Winter's Storm: Retribution (Winter's Saga #2) by Karen Luellen Read Free Book Online Page A

shrugged humbly, “I dunno. I really just want to figure out how to get mom better faster. And maybe, figure out what happened to us to make us so different from all the other metas.” He grinned adorably, “Strictly selfish reasons, really.”
    “ I think you’d make a wonderful doctor, Evan. Maybe we should look into getting you accepted to a university so you could begin pre-med classes?” I asked casually after finishing my last bite of rice.
    “ First thing first, Meggie,” he said in an absolutely serious tone, “we’ve got to take care of some unfinished business.”
    “ Right,” I said clearing my plate. “We need to talk with Alik and get a plan in motion. Sometimes, I feel like Williams could walk through that door any minute and put a bullet through mom’s head.” I shivered at the thought.
    “ Naw, he wouldn’t get his own hands dirty. That’s not his style. He’d send a meta to finish the job. That’s who we have to look out for: Some guy who looks completely out of place here; probably tall, muscular and extremely clever. He’s done with regular hired henchmen. He’d send a meta like the one who attacked you in his office,” Evan’s eyes were too busy watching Maze chase his now empty paper plate around the floor licking every last morsel off to see Meg’s face pale.
    “ Of course,” she whispered thoughtfully rubbing the scar on her thigh. “That’s exactly how he’d do it, isn’t it?”
    “ That’s how I would do it if I were him,” Evan leaned down and grabbed Maze’s empty plate before he started to rip it up and eat the pieces, as he’s been known to do. The old goat!
    “ Of course, there is still the matter of our blood. He wanted to study us to figure out what he stumbled upon that worked so well in the serum we were given. He probably still wants us. Blood samples only last for an hour or two before the fragile molecular compounds start to change and/or lose their blueprints,” Evan was thinking out loud now. He was casually discussing the ideas that had scared the apple fritters out of me ever since this whole thing came to light.
    Ugh, again I’m amazed at how nonchalant he could be in the face of scary stuff like, oh I dunno, becoming lab rats again, mom getting off-ed right in front of us, watching a madman use us as his weapons of mass destruction by cloning us and turning the clones into mindless drones to do his bidding, you know…all the stuff that wicked, scary books and movies love to throw in their plots. How can Evan just casually speculate and project these very real scenarios and outcomes?
    “ Hum, but you know, he doesn’t need all three of us,” Evan stopped talking and looked pensively over at me. “Just one of us would probably suffice for his purposes.”
    As if my face wasn’t pale enough, I felt myself go perfectly still at my brother’s words. I stared at him, unblinking for a full minute, feeling all the terror of the last few weeks wash over me with a completely different slant on what could have happened.
    “ Breathe, Meg,” Evan ordered. “Meg, come on. Don’t freak out on me. All of this is just me throwing around ideas—you know, hypotheticals. I could be completely wrong. Who knows what is logical in the mind of a madman?”
    Just then, there was a knock at the door that scared the heck out of me. “Hello, there Winter family!” Dr. Andrews called through the closed door.
    “ You have got to stop drinking caffeinated coffee, Meg,” Evan teased as he walked to the door to let the doctor in.
    “ Good morning Meg, Evan. How’s the patient this morning?” He asked us, oblivious to the tension he just walked in on. Out came his little flash light as he leaned over mom’s closed eyes. He gently lifted one lid at a time to expose the pupil. Quick flashes of light across her eyes seemed to make the doctor happy. “Nice and reactive,” he mumbled and put his stethoscope to mom’s chest. After a few moments he said, “Good,