The Countdown (The Taking #3)(5)

I rolled onto my back so I could find him, and even from all the way down here, I could make out his form, bare except for his boxer shorts. I could see his expression, distorted as it was. There was something there as he searched for me. What was it? Worry? Fear?

Anxiety percolated in my chest, bubbling like the spring beneath as I realized I needed to reach him. I kicked my legs hard behind me. When I was close enough, the drawn line of his mouth and his pinched brow became crystal clear.

It wasn’t just worry on his face, it was stark panic.

His fingers pinched my arm as he dragged me the rest of the way to the top. When we broke through the surface, he choked out, “Kyra . . . what the . . . What the hell?” His feet caught the rocks beneath him finding his balance, and I couldn’t tell if he was stammering because he was frustrated or because he was breathless.

When his green eyes probed mine there was hot accusation in them.

I shot him a mute frown as I tried to unravel what I’d missed during the time I’d been down there.

His grip intensified. “I thought . . .” He scowled back at me, and I saw the way his gaze swept over me then. “You were down there too long.”

Then realization hit home: Tyler didn’t remember.

I shook my head, my whole body unwinding. I reached up and pressed my thumb to the bridge of his nose, where his eyebrows were practically fused together. “It’s okay,” I explained, willing him to understand. “I didn’t need to breathe . . . down there. I can hold my breath for so, so long.” It sounded strange to say it again, especially to Tyler, but even without seeing the proof on his face I could sense him collecting himself.

And then he released a strangled sigh. “God, that too? How long?”

I shrugged. “I never really tested it. A long time though.” I dared a quick smile, thinking of the first time Tyler had seen that little trick of mine in action, when it wasn’t a trick at all but because my leg had been trapped beneath a fallen log in a rushing river. Agent Truman had been chasing us and we’d had no choice but to jump into the raging waters.

That was nothing at all like now. Here.

“Really long,” I finally answered.

Tyler might be like me in the sense that we could heal faster than the Returned, which was already pretty darned impressive, but I had a few other new talents he didn’t. Maybe because the aliens had taken me for five years versus Tyler’s five days. I could see in the dark and hold my breath for forever. I could also throw crazy hard—something Agent Truman had discovered when he’d been on the receiving end of my new killer fastball and ended up with a broken hand.

And sometimes, when I concentrated just right, I could even move things with my mind. Even I had to admit that last thing was pretty freaking cool.

I lowered my hand to his jaw. He didn’t move, and our eyes stayed locked while my stomach flipped. I swallowed nervously.

“Your eyes,” Tyler said, his voice thick now. Low too. “They’re doing that thing again.”

I studied his eyes back, only slightly brighter than they’d been before, but definitely greener. Then I blinked deliberately, intentionally casting a long slow shadow over his face.

Another of my freaky new talents.

“They always remind me of fireflies, when we’re in the dark like this.” He spoke softly, his eyes fastened to mine.

I shuddered. That word, fireflies, raked up my guilt all over again.

I tried to shrug it off. There were so many things I wanted . . . needed to tell him. So many things I needed to confess, starting with Devil’s Hole—the night I’d let him be taken.

For me, it may as well have happened yesterday. There wasn’t enough bleach in the world to scrub the memory of those bugs, all those prickly firefly legs swarming over my skin, tangling in my hair, and finding their way up my nose right before Tyler vanished. I’d felt choked by them, smothered.

He was right about my eyes, though. Denial didn’t make the truth any less real. There were times, especially at night, when my eyes flared like strange glowing orbs—impossibly-ridiculously-comically bright.

So, not only could I see in the dark, but if the moment was right, I could also be seen. I’d become a human beacon.

Tyler ran his finger along my cheekbone. “If it makes you feel any better, it’s not really your eyes I’m thinking about.” This time, I didn’t blink to get a reaction from him; it was strictly knee-jerk. But the glow from my eyes, which was too intense for the kind of blackness out here in the dense woods, flashed over his face all the same—once, then twice, and then a third time, while my breath faltered.

Simon had the worst timing and chose that moment to pop into my head, all grinning and smug-like. Typical.

“You know, if we have to be going through all this, I’m glad we’re in it together.” Tyler’s gaze shifted, moving to my lips.

My stomach dropped as I tried to blot Simon from my mind’s eye. He was a serious mood killer.

A week ago, I’d have begged Tyler to look at me like that. For his lips to find mine.

But that was a week ago, before I realized he wouldn’t remember who we were to each other, and what we’d been through. And before Simon had planted that stupid, stupid, stupid kiss on me at the last minute, right before he’d left me and Tyler with my dad.

Now . . .