Free Keepers: A Timeless Novella by Laura Kreitzer Page B

of a moron she thought I was. “They’ve found
Sara.”
    Jenna started to wake, and
I knew the last thing she wanted to hear about was Sara. Hell, that
was the last thing I wanted to hear about.
    “ Um, thanks for telling
me?” It came out as a question. I still wasn’t a hundred percent
sure why Lucia needed to dump me on the floor to tell me this news
while I was busy getting some much-needed sleep. Of course I was
thrilled to hear they’d captured Sara, but couldn’t it have waited
until later? Hadn’t I been through enough?
    “ The thing is, Joseph,
Sara’s refused to come . . . quietly,” Lucia said slowly, as if
explaining it to a child. She paused. Waited.
    I made a gesture for her to
continue. “And? Tell the agents to man up, slap the handcuffs on
her, and drag her to prison. You’re an angel, why don’t you help
out?”
    Lucia shook her head in
frustration. “It’s true that I can do some pretty amazing things,
but you need to understand that I don’t want to hurt anyone by
using my abilities.”
    Hurt anyone? Was she
seriously afraid of hurting Sara? The thought of shooting Sara was
rather appealing to me, if I was being honest. That was how furious
I was with her. “She attacked Gabriella and burned my house down! I
don’t understand your use of caution at this juncture.”
    At my words, Lucia finally
had to spell it out for me. “The FBI found her at a friend’s house,
but she saw the flashing lights and ran out the back door before
they could get to her. Just around the block was a mall, and Sara
ran inside. When the FBI finally caught up with her, she’d grabbed
a girl and taken her as a hostage.”
    “ She WHAT?” The question
flew out of my mouth in an angry roar, propelling me to my feet.
“She took a hostage?” I knew the bitch was crazy, but she’d left
Crazyville a long time ago and hopped on the bus to Schizophrenic
Town. A hostage? Oh yeah, she was definitely psychotic. Someone get
that girl a shot of Valium and a padded cell—STAT! I started
frantically searching for my clothes, but of course I had none
besides the burned remains of what I wore the day
before.
    Lucia smiled, though she
wasn’t amused. “I brought clothes,” she said and pointed toward the
bathroom where there were two baskets of folded clothes. “And some
toiletries.”
    With no time to waste, I
stripped in front of Lucia and Jenna and changed into clean
clothes. As I was doing that, Lucia made a portal. Jenna stared
between the two of us, shocked, but she snapped out of it. She held
out my phone. I snatched it up, kissed her, and turned toward the
portal.
    “ Be safe,” Jenna
called.
    “ I will,” I
promised.
    In seconds, Lucia and I
were in D.C., and I made sure to mentally tally the frequent flyer
miles for yet another trip through the dimensions. We were outside
a mall, though far enough away that no one saw us walk out of the
portal. We made our way between parked cars as Lucia filled me in
on the situation. “She’s demanding to talk to you and refuses to
negotiate with anybody else.”
    “ Great,” I grumbled. Hadn’t
this woman stolen enough of my life? Couldn’t she at least be
arrested without causing trouble? This was just
fantastic.
    We were greeted with dozens
of flashing police lights, two ambulances, and a fire truck. There
was a mob outside the mall, pressing themselves against the police
barricades. Media vans had already pulled in and were filming
outside. I made sure to stay far away from them, keeping my head
down and my attention elsewhere. When we got to the barrier, an
officer stopped us. I was about to pull out my identification, but
I’d lost that, along with my gun, in the fire. I felt stripped and
naked without them, and I stupidly stuttered out nonsense when I
realized this.
    “ Stay behind the
barricade,” the officer demanded, glaring at me.
    “ I’m Special Agent Joseph
Carter of the FBI, now let me pass,” I shouted, furious I was being
held back from going