Chapter 5

• I stood in the closet with the women. For whatever reason, this closet could have been several stores filled with every size, style and accessory possible. I’d discovered, while showering, that during my slide I’d taken several layers of skin off my hip and leg, so the fact that this closet had loose-fitting workout clothes in my size was a plus.
• Daxx held up a pair of black sweatpants. “These look about right.”
• Taking them, I held them against my waist, they’d work. I pulled them on under the robe.
• Pulling a top off the hanger, I glanced at her. “The woman with the crazy man, she said she was an empath?”
• Daxx laughed and glanced to the other two women, who were also grinning. “Chase is going to love knowing he met you in that state.” She sobered, “but, yes she’s an empath.”
• I turned the top around and held it up against me. How I was dressed was the last thing on my mind at this point. I just wanted clothes on before the men came back. After that, I needed to figure out how to get home. I didn’t even know where I was. “I always wondered if there was such a thing.” I shrugged, “with what I can do, I suspected the stories about others were true,”
• Turning, I dropped the robe and pulled the shirt over my head. Pulling it down, I turned to see the not just the women standing there, but Arius in the doorway of the closet.
• His brows were furrowed. “Did I put that bruise on you?”
• I’d seen it when I showered, the mark from his arm wrapped from my collarbone to under my arm on the other side. I shrugged. “It’s no big deal. If that bruise wasn’t there, I would have drowned.” I touched my forehead. “This one is from bouncing off one of their invisible walls a few days ago.” I shrugged, “thought I’d found a spot without one.” I touched my cheek, “this is from branches.”
• His grey eyes flicked to mine briefly, he didn’t look placated by that reasoning. He looked at Daxx. “Have you discussed anything with her?”
• She shook her head. “Not really.”
• Closing the distance between us in a few strides, he stopped in front of me and leaned down. “I can take the bruising away.”
• I gave him a surprised look. “You have a healing touch?” I’d never heard of something like that, but wouldn’t that be cool.
• He shook his head. “No, blood.”
• My eyebrows shot up. “That’s a little too vampy for me, but thanks I can live with a bit of bruising considering it saved my life.”
• He made a sound of displeasure in the back of his throat and rested his hand on my shoulder as he leaned down and looked at me.
• I waited for the words, something like ‘please let me take them away’, but he said nothing. His eyes were haunting, but nice to see the pale grey this close. I felt a pressure in my head, a new weird feeling I’d never felt before. I frowned, “are you trying to mess in my head?” I stepped back so his hand dropped. “That’s kind of an invasion of privacy, you know,” I nodded, “please don’t.”
• Straightening he gave me an odd look. “You felt that?”
• “Yes.”
• Daxx came over. “Has that ever happened before?”
• Arius shook his head, “not that I know of.” He shrugged, “Troy would know, or someone with a similar ability—” he looked down at me. “What is yours?”
• I held up my arm with the red cuff on. “Take this off and I’ll show you. It’s not dangerous.”
• His gaze moved over my face slowly, emotion moving through his eyes, but he didn’t say anything. I held his gaze, so he could see I wasn’t scamming him. Looking down, he lifted my arm and pulled something out of his pocket. It looked like a barcode scanner. “This one may not work on an illegal device. If not, I have some older models we can try.”
• I nodded and held my breath as he turned my arm over and held it against the cuff. I wondered how he knew where to hold it.
• “Your pulse is what closes it.” He said then pushed the button.
• It zapped my wrist. I jumped but didn’t pull my arm away.
• Moving the scanner, he pulled the cuff off my arm. He looked at it, turning it slowly. “How would they know how to make these? This is almost flawless.”
• “We need to figure that out.” Daxx said not sounding happy.
• I rubbed my arm where it had rested since I woke up on the island. “Thank you.” I looked around for something to use. I wanted to show them that I wasn’t dangerous. I remembered the cup from my tea. “Come out here.” I walked out of the closet and went over to the bed. Picking up the cup, I drank the last sip as I walked to the middle of the room. I turned to look at them. Tossing the cup into the air, I held my hand up toward it. It stopped falling halfway to the floor, and was suspended in the air. I kept my eyes on it. “I didn’t stop the cup. I manipulated the time around it. It’s hard to explain.”
• “Cool is what it is.” Daxx said.
• “Where is she?” A voice boomed from the door.