Mind Storm by K.M. Ruiz Read Free Book Online Page B

bodies.
    Jason struggled to bring up a telekinetic shield, but he was still suffering from being yanked unexpectedly out of a teleport and wasn’t quick enough to block the first wave completely. It shocked through him like lightning, curling through his nervous system and brain. His control skipped just out of reach and his shields wavered.
    Hands grabbed his arm and shoulder, dragging him behind the precarious safety of a pew. Kerr focused his power on Jason, looking into those bloodshot hazel eyes, and snarled, “Shields.”
    With Kerr’s help, Jason wrenched his power back into place, managing to slide his telekinesis around them both. The sudden absence of electric burn left both of them gasping for breath and reaching for their guns. Together, they took aim at Jin Li. Neither of them were surprised when all the bullets missed. A distraction only, and not a threat; both sides had telekinetics to shield against bullets.
    Across the aisle Threnody had her hand pressed firmly to the back of Quinton’s neck, her power regulating both their nervous systems against Jin Li’s attack. She was still recovering from the last time she had pulled this maneuver in Johannesburg against Jin Li and it was a strain, her power barely able to cope.
    â€œJason,” Threnody said. “Get a shield around Quinton.”
    She could handle Jin Li’s power on her own. Quinton was a drain on her reserves that she couldn’t allow. Seconds later, she felt invisible power hardening between her fingers and Quinton’s neck, a telekinetic barrier that would let him live. She pulled away, blue ribbons of electricity arcing from fingertip to fingertip, sliding up her arm and through her body. Quinton took aim with his gun at Samantha and fired, the weapon the only thing Jason wasn’t shielding. When the gun was wrenched out of his hands, nearly breaking his trigger finger, Quinton realized that Gideon didn’t much like people targeting his twin.
    Jason looked up, eyes sweeping over the cathedral’s interior to visually tag everyone’s position. His inspecs were dead in his eyes from the electrical surge, leaving only the human spectrum for him to work with, and eventually even that threatened to shut down as a massive telepathic blow pounded against his mental shields. The surprise that leaked from Samantha into his mind when they didn’t break wasn’t comforting.
    You can’t keep those up forever, Samantha said as she began to bear down on his mind.
    They keep themselves up, Jason shot back even as he dialed back on the strength of his telekinetic output to focus on the telepathic strike that was carving mental canyons into the outer edges of his mind. Canyons that were then filled by Kerr’s power, a burning challenge that Samantha was forced to reckon with.
    Get the fuck out of his mind, Kerr said.
    The twins had spent their entire life learning how to wield their powers simultaneously in a merge, like the dual psion they resembled, but weren’t. Kerr and Jason didn’t have the twins’ expertise, but that didn’t mean they weren’t up to the task of protecting themselves against a pair of Class II psions. It just meant they would be the first to falter.
    Nearby, Threnody had emptied an entire clip at the Warhounds, the bullets going everywhere except into bodies. Ejecting the empty magazine, she looked over at Quinton and said, “Burn it the fuck down.”
    He didn’t answer her in words. The air down in the Slums was heavy, thick, and hard to breathe at the best of times. It trapped heat and caused the temperature to rise higher than the regulated environment in the city towers of Los Angeles. It was already sticky hot in the cathedral, mere degrees cooler than the suffocating heat that burned outside.
    Quinton made it hotter.
    He couldn’t create fire, but he could control it, use it, make it grow. Quinton clenched his hands into fists, the