Revolution (Collide, #4)(71)

She smiled softly at me and then walked down the wall to the street. I followed closely behind and watched as she gazed up at the town sign, 'Welcome To Effingham, Illinois'.

I felt the others at my back and turned to Miguel. He had a curious look on his face. Sherry turned to me. "Lift me, babe."

I didn't ask why, I just did it. I hoisted her up easily to sit on my right shoulder and watched as she shook the can and sprayed it, her arm moving and swinging with the motion. I couldn't see what she wrote, but when she stopped, I lowered her back to my side and we all looked at it with a reverence I felt pulsing through us all. She had written over some of the words.

The sign now read, "Welcome To Our Town".

"Looks good," Chesser said and crossed his arms. "Sounds like a country song."

Everyone laughed behind us. I looked down at her and she looked up at me. We both smiled at the same time. "Let's go home," she said. "Let's go wait and see if all this was worth it."

So I picked her hand up in mine and we all walked back to the van.

"You'll need to come home with us. You know that right?" I looked at each of Chesser's men. "You're all welcome."

"Well," he said and sucked air through his teeth. "I'm not sure we could go home again, so I guess we've got no choice but to take you up on your offer."

The others agreed vigorously.

As soon as we were pulling out of one side of the parking lot, another van was pulling in on the other. I had no doubts it was the Lighters and Enforcers and we had dodged a major bullet. But the ride home was uneventful and as soon as we pulled in, it was apparent our night of anxiety had been for a good cause. We did it and now, just needed to wait to see if the tape played or not.

"I just don't get it, I guess," one of Chesser's men said.

"Get what?" Chesser asked him and looked around at the dilapidated warehouse.

"I just don't get this compulsion thing." We parked the van under the tree and made our way to the ladder.

"What don't you get?" Marissa asked and went up the ladder ahead of Jeff. We all lumbered up to the roof before he spoke again.

"How can the Lighters compel us? And how come this tape thing is going to work?"

"One compulsion overrides the other," she explained and punched the elevator button. "They compelled those people. Sherry's tape, in a sense, will override the compulsion and they can think for themselves again. Sherry can't do compulsion, but…." She shook her head. "For some reason, when someone is told the truth about the Lighters, the compulsion wears off."

"I see." He rubbed his chin and looked around the elevator. "Then how come I was never under the compulsion to begin with?"

The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Marissa shrugged and sighed as she went through. "Don't know, but it's so good to be home!" she exclaimed. That was when I saw Lily bolting through the crowd toward us. I pushed the jabber mouth out of the way and lifted her sweet smelling self into my arms. Sherry was at my side and hugged her, too.

"What have you been eating?" I asked and laughed at the fruit pulp stuck on her lip.

"Peaches," she spouted.

"That's why you smell so sweet," I told her. "Did you and Lana have fun?"

"Not reawwy," she admitted and whispered the rest. "She wouldn't let me eat anything but peaches while you were gone."

Sherry chuckled and covered her mouth with her fingers. "What did you expect her to do, bug? Feed you everything there was just because we were gone?"

"Um, yeah! Isn't dat what babysitters do!" she crossed her little arms and pouted in the cutest way. I hugged her to me before seeing Chesser over Sherry's shoulder. I hoisted Lily to my chest and turned to him. "As you can see it's not much. We sleep on pallets. It's concrete. It sucks," I admitted, but he laughed.

"No worries. I just feel bad that we couldn't bring anything with us," he said and looked around. "Things just went from bad to worse tonight. They caught us as we were going in. Sorry."

We'd all been so quiet, reflective, on the way home that we hadn't talked much. We had no idea what had happened.

"No worries, mate," Miguel grinned his wolfish grin and slapped Chesser on the back. "We got lots of chores for you to do to earn your keep."

Chesser grinned back good naturedly. "I bet you do."

Miguel laughed and came to me and Lily. "Come on, little love." He winked at me. "Daddy and mommy have lots of…talking to do tonight."

Sherry laughed into my arm to hide her blush, but I just couldn't do anything but be grateful to that Aussie. "Thanks, man."

"You got it." He held out his free hand to Rylee. "You coming, sheila?

She looked at us all in turn and then straightened her back. She took Lily from Miguel and hoisted her to her hip. "Come on, little girl. Let me teach you the importance of pepper spray."

Miguel just laughed, turned and gave me a very suggestive thumbs up, and then trotted after the girls. I switched my gaze to Chesser, who seemed pretty amused by things. I pointed at the crate near us. "Sleeping bags are there. Bathroom, and I use that term loosely, is back there." I smiled. "Goodnight."