peer at his brother curiously. “He’s definitely gone completely off the deep end this time.”
I did what I usually did when it came to the demon and ignored him. “Stephen grabbed me yesterday morning. He has me in a locked room, but I don’t know where.”
“How can you do this? How can I hear you in my head?”
“Now he’s talking to himself,” Kraven said, bemused.
“Shut up,” Zach snapped at him. “You’re not helping.”
Kraven rolled his eyes. “Whatever. He’s crazy, that’s all. Don’t you see that?”
God, he was so frustrating. “Tell James I told him to shut the hell up.”
Bishop snorted. “He’d just talk more.”
The image I saw through Bishop’s eyes went staticky again, it flickered to black, to white and then back to normal. “I don’t think this is going to last much longer. Bishop, listen to me. I got to you from that piece of your soul I took—it’s still inside me. It’s what our bond is, why I can see things. It works both ways, I’m sure of it. So you need to find that, too. You have to follow it.”
“I’ll do it. I’ll find you. I swear it.”
“Hurry, though. I—I don’t have much time.”
“What do you mean?” His voice turned harsh and raw. “Did that son of a bitch hurt you? I’m going to kill him.”
“Stephen locked me in a room with someone—someone with a soul. Please, you need to find—”
Snap!
The thread connecting us disappeared and my mind returned fully to the small, locked room. My eyes popped open.
“What are you doing?” Jordan demanded. “Do you really think meditation is going to help us right now?”
I sent a look at her across the room. “You sure better hope so.”
So strange, but just being in Bishop’s head helped to bring me some much-needed warmth. The whole time I’d seen through his eyes I didn’t think once about the previous memory melds, not once. I wasn’t afraid of him. All I felt when I’d been in his head was that warmth. He wasn’t the same person now that he’d been back then.
I’d told him I wanted him to stay away from me. He’d believed me, even though I’d never told a bigger lie in my life.
“Now what?” Jordan asked, the anger fading from her voice.
I swallowed hard. “Now we wait.”
I concentrated on the sound of my heart beating, but I lost count at a thousand. My stomach growled. It was so empty after being locked in here for so long. Food might help a little; the more I ate the better I felt. But not enough.
Something hit me and I opened my eyes to look down at the energy bar that had pinged off my leg.
“Eat it,” Jordan said.
“It won’t help.”
“Eat it anyway.”
I ate it. And then I tried to come up with a Plan B. Because with every minute that ticked by, my resolve and my control were slipping away like the sand in a very scary hourglass.
My chills returned and my arms broke out in goose bumps. I crossed my arms over my chest and tried to keep from shivering.
I could figure this out. I had to use my brain, which had rarely failed me before—not including the F I’d received on my English test. I’d assumed I knew enough. One can’t assume. One had to know for sure, because guessing could lead to failure.
I could pretend to take Jordan’s soul. Stephen would see through the camera and he’d come in. I’d use Jordan’s brick to knock him out. Yeah, that was a plan.
A really lousy one.
“Come on, brain,” I mumbled under my breath. “Start thinking.”
Sadly, it wasn’t cooperating today. A full hour had gone by and Bishop wasn’t here. We were stuck and nobody was going to rescue us.
“I don’t like the way you’re looking at me,” Jordan said uneasily. “I swear, if you come anywhere near me, I’m clobbering you.”
She scrambled to her feet as I moved closer to her. My wrist and shoulder were still in pain, but it was a distant echo now. My hunger had steadily moved to the forefront, impossible to ignore. Impossible to fight.
“I can take you,” she managed shakily. “You’ve never intimidated me before. I mean, look at you. You’re the size of a hobbit.”
Normally, I’d resent that. I wasn’t the size of a hobbit. Five-two wasn’t that short, but compared to statuesque aspiring models like Jordan...
Size didn’t matter. Not in a case like this.
I’d made it across the room, so close now that she gasped and raised the