Free Chaos by Lanie Bross Page A

except for a claw-foot tub in one corner that looked ridiculously out of place.
    Had someone really lived here? Broken teacups were scattered on the ground near a sink that was partially detached from the wall, revealing rusted pipes. Multicolored glass crunched underfoot; Jasmine saw that a shelf with dozens of colored bottles had been upended.
    A faded rug was just barely visible under the dust, and the corner of a picture frame stuck out from beneatha pile of loose plaster. Jasmine bent and removed the frame, carefully brushing the dust from the glass. It was a painting, a boy and a girl holding hands and staring off toward mountains in the distance.
    Yearning rose out of nowhere, thick in her throat.
    She set the picture down.
    The boy craned his neck to squint up at the sky. “So what now?”
    “Look for a ring.” Jasmine needed to buy time. She kept waiting for another memory to rise like a wave. She made her way across chunks of concrete and earth to a second doorway. “I’ll check in here.”
    Inside the second room—a bedroom, she guessed—one whole wall had caved in. Behind the bed, a torn poster hung from one side, and a chest lay broken, spilling its contents like guts across the floor.
    She stooped and picked up a silk skirt. It was about her size. Maybe some runaway had squatted down here? Maybe even one of the attackers? It seemed plausible. Now if only she knew why, and how the skirt related to her and Luc. Jasmine made her way to the nightstand beside the bed, surprisingly intact given the destruction of the rest of the room.
    There was a piece of paper there, taped neatly to the wood. In handwriting eerily similar to her own, was written:
    Find Ford.
    He’ll know what to do.
    Again, she had a wave of intuition that was almost like certainty. “Ford?” she called out, then held her breath.
    Immediately, he responded. “Yeah? Find something?” Then, a second later, he appeared in the doorway. His face was very serious. “How do you know my name?” He was looking at her, eyebrows drawn down and suspicion in his eyes.
    Jasmine’s head was spinning. She felt as if the room were getting smaller. Who had left this note? How had they known that Ford would be poking around?
    She moved to conceal the note from view. “I … I think you told me. Outside. Remember?” She swallowed. She could tell he didn’t buy it.
    He held up a hand, cutting her off. She’d been distracted by the strange note, the pounding rhythm of her heart, but then she heard it: footsteps coming down the stairs, whispered voices. She recognized the voices.
    It was the boy and girl who had attacked her.
    Panic slid down her spine. How had they found her again so quickly? Were they stalking her?
    Ford turned, as though to go investigate, but Jas grabbed his arm and pulled him behind the bed, forcing him down into a squat. She ignored the way her skin tingled when touching his.
    “What—?” Ford started to ask, but Jas shook her head.
    The voices were louder now. The boy and girl had reached the bottom of the stairs; she could hear them moving through the main room, feet crunching on theglass, breathing heavily, as though they’d been running. But she could
feel
them, too. Their determination. Their ruthlessness.
    Her thighs ached and her legs were shaking. She and Ford were trapped. They would find her any second now. They must have heard the frantic pounding of her heart. To Jasmine, it was as loud as a marching band.
    “We’re going to have to run.” She leaned in so close to Ford, she could practically taste him. For a second, the smell of his skin—like pine trees and fire and rain, all mixed up—made her dizzy.
    Luckily, he didn’t ask questions. “Follow me,” he whispered.
    She couldn’t stop the slight tremble in her limbs when his breath washed over her ear.
    Ford stood up, keeping his hand wrapped around hers. It made her feel slightly better. They inched toward the doorway that led to the main room,