Freeze (Midnight Ice Book Two) Read online

  A moment later, Sam appeared by her side.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Go away,” she whispered, hiding the words in the shadows so the girl couldn’t hear them, not looking at Sam, not giving him the chance to distract her.

  “You don’t need help. You’re better off doing this on your own,” he stressed, voice firm and somewhat demanding.

  “Go away,” she ordered again.

  “Who do you want to talk to, Pandora?”

  She zipped her lips shut.

  “Why are you making this deal?”

  Pandora turned to meet his blazing blue eyes and didn’t say a word. Instead, she smiled a coy little smile and shrugged. Two can play at this game, mister. I’ve got secrets too. And no one said I have to tell them to you. Sort of sucks being kept out of the loop, doesn’t it?

  Her message came through loud and clear.

  Sam narrowed his gaze, nostrils flaring. In a blink, he disappeared.

  Pandora turned back to the girl, who’d pursed her lips, eyes glowing an intense amber color as she scrutinized the empty space she knew Pandora filled. “Why do you think you can trust me to keep my end of the bargain once we get out?”

  “I don’t,” Pandora answered honestly. “If there’s one thing life’s taught me, it’s that you can’t trust anyone. But I am good at reading people. The first time I came in here, you thought I was a lost soul seeking assistance, and you freely offered to help, which means you’re kind. When I tossed out the idea of a bargain, you were cautious instead of opportunistic, which means you’re smart. You said you only make deals with people you can trust, which means you’ve still got enough good in your heart to have faith. And I’m guessing that like me, you’re a victim of circumstance rather than a hardened criminal who deserves to be in this hellhole. You’re about as close to a safe bet as I’m going to find given the circumstances. And right now, I’m willing to take a gamble. So, what do you say?”

  “I’d say you sound quite arrogant for someone who’s seemingly lost everything,” she answered. And then she grinned, a full, beaming smile that oozed with mischief. “But for this sort of undertaking, I’m not so sure overconfidence is a bad thing. How do you plan to get out?”

  “First things first—are you in, and what’s your name?”

  “Nayelé,” she said, letting each syllable roll off her tongue in a thick accent Pandora hadn’t noticed before, hinting that though her English was perfect, it wasn’t her native tongue. “Naya for short. And yes, I’m in.”

  “Excellent.” Pandora sat down as a matching smile widened her cheeks, one that was ready to start causing trouble. “If it were just me escaping, the plan would be relatively simple. Slip out of my cell, through a couple walls, up the stairs, and boom, I’m free. But getting us both out alive will be a little trickier. Luckily for you, I’ve got experience with this sort of thing.”

  “With prison breaks?” Naya snorted, doubtful.

  Pandora made a face she was happy the medium couldn’t see and pressed on. “I’ve managed to sneak my way into the control room and have studied this place enough to know the best route to the front door. It’s just the how I haven’t completely worked out. I’m thinking, I could zip to the control room and wreak some havoc on their security system—clip some wires, open the doors, render the computers useless for a short time, stuff like that. In the chaos, I find us a keycard, and we sneak out.”

  “That’s the plan?” Naya frowned. “I might have signed on a little too soon.”

  “Hear me out,” Pandora jumped in. “You have no idea how good I am at creating distractions. There are three huge floors full of cells above our heads, and I’m guessing they’re holding all sorts of pissed-off supernaturals who’d love to do some damage should, I don’t know, their doors mysteriously open, setting them all free. With a little more time in the control room, I’m sure I can figure it out. And in all of that craziness, we’d slip by no problem.”

  “No problem?”

  Okay, that’s it, Pandora thought, getting pissed off now. The attitude on this girl was ridiculous. She was offering freedom, a golden freaking ticket, at her own expense. “You know, I’m sure I could find some other medium in the world who’d be a hell of a lot more grateful for my help.”

  “You probably could,” Naya responded smoothly, not at all affected.

  Pandora gaped, gobsmacked. You know, I’m seriously regretting offering to save your smart ass, she silently snapped.

  Then the girl continued, “But there’s no other medium in the world who’s as powerful as me.”

  Pandora paused her internal rant, intrigued. “I’m listening…”

  “Do you think they have vampires in any of those cells?”

  “I’m certain of it. I saw a few on the monitors in the control room. Why?”

  “Because,” Naya said, voice gaining a cunning Pandora hadn’t fully noticed before, “I’m not just a medium. I’m a necromancer. The most powerful necromancer in recent history, which means I don’t only speak to the dead, I command them. And that includes the undead too.”

  Oh, I’m starting to like you, Pandora thought, mind whirling with the possibilities. But aloud, all she said was, “Is that what you meant by ‘among other things’?”

  “Not entirely,” she answered, eyes glowing again. “But it is what got me stuck in here. I was looking for someone, I was ordering vampires around to do it, and I got quite a large target on my back because of it. So the titans came calling, offering their protection.” She sneered as she said that last word—serene, peaceful persona totally gone. “Couldn’t you tell locking me in a cage was for my own good?”

  Pandora inhaled sharply at the injustice. She’d spent the first nearly sixteen years of her life with titans, and she never suspected they did anything but good. But apparently, she was becoming a cynic in her old age because she didn’t doubt Naya’s claim for a second. “How long?” she asked softly. “How long have you been in here?”

  “Six months,” Naya confessed, voice bitter. “Six months, and the whole time, he’s been, he’s still—” She forced her lips shut, taking a long deep breath, letting the frustrated wrinkles smooth out, letting the passive, calm persona take over.

  Pandora knew better than to ask for more details.

  Naya looked up, gaze the slightest bit grateful for Pandora’s silence. “Tell me the plan again. I’ll shut up this time.”

  About damn time, Pandora snarked. But it was only halfhearted. There was something about Naya, about the fight she’d just seen in her peculiar eyes, about the selfless tone of her voice, that Pandora liked, that she understood.

  So she launched into the plan, slower this time, with more detail, pausing to let the other girl give her input. And after about an hour, Pandora’s rough idea had become a full-blown plan of attack—one they were going to start implementing tomorrow, giving Pandora the rest of the day to hide out in the control room and gather intel.

  But just as she was getting ready to leave, a thought stopped her.

  “Naya?” she asked, voice vulnerable enough to make the other girl pause and tilt her head curiously. “The ghosts you talk to, do they ever…do they ever tell you where they are? What it looks like?”

  “They’re here, I think,” she answered truthfully. “They’re all around us, wandering aimlessly, part of the world yet unable to interact with it, separate somehow. Why?”

  The darkness of the shadows billowing around her suddenly seemed deeper, emptier, more like a void as the image of Sam floated through her mind. He didn’t seem dead, not when she spoke to him, not during those brief moments where his touch felt solid and warm. But if he wasn’t a ghost, what was he? “No reason.”

  Naya paused and then shrugged.

  But Pandora didn’t leave.

  Something still nagged at her, an annoying little stabbing sensation in the back of her mind. Sam. And his little tidbits. And his hints. And what if she could get one answer, just one,
right now?

  “What?” Naya asked, sensing Pandora’s hesitation.

  “Nothing.” Pandora shook her head. She should let it go. She was playing with fire. The two of them had only just met, only just agreed on a fragile truce, a means to a mutually beneficial end. She couldn’t risk losing Naya’s trust by revealing she hadn’t been totally honest about why she was locked up, what she could possibly mean—what she might be. Saying her father wanted to kill her was one thing. Revealing that it was because he thought she might mean the end of the world was quite another.

  Pandora had to be careful.

  She couldn’t give away too much too soon.

  And yet…

  Naya raised her brows, expectant.

  “It’s just,” she said finally, words tumbling out. “Do you believe in reincarnation? I’ve always wondered, and I’ve never had anyone with real experience to ask.”

  “That’s what you want to know?” Naya asked, surprised.

  “What?” Pandora retorted, defensive. “The idea of life after death isn’t big enough for you?”

  “No,” she said and then shook her head. “I’m surprised, that’s all. Most people I’ve met here seem to buy into the whole heaven-and-hell, judgment-day way of thinking. I didn’t expect it.”

  “But do you?”

  “Where I come from, we believe the sun god holds the key to heaven’s door, to a life of peace, once earned. But it can take many lifetimes to earn a spot within that sacred fire, to shed the darkness and live an existence worthy of being brought to the light. And everything I’ve experienced confirms that belief. The souls I meet, the ones who walk this earth, they’re not at peace. They’re restless. They’re all waiting for a second chance to do better, to be more.”

  “And do they get that chance?”

  “Most do,” she said and then frowned, thoughts retreating to a place Pandora couldn’t follow, a private, extremely personal space. “But occasionally, there are those who become lost to the darkness, those who have traveled in too deep and have lost sight of the light. Not everyone can be saved.”

  Naya was talking about someone else, someone Pandora had never met she was sure. And yet, her throat still suddenly turned dry. Her mouth grew chalky. She swallowed. “Saved from the darkness?”

  Naya blinked, clearing her expression, returning from whatever gloomy place her mind had wandered to. And then her eyes focused, seeming to look directly into Pandora’s, seeming to stare right through her. “Saved from themselves.”

  Pandora looked at the ebony tendrils twisting around her arms, resting over her frame like an inky veil, protecting her, hiding her. And what if darkness has become your only light? What if shadows and swirling smoke are the only things that bring you hope, the only things that understand you? What then?

  But she didn’t ask.

  She couldn’t.

  “I’ll be back in a few hours,” she mumbled before melting into her power, letting her world turn black and vanishing into the mist.

  But she didn’t go to the control center as she was supposed to.

  She didn’t follow the plan.

  She floated back through the wall, picturing her cell, picturing her room, picturing Sam. And when she opened her eyes, he was there, watching her, studying her.

  Their eyes held.

  The world faded away, until it was just Sam and her, alone in a starless sky.

  “Don’t ever fear the darkness,” Sam whispered, as though he’d been listening to her conversation, listening to her thoughts. “That’s what they want you to do, fear yourself, fear our power.”

  He reached out, bending his fingers and rolling his wrist, twisting and turning his hand through the shadows. The ebony tendrils washed over his golden skin like a smooth current, moving where he moved, chasing his touch. He stopped just short of her skin.

  “What’s so great about the sun?” he mused offhandedly. “A burning ball of fire in the sky? Harsh light stings the eyes. Too much heat can melt a person’s flesh. Too warm and the world itself withers.”

  “It brings life,” Pandora murmured. Wasn’t that what she learned in science class? The solar system, the Earth, so incredibly unique that there might literally be only one place like it across the entire universe. A perfectly harmonious ecosystem with the sun at its core. “Without the sun, there’d be nothing.”

  “Without the night, there’d be nothing,” Sam countered, voice a soft breeze rolling over her, bringing a shiver to her skin. “The darkness brings cool air and morning dew, brings relief from the harsh light of day, brings reprieve. The night is for artists, for wishes upon stars, for dreams…” He paused. The tips of his fingers pressed momentarily against her, a lightning touch she felt down to her core. “For lovers.”

  Pandora inhaled sharply, snatching her hand away as a bolt flashed down her spine. She looked away, unable to stand the intensity in his gaze.

  “The night is for the lonely, the lost, the misunderstood,” Sam continued, circling her so his words wrapped around her, holding her even tighter than an embrace. “Darkness is safety—safety from judgment, safety to be exactly who you want to be, safety to do exactly what you want to do, to love who you want to love. Don’t turn your back on the shadows, Pandora.” He paused in front of her, putting his finger under her chin, warm and almost real. Slowly, he lifted her face, forcing her to look into his twinkling blue eyes. For the first time, they looked more like the stars than the sea, as though his words had the power to change them. “Darkness is freedom.”

  No, Pandora thought, breaking the spell, remembering she had a place she needed to be, a plan she needed to follow. Freedom is freedom.

  Breaking his gaze, Pandora pulled the shadows closer, using her mind to replace his penetrating expression with control panels and computers, with television screens and wires. Her body dissolved into the darkness, enveloped by it, and Pandora let it carry her away.

  Chapter Five

  Pandora watched Jax sleep through the glass of her cell. She had known he wouldn’t leave the way he’d been ordered to, that he couldn’t leave. No command—not from her father, not from his father—would be strong enough to overcome the guilt keeping him here.

  In fact, Pandora had been banking on it.

  Waking up to find Jax outside of her cell was phase one of the plan. Because she knew all his weaknesses, knew just what to say, knew just what to do to get what she wanted. That’s the dark side of loving someone with your whole heart, she thought sadly. You end up knowing exactly how to destroy them.

  After all, it was what Jax had done to her on the road trip. He’d said all the right things to make her drop her walls, all the right things to make her trust him despite her better judgment. He’d known every one of her weaknesses—how much she yearned for companionship, how much she wanted to be loved and accepted, how much she was secretly drowning in her loneliness—and he’d used them against her.

  Well, it was her turn now.

  And she knew Jax—knew how much he always wanted to be her savior, knew he couldn’t stand her ire, knew he felt trapped and had felt trapped for most of his life. A musician in a titan’s body. A lover and an executioner. A man bound by duty and honor, bound so tight he’d lost sight of his own thoughts, his own decisions, his own fight. And wrapped in all that was his guilt—guilt that he couldn’t save her, guilt that he couldn’t fight for her, guilt that he couldn’t grant the dreams he always promised he would.

  He was desperate to stop things from ending this way.

  Desperate to explain himself, to make her understand, before it was too late.

  Before she was gone.

  Before she spent the rest of eternity blaming him.

  And she did blame him. Not entirely. Not even the most. After all, Jax hadn’t placed this gruesome fate on her shoulders. Jax hadn’t ordered her execution. Jax hadn’t spent his entire life lying to her. Jax had been almost as innocent a victim in this deadly game as she was.

  Unti
l a few weeks ago.

  Until he hunted her down, used their once-beautiful love, and twisted it into something ugly, something painful—a weapon to trap her.

  Jax, the naïve boy who’d been confused, who’d had his entire life flipped upside down by finding out the girl he loved might destroy the world, who’d had to make a split-second decision on the eve of his initiation and had chosen safely? Chosen his family, his community, and his duty over her? She didn’t blame him.

  She blamed the man asleep outside her glass cage.

  The man who’d known exactly what he was doing.

  The man whose seafoam eyes had just flickered open, then widened in shock when the sleep drifted away, and he realized she was sitting before him, fully visible to the world.

  Jax scrambled to his feet, tripping over himself as he jumped for the intercom button, moving as though she might vanish at any second. “Dory?”

  “I want to speak to my father,” she responded, tone even and absent, emotionless and hard. Because she knew that voice would hurt him, would cut him.

  “Dory.” He seemed to exhale the sound, breathy and surprised.

  “I want to speak to my father,” she repeated, stern. Those words were probably the last ones he expected to come out of her mouth.

  “I…” Jax started and stopped. His jaw dropped open, but no sound came out. It closed. Then bobbed for a second, lips twitching as he fought for the words. He’d been lying outside her room for five days straight, waiting for this moment, but he had nothing to say. Because what was there to say? What could he say to the woman he loved, when she was the same woman he was helping to murder? “I…I’m…”

  “You’re what?” Pandora asked, calm and controlled, trying her best to stay that way. She took a deep breath, preparing to launch her attack. Words were the weapons. Words that would hit him like bullets to the chest. One shot. Two shots. Dead.