Out of the Box 7 - Sea Change Read Online Free Page A

cameras in his peripheral vision were blinding. Wasn’t it the middle of the day? “Can you get an angry confrontation out of this?”
    “What?” Scott looked at the guy, aghast. “‘Angry confrontation’?”
    “Oh, that’s right, he’s a meta,” the guy said.
    “This is Scott Byerly,” Kat said, her voice loud and staged. “He thinks we dated once upon a time.”
    “Because we did,” Scott said hotly.
    “Yeah. Okay,” Kat said, swallowing visibly. “There’s no need to get violent.”
    “I’m not—what?” Scott’s facade of control degenerated. “I’m not violent. What are you talking about?”
    “That’s good,” Taggert said, whispering softly. Scott anchored his gaze on the man’s acne-scarred face. “Just ignore me,” Taggert said to him, just out of view of the camera that was fixed on Scott and Kat. “Pretend I’m not here.”
    “If only I could,” Scott snapped. “Kat, what the hell is this?”
    “I asked you to stop stalking me,” Kat said, voice in a low quiver. The flashes of bulbs, the click of cameras were blinding lights to Scott, but he held his eyes painfully open as his jaw dropped. “I know you’ve got powerful connections, and I’m a just a girl who—”
    “What the actual—?” Scott let his head slump in disbelief and disgust. “I’m not stalking you. I saw you, and I thought I’d say hello—”
    “You’ve made up all these details of a relationship that never happened,” Kat said, shuddering slightly on camera. She adjusted her sunglasses and wiped a single tear off her cheek—her right cheek, perfectly positioned where it would be in frame.
    Scott felt himself hit hard boil and his fists clenched. “You gotta be kidding me.”
    “You don’t need to be so abusive,” Kat said, taking a step back, her voice quivering.
    “Abu-WHAT?” Scott boggled. “This is the first time I’ve seen you in years!”
    “I know you’ve been following me,” Kat said.
    “I’ve been in Minnesota!” Scott sputtered. “It’s hard to follow you from Minnesota, unless you count watching the occasional interview, or your TV show—”
    “You’re stalking me,” she said quietly, and her bodyguards closed ranks, positioning their enormous frames between her and Scott. “You’re unhinged, Scott, and this has to stop. All these things you remember about our supposed relationship—they’re all in your head.”
    “Uh, no,” Scott said, “they’re just not in yours, unfortunately, because of your powers draining your memory—”
    “You need professional help,” Kat shouted from between the two towering bodyguards as they protectively shuffled her away. “You need to talk to a psychiatrist, Scott!” Her voice was all insipid concern, so filled with worry. “You can’t keep living like thi—”
    A spatter of blood hit her sun-glowing white blazer and drenched her tastefully exposed, bronzed upper chest. The dark crimson was like ink on her browned skin, barely visible between the linebackers who protected her from Scott.
    “What the—” he mouthed, and then another splatter of crimson liquid bathed her blond hair, running down the side of her face in beads as her own mouth dropped in surprise. A little blood hit her exposed, bleached teeth.
    Her bodyguards fell, leaving Kat exposed between the two of their corpses. Wounds gaped on their sides, holes a few inches wide. A tall, lanky man stood next to Kat. He was pale as snow but freckled, and he had long red hair and a ragged beard that stretched down the middle of his chest. He grabbed Kat by the wrist, fingers sinking into her golden skin and squeezing, hints of white showing around the edges of his fingers as he squeezed and then shook her. She flapped like a paper being waved, dragged by his superior strength as she stared at him in stunned horror.
    “Do you know what you do to people?” the man shouted, right in her face, his voice thin and ragged as he was, in danger of breaking. He had sunken