think of Molly’s safety. He hadn’t protected her.
“Yes, Teddy. We keep this country safe. We think big-picture. Yates was a traitor. I had to do everything I could to make sure he stayed in prison. He abandoned the cause.”
She thought about the surveillance video she’d seen. A man had been murdered on a busy city sidewalk, without a trial, without a judge, without a jury. “You’re talking about assassinations.”
Jeremy shook his head. “You don’t understand. Yates let personal feelings get in the way.”
“What about Molly? You didn’t have personal feelings for her?”
At that Jeremy ducked his chin, avoiding Teddy’s eyes. “I recruited her myself,” Jeremy said. “But her loyalty wavered. I had to intervene. I meant to destroy the laptop. I thought she’d drop it. Not . . . ”
“We helped Molly,” Brett said, picking up where Jeremy left off. “She hated sensing people’s emotions all the time. Made her feel crazy as a bullbat. The Patriot Corps fixed her up. And in return—”
Jeremy shot Brett a glance, silencing him.
“You helped Molly?”
Molly was working with Jeremy?
Teddy ran over the events in her head: the hacking of Eversley’s computer at Halloween; the attack in the warehouse. Teddy felt like she’d been blindsided. Of course Molly was a member of the Patriot Corps. Her behavior had always been erratic. Irregular. Like she was hiding something. “Is that why she came back from winter break so altered? Did your group do something to her? Experiment on her? Like they did on psychics in Sector Three? Was that before or after you made her attack me in the warehouse?”
Teddy heard a noise from behind her. Jillian.
Thank God.
But then a burst of searing pain shot through the base of her skull as something rock-hard slammed against her head. Teddy fell forward, landing on her hands and knees. Clint’s gun, knocked from her grip, skittered across the rocky ledge.
Pinpricks of light danced in front of her eyes. She gritted her teeth, determined to hold on to consciousness.
“Stay down,” a female voice ordered. Not Jillian.
Teddy blinked. Christine Federico swam into focus, her toned arms flexed, Clint’s gun now firmly in her grip.
Whitfield Institute’s two missing recruits were missing no longer. Teddy
