the room. I didn’t know much about video surveillance, but there were a half-dozen places they could have put a camera. The good news is that it was on the ground floor and there were big windows, so if they came for me in the middle of the night I could send a chair out the glass and follow behind. I had a reasonable amount of confidence that I could run faster than any of them. Hopefully fast enough to escape into the trees if need be.
I sat down on the bed and realized for the first time just how tense I was. My shoulder muscles were crying out for relief; I’d been walking around ready for someone (Wolfe) to come jumping out at me. I rubbed my neck with one hand while I held the bottle with the other.
The bedspread was dark navy, the only splash of color in a room that was a dim beige. It was so generic and stark, totally lacking in décor, it had to have been done by a guy. No woman could abide anything this plain and boring. I thought about how straightforward and businesslike Ariadne’s wardrobe was and conceded that maybe she could have done it. But no one with any taste.
I found it hard to believe how much things had changed for me in the last couple days. My mind went once more to Reed, and I found myself wondering if he was okay. I thought about those brown eyes, and they hung in front of me. I lay back on the bed and they still lingered; and a few moments after I lay my head on the pillow, I fell into a deep sleep.
Seven
I knew I was dreaming. It was weird, but I could feel it, the darkness of the room just fading away as I slipped off to unconsciousness. Streaks of light from outside the window shot through my field of vision and a sensation of falling was replaced with a feeling of weightlessness, like the moment before you step down a stair in a dream and your heart catches and you wake.
Except I didn’t wake. I saw Reed again, those brown eyes staring, searching for me. The haze around me began to lighten. Splashes of color entered the world around me and I realized Reed was coming into focus, details adding in front of my eyes. He looked at me with confusion. “Sienna? Where are we?”
I felt a chill and looked down. There were two figures at my feet. A face stared back at me with dead eyes. “I think we’re in the parking lot of the grocery store where Wolfe found us.”
He looked at me with practiced skepticism. “What’s going on here?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
He looked at the body at my feet. “I remember going to sleep…but this isn’t like any dream I’ve ever had. In a dream, you can’t pick your words, and ridiculous things happen. Like a man with a platter of cheese slices comes wandering through, and it seems totally normal until you wake up.” He eyed me with an air of uncertainty. “Right?”
“I’ve never dreamed about a man with cheese slices.”
“But you know what I mean? This really happened, right?” He looked down at the body. “I remember this guy’s face.”
Remembering the two men who died here – trying to help me – took the thought of laughter away. “What happened to you? I woke up at the headquarters for those two clowns who broke into my house.”
Reed flinched. “Yeah, I saw them get you. I had to bail. Wolfe messed me up pretty bad or I might have tried to fight them off.”
I narrowed my eyes as I looked at him. “Are you a meta too?”
His hands fell to his waist. “Yeah.”
“So what can you do? What’s your…power?”
“The basics. Stronger than most. Nothing compared to that Wolfe guy, but I can tip over a car if I have to. I heal fast, of course. Some other stuff. Nothing major.” He looked down, eyes avoiding mine.
“Uh huh. So why didn’t you square with me when we were talking in the store?”
“It’s your first day out in the world, you’re running to escape from some guys who are shooting at you, and I get to break the news to you that you’re a superhuman. Yeah,” he said with sarcasm, “that wouldn’t have sent you running away from me.”
“It might not have.” I thought about it for a minute. “Yeah, it probably would have