Amy Rench - Fallen Rogue

The pain receded when they moved into the full sunlight. Her mind reveled in the glorious feeling of the natural radiance. A surge of electrifying energy pulsed through her veins, leaving invigorating trails in every fiber.

Approaching the truck, Harper tested her hunger for the power she’d missed the last few days while confined in the cold darkness.

She concentrated on her bindings, closed her eyes, and in her mind saw the clamps break apart. Her head whirled with the rush of ice and heat. A shiver of burning energy passed from her brain through her shoulders, and then shot down her arms to her wrists. She looked down and saw the clamps fracture and fall to the ground with a heavy clank.

Harper raised her hands, full of awe and surprise at her success. She’d controlled it. She had actually controlled it. And she hadn’t passed out.

All six of the huge guys stared at her. Though not with the terrified shock everyone had before. Curiosity with a hint of challenge colored their expressions. She wasn’t sure what that meant, but she wasn’t about to stay and find out.

This was her chance to bolt. Her power, or whatever it was, seemed to be working again. She wasn’t about to waste time questioning that or the lack of horror in these guys.

Summoning the energy force again, Harper spread her arms and focused on driving her captors back so she could escape. Prickles of power sparked under her skin as she called upon the energy force flowing eagerly through her body.

A cold rush, then a hot charge blazed within her and she forced a clear wave of energy to surge forward toward the waiting men, seeing the air ripple from the pulse. She watched, mesmerized as the two men in the forefront raised their hands and somehow halted her surge with a filmy current of their own.

Just like her.

A whoosh of displaced air rushed over them as their forces canceled each other out.

Well, that was a new one. The hulky men looked as stunned as she felt. They all stared at the empty space between them as if it would provide the answer.

Now a little drained, Harper caught their eyes and smiled at them with a shrug. And then ran as fast as she could.

She saw a gate just beyond the front of the truck and headed straight for it. Footsteps thundered. A tackle from behind knocked the air from her lungs just as she reached the gate. The momentum carried her and the men on top of her through the wired gateway.

Tumbling onto the ground, she kicked and punched wildly. She heard grunts and thuds as she was able to connect on some of the blows. A clinking noise caught her attention. They were trying to wrestle her into another pair of clamps.

Twisting in their grasp, Harper ended up facedown on the hard ground. Raising her head, she peeked at the surrounding area, checking it out. An alley. Squirming and striking, her darting gaze fell on an unforgettable face tucked behind a rusted green Dumpster.

Rome.

Fury consumed her. It was his fault she was here. She’d killed those men at Bobby’s to protect him, and he’d betrayed her.

Harper grasped on to her rage with her mind. Focused on it. Thirsted for it. Her body vibrated as power pulsed through every fiber. With a wail, she bucked with power and once again hurled a crushing wave from her mind. The heavy bodies pitched away from her through the air and she was free.

Harper’s vision blurred, and she felt a prickly detachment as she began to fade from consciousness. No. She was going to pass out again.

The Dumpster where she thought she’d spied Rome had been hurled against the graffiti-stained brick wall. Warped and creaking. Could she have crushed him? Her mind reeled.

Fiercely fighting the roiling of her mind and her heart, she struggled to scrape her exhausted body from the hard pavement. The sunlight beat down on her, seeping into her skin, charging her blood.

Feeling a boost of strength, she dragged herself up and staggered forward, shooting a look over her shoulder at the prone men. They were stunned, but beginning to get back up.

She hadn’t killed them? No, all six were standing now. They weren’t dead. And they had a power similar to hers. What the heck was going on here? Though, where her stronger power surges were clear and barely perceptible, theirs were tinged with a filmy coating, like pure water versus soapy water.

Stumbling away from them, Harper’s head began to swim. All she was finding were more and more questions instead of answers.

But right now, she was losing it. Not much longer and she’d pass out again. Fear encompassed her, blurring her sight. She didn’t know whether she could handle captivity again. She didn’t want to find out.

Shaking her head, she began to run, but stopped as a black streak filled her vision, accompanied by the screech of tires.

“Get in!” a deep voice commanded from the open passenger-side window.

She paused.

“Harper. Get in. Now!” Rome? He was alive? “Trust me.”

Hesitation. He was alive. Thank the stars. But he’d betrayed her and now he was here to help? Again? She glanced over her shoulder. Her tunneling vision showed fuzzy, bulky figures racing toward her. She swung back around to face Rome, both hands braced against the vehicle.

“Harper, please.” It was indeed Rome. That much she could tell.

At this point, she wasn’t above accepting his help without trusting him. So she hauled herself in the vehicle and clumsily pulled the door shut as the car sped away, tires squealing. Gunshots rang out, but sounded hollow and far away to her ears.

She tried to focus on the rugged profile of the man she’d trusted. The man who had let her down. The man who now reached over and grasped her clammy hand in his strong one. And she’d almost killed him.

“Don’t worry, Harper,” he was saying, but he sounded far off. “It’ll be all right.”

Would it? Would anything ever be all right? She sincerely doubted it. But it was nice anyway, given those were the last words she heard before embracing the darkness of an unconscious oblivion.

Jeff reread Dr. Andy’s report again. He simply could not reconcile the words and charts that covered the pages with the woman they depicted.

Harper Kane. She was one tough bitch.

When he’d first heard about the incident at the train yards, a rare excitement had overtaken him. Though he’d lost some good men, the sheer power unleashed upon them was immeasurable.

And that power was exactly what he’d been striving for.

Somehow, Ms. Kane had gotten her hands on the pure serum and used it. The pure serum that had evaded him. Her damned scientist brother must have given it to her before he destroyed his own lab and all remnants of his research. The details were still a tad sketchy, but the fact was the pure formula pumped through her much-too-healthy body.

The pure formula that was proving very difficult to replicate. Jeff had yet to be successful in reproducing the serum Dr. Kane had used on his precious plants.

Something was missing. Something that Harper Kane possessed. Something she’d refused to give him.

She was damn tough. Everything he’d had Dr. Andy expose her to had failed to produce acceptable results. Every extraction of blood had given him nothing. Plus she refused to utter a single word and barely screamed when subjected to his most inventive interrogation drugs. Drugs that had made experienced and trained men twice her impressive size break like dried twigs. It was as though Harper Kane were impenetrable.

And according to Dr. Andy’s reports, she was.

A loud smack vibrated through the quiet of his office as he slammed the papers on the top of his desk. Resting a fist against his mouth, Jeff thought hard about the decision he’d made just before Rome’s impromptu and unusual visit. To move Harper was risky. He wasn’t sure what to expect from her. But he had to take the chance. He wanted more intensive and invasive experiments. The larger lab facility was better equipped for the comprehensive trials and dissections he intended for her.