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asked, rummaging through the bag. He pulled out a freeze-dried bag of food — the kind you needed to pour boiling water over to eat.
    Without asking, he opened the bag and reached in. He picked out a few pieces of food and tossed them into his mouth.
    He grimaced. “That tastes like shit,” he said. He flipped the bag around and studied it. “You were really going to eat this?”
    “What do you think?”
    Ignoring me, he glanced back into the bag and let out a low whistle. “We have a winner.” He held up a tiny G-string. “Now this, I approve of.”
    If my hands weren’t tied, I would’ve throttled him. As it was, I was tempted to kick him. But I wouldn’t be fast enough, and I’d probably end up beneath him. Again.
    So instead, I leaned my head back against the wall and closed my eyes. I began humming a childhood lullaby, one that my mom used to sing to me when I couldn’t fall asleep. Sometimes it’d helped me cope when I teleported into awful situations.
    Only once the song came to an end did I realize that my captor hadn’t spoken in a while.
    I opened my eyes and found him staring at me, his gaze softer than it had been.
    “Don’t look at me like that,” I said.
    “Like what?”
    “Like you pity me.” Or care about me.
    It was human nature to want to connect with others, and I definitely didn’t want to feel anything other than animosity for the guy who arrested me.
    Arrested. The term didn’t sit well with me. Nor did the term officer . He’d used a lot of pretty language when he grabbed me, but had he even flashed a badge? I didn’t think so.
    “You’re not a police officer,” I stated.
    He smiled. “I’m not.”
    My heart dropped. “Do you work for the government?”
    His smile became sly. “You could say that.”
    “So you came with those agents to capture me?”
    He pulled his leg up so that it was bent at the knee, and he slung an arm over it. “I didn’t come with them, but I do work with them.”
    He made his next words sound deliberately casual. “And when they told me they’d found you, my pair, I requested that I personally be there to bring you in.”
    Pair?
    His eyes flicked over me. “Have to say, you didn’t disappoint. At all.”
    I had the oddest temptation to blush at his words.
    He stood up and glanced at his watch. “Looks like our time’s almost up, princess.”
    “Stop calling me that.”
    His eyes sparkled mischievously. “But it’s so much fun getting a rise out of you.”
    When I shot him a mean look, he sighed, as though his life were real tough. “I’ll see you tonight, Ember.”
    He knew my name. I raised my eyebrows, ignoring the way my skin heated at his words.
    His watch beeped twice, and then he vanished.

Chapter 5
    For a moment , all I could do was gape.
    He was just like me.
    I didn’t know there were others out there who shared my ability, but my captor did.
    My captor. He’d vanished, leaving me alone. I could still escape.
    As soon as that thought entered my mind, several black SUVs rounded the corner, their sirens on. They slammed to a stop in front of me, and then agents poured from the car.
    Rough hands grabbed me and pulled me toward one of the vehicles. Guess I wasn’t escaping after all.
    Dane Richards rounded one of the cars and assessed me. “Caden was right; you did run. Good to know that boy’s instincts were on the mark.”
    “Caden?” I asked.
    “The guy who caught you.”
    He now had a name. Caden.
    “He’s an extractor,” Richards continued. “And one of the best damn ones we have.”
    “What’s an extractor?”
    He put a hand on my shoulder and shook it. “All in good time, Ember. For now, your job is to focus on getting acquainted with our staff and the facility you’ll be living at.”
    He let me go, and the other agents threw me into the backseat of an SUV. A moment later my backpack hit my side as one of the agents tossed it in after me. The door slammed shut behind me, and two agents I’d met earlier