Rivals and Retribution by Shannon Delany Read Free Book Online Page B

“Pick up the eraser and let’s make up her mind for her.”
    I fought him. I begged him. Don’t do it, my mind screamed. Don’t erase her dream and replace it.…
    But he grabbed the eraser and went to work, his arm sweeping the height and width of the board to wipe it clean. To wipe out any trace of her dreams and desires.
    “It’s not coming off.…”
    “Put your back into it,” Mommy commanded. “Push your will onto hers.”
    I was going to be sick, but there was no way I could. I was without form. He was without form.…
    I was watching the memories of a ghost.
    The queasiness passed as he worked with a fierce passion and the words began to disappear.
    Mommy wasn’t just erasing Wanda’s future, she was changing Derek’s by letting him tamper with another person’s soul.
    Inside his head, I cried. For both of them.
    “Now what?”
    The floor beneath our feet shifted, the boards buckling.
    “Mommy?”
    “What is it?”
    “The room is … tilting.…”
    “Oh. Very good. She knows something’s wrong. She’s strong enough to rebel. Be quick, baby. You need to write the new goal and get out.”
    Back the way we’d come the door swung open and closed like a chewing mouth as the entire office slanted.
    “What do I write?”
    “In the center, write: ‘Work for the CIA.’ Then surround it with these words: ‘Shoot, Train, Fight, Work, Battle, Justice, Blood, Compete, Rise.’”
    We scrawled the words on the whiteboard, connecting them back to her goal with a trembling hand.
    The walls shuddered, pictures dancing off hooks and nails to crash on the floor and throw splinters of glass at us. “Finished!” we screamed.
    “Not yet,” Mommy said as we grabbed hold of the whiteboard’s tray to keep our footing. “Grab all the markers so she can’t rewrite her destiny.”
    I heard the smile in her voice and I shivered again.
    We grabbed the sliding markers and shoved them into every pocket as things fell off the bookshelves and rolled under the desk. “Done!”
    “Good boy! Now get out of there!”
    We let go of the whiteboard and slid toward the door, kicking it open and bursting out into the hallway.
    The ceiling undulated, tiles popping loose and flying in our direction, and Derek screamed, “Ouuut!”
    We were back in the room with Mommy, her face so close to ours we pulled back in surprise. She patted our hand.
    “How did I do?” we asked, panting from our efforts.
    “Beautifully. You didn’t give up, and you adapted to new circumstances. You’re a survivor,” she said proudly. “Now let’s get things ready for Auntie’s arrival.”
    I plummeted back into my own head—or he seemed to be vomited out of mine—but his mother’s words stuck.
    “You didn’t give up, and you adapted to new circumstances. You’re a survivor.”
    It was like Derek was sharing a lesson with me. With a groan, I kicked my feet out in front of me and rolled up onto my butt. The blanket fell off my shoulders, but it didn’t matter. Energy from Derek’s memory still washed through me beside the roaring headache. If I was going to survive this, I had to adapt.
    And I was determined to survive.
    Marlaena
    My brain spilled out of my ears as my lips parted for Gareth’s kiss. His mouth was all cloves and cinnamon drenched in honey, his lips somehow both soft and firm, his tongue delicately probing along the edge of my mouth, precise as a cautious finger.
    I sucked him down, filled my head with his smell, his taste, and wrapped my arms around him, letting my hands glide over the powerful muscles of his back and come to rest on his hips, just above that magnificent ass of his. He pressed me so close against his chest that my boobs ached, squashed against him the way I was, but I didn’t care. Because this was me and Gareth. Together. The way I’d wanted things to be for so long.
    And then he pulled back from me so slowly I followed him, bending toward that delicious mouth like a moth drawn to the buzzing bulbs