by Ava Gray
“Now diagnostics?”
He grinned. “That was diagnostics.”
“Wow. Impressive range.”
With the air of a kid showing off, he set the lights to flickering. They should be able to move from her apartment now. If anyone interfered with them, Taye could handle nearly anything, and Silas would arrive soon to provide muscle.
She’d been horrified to learn that Rowan held Silas prisoner, too. Staff lived off-site, but since Silas had been part of the original experiments—a failure—the orderly wasn’t permitted to leave. However, the moment Taye shorted the implant in his neck, the life had started returning to the big man’s eyes. Gillie knew they could count on him.
Nausea rolled through her in a hard wave. Now that the moment had arrived, she was frightened of leaving, frightened of the wider world, of which she knew nothing but what she’d seen on TV. Taye misunderstood her expression.
“Is there anything you want to take with you?”
“No,” she said quietly. “There’s nothing.”
“Then let’s go.”
Gillie followed him out of the apartment. In the distance, they heard cries of fear. The electrical problems were growing worse. In passing the first cell, he extended a hand. Blue sparks lit up the keypad and then blazed along hidden connections, giving the wall an eerie glow. The doors snapped open one by one as Taye went by.
Most of the prisoners were too far gone to respond. It broke Gillie’s heart, but there was nothing she could do, short of sacrificing her own chance at freedom. Others stepped cautiously into the hall, gazing around like frightened animals. Gillie quickened her pace. Maybe it was wrong, but she was almost as frightened of Rowan’s subjects as she was of the scientist. She knew all too well his gift for twisting humans into beings both wretched and monstrous.
Spotting Silas at the next intersection, she broke into a run. Taye followed, but she noticed him keeping an eye on the escapees trailing behind them. The orderly fell into step as they headed toward the lift. They had no way of knowing whether Taye could make it work as he did the locks on the cells, but it was their only hope. This was the one portion of their escape they hadn’t been able to test.
“Are you all right?” she asked Silas.
The enormous orderly gave a quiet nod.
From the other side of the facility came a distant boom. Something had overloaded. Acrid smoke trickled through the vents, stinging her throat. Gillie tugged her pink scrub shirt up over her mouth and watched Taye at the lift controls.
“It’s much the same as the cell door security,” he said, after a few seconds. “This should work.”
“Then do it. Fast.”
She couldn’t figure out why they hadn’t seen Rowan by now. Someone would’ve called him, and from what she’d gleaned from his odious, egocentric soliloquies over the years, he lived nearby. Still, it was an unexpected boon.
“Here goes.” Taye touched his fingers to the keypad, and a pale ripple of energy flooded outward, enveloping the ret-scanner.
CHAPTER 1
NINE MONTHS AGO ABOVE THE EXETER FACILITY, VIRGINIA
Taye prayed his nerves didn’t show. He had a whole elevator full of people counting on him to make the right decisions. Insane when you thought about it. He suspected he’d never been in charge of anything before. He bore all the signs of a man who had never amounted to much; nobody was looking for him.
Not so long ago, Gillie had asked him, Do you remember who you are? Do you have a family? He’d answered, Only bits and pieces. I think I might have a family out there, but I’m not positive. I’m pretty sure they’d given up on me, long before I was taken. Which made it even crazier that these people were all looking to him to guide them out of this mess.
But hell, I got us this far.
As the lift rose, the sound of distant explosions carried from the facility below, even through all the metal and concrete. Down there, the workers were dying. Because of me. That probably made him a monster by most people’s reckoning, but to his view, those who could cash a paycheck without trying to stop what had been done to Gillie—well, they deserved the big boom. The floor heated beneath his feet, and he imagined the wall of flames shooting up the shaft toward the car. There were only two stops, top and bottom, and the metal box rocked as it climbed. Come on, just a little higher. Systems, don’t shut down just yet.
At last, the doors swished open, swamping him in a wave of crushing relief. Promise kept. Gillie glanced his way, seeking direction. She had to be scared shitless, but damned if she would show it. There was a word for a girl like her—indomitable.
Now let’s see, where the hell are we? Four walls of textured metal. No visible door. But since the place had been built from panels—
“Start looking for a latch or a hidden exit,” the dark-haired lady said.
Took the words right out of my mouth. The woman who had given the instruction seemed different than everyone else, less tentative, less damaged. She couldn’t have been there long, or she’d carry fear in her face. Instead, she only appeared determined, as if this sojourn had proven a minor inconvenience. Rowan didn’t have a chance to work on her. Taye took visceral satisfaction in that.
Eager for freedom, the others spread out; Silas found the panel after a brief search. The big orderly flipped it open, and Taye pulled the juice from his own body—precious little left now—to pop the electronic lock. Sizzle and spark, just like underground. When the door swung open, the scent of musty grain wafted in. Tentatively, they moved as a group, peering into the next room.
It wasn’t what he’d expected. No barbed wire, no high-tech perimeter. There were no guards he’d have to fry. It was almost . . . anticlimactic. This outer room was lined with straw and held the remnants of an old harvest. That was all.
“Looks like a farm,” a man with a faint Southern drawl said.
He was a little taller than Taye, but he wasn’t as pale, which meant he hadn’t been incarcerated long. The blond woman, on the other hand—Rowan must’ve had her for a while because she was damn near wrecked. And that was everyone: Gillie, himself, Silas, the Southern man, the confident brunette, and the broken blonde.
“We need to get out of here. Right now. Rowan could be arriving any minute.” Fear rendered Gillie’s words sharp and staccato with urgency.
That triggered a stampede, though nobody pushed or shoved. Silas hit the door first, and it wasn’t locked, swinging open to reveal daylight. Taye shaded his eyes, unable to speak for the pleasure of it. Though it hurt his eyes, the fresh wind on his face felt amazing. It was late spring, he guessed, by the color and size of the foliage, so the weather was on their side, at least. Given all their disadvantages, they needed the break. Or it might be early summer, if weather patterns had changed while he was underground.
Taye gazed out over the furrowed fields, breathing in the verdant air. It was sweet and clean, hints of manure and compost, but no chemicals. No pine-scented cleaner. That antiseptic smell haunted him. Flashes still hit him from the time before, when his brain was scrambled, and he remembered screaming as they dumped some solution on him from the ceiling; Rowan aspired to complete dehumanization of his subjects, and in most cases, he had succeeded.
Beside him, Gillie trembled from head to toe. This had to be fucking overwhelming for her. He remembered how she had said, I want to see the sun again, Taye. That was when he’d known he’d do anything to make that dream come true, anything at all.
And here they were.
He touched her on the shoulder. “It’s okay. We made it.”
“What now?” the man with the drawl asked.
“We should split up.” The black-haired woman spoke decisively. “Looking like this, if we stick together, we’ll be caught fast.”
Mental hospital pajamas, no shoes, no money, crazy eyes? No question. They’ll round us up and put us on the first short bus they find.
“She’s right,” Silas agreed.
Gillie managed a grin. “Be
fore we split, should we all agree to meet at the top of the Empire State Building in five years?”
And that was so Gillie. Lightening the mood, refusing to show fear. She might be quaking inside, worried how the hell they’d manage, but nobody would ever know it. The girl would spit in death’s eye, and if he understood her past, she had done so more than once.
While the others gaped in astonishment, Silas gave a slow nod. “I’d like that. Five years—to the day.”
The thin, blond woman spoke for the first time. “If I’m alive, I’ll come. But for now, it’s time to get moving.”
A murmur of good-byes followed. Taye didn’t take long about it, and he didn’t ask Gillie if she wanted his company either. He laced his fingers through hers and gave a tug.
With a final backward glance at the silo, she followed him across the field. He pushed north, avoiding the highway, because they would attract attention from passing cars. People in their right minds didn’t go for a hike barefoot in thin cotton pajamas.
They’d been walking for a while—impossible to say how long—when he glimpsed a white house set well away from the road in the middle of sprawling fields. Farmhouse. He didn’t see any cars in the gravel drive, but there was a detached garage, so it was impossible to be sure.
“Let’s go check it out.”
“Why?” she asked.
He read the anxiety in her expression. Though she tried to hide it, she was freaked. She hadn’t been out in twelve years, and it would be dark soon. Compounding that, they had no money, no food, and no shelter, and she had to rely on him for safety; that would trouble anyone with a lick of sense. Shit, it worried him.
“We’re not gonna knock on the door and ask for help, if that’s what you’re fretting about. But we can’t travel like this either.”
She merely nodded. He pretended confidence, striding toward the house. The gravel drive bit into the soles of his feet as he crossed to peer into a garage window. No cars. That ought to mean nobody was around. Setting Gillie on watch, he broke in through the back and stole food, drink, and clothing.
As he came back out carrying a plastic bag, she called, “I hear a car coming.”
In tandem, they raced across the property toward the fields; once they put some distance behind them, they paused to change clothes. His were too loose and short; hers looked like they’d previously belonged to an old woman. It didn’t matter. At least the shoes worked, more or less, and socks made up the difference.
By then it was getting on toward nightfall, but they pressed on. He could think only of getting out of Virginia. To the north lay safety and freedom. Or maybe he was conflating old history classes about the Underground Railroad with personal motivation. Strange he could remember those kinds of facts, but nothing about the man he had been. That was unsettling.
Gillie stumbled beside him and he turned to her, shoring her up. “We need to stop soon, huh? You’re not used to this.”
She didn’t deny being tired, but she didn’t complain. “I can go on.”
“No need.” He pointed. “There’s a barn up ahead. Just a little farther and we’ll rest.”
The red outbuilding was well kept and had been shoveled recently, so the smell wasn’t overwhelming. In the stalls, the landowner kept cows, who lowed at the intrusion. Taye ignored them and scrambled up the ramp to the hayloft. There was enough straw to mound for a bed, and if someone came to investigate the restless animals, they should be able to hide behind the bales. Good enough.
“It’ll get better,” he told Gillie. “You’ll have your own place. We’ll find work.”
“But we don’t have any identification.”
“That just means we’ll have to do the jobs nobody else wants for a while. Just until I figure out a better way.”
She didn’t argue. Instead she helped him arrange a makeshift bed. Though he wasn’t crazy about the idea of sleeping together—even like this—he couldn’t leave her unprotected. He’d just have to tamp down the unwelcome desire she roused in him. Thinking about Gillie that way made him feel dirty and wrong, as bad as that bastard Rowan.
They ate some of the bread and peanut butter he’d lifted from the house a ways back and washed it down with tap water. It wasn’t gourmet fare, but he could tell she enjoyed it by the way she smiled at him; that look made him feel ten feet tall.
“My first meal as a free woman,” she said.
“The first of many.”
Then he lay down and tried to sleep, but as the temperature dropped and she lay shivering in her thin polyester pantsuit, he turned with a reluctant growl. “Come here.”
Just sharing body heat, that’s all. Don’t think about that kiss. You can’t have her. Not now. Not ever. He gazed up at the slats above his head and tried to resign himself to that. The straw prickled, and they lacked both covers and pillow. Not an auspicious start, genius.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“I should’ve grabbed a blanket, too. I wasn’t thinking about sleeping rough.”
“I’m glad we didn’t take more than we had to from those people. They had nothing to do with what happened to us.”
“You’re too nice.”
Gillie didn’t reply right then. Instead, she nestled into his arms. God, why did she have to feel so good, feminine without being fragile. Her small frame possessed a tensile strength; he knew she’d worked out in captivity to stay strong. Some days when he came to visit her, he’d found her running on the treadmill, as if she could outpace Rowan and his cameras, artificial lights, and doors that didn’t lock.
Eventually she asked, “Do you want to split up?”
He understood the reason behind the question. After all, they’d decided as a group that it made sense to go their separate ways. That would be the smart thing. He sensed her tension as she awaited his reply; she wasn’t ready to be alone. Which guaranteed his response.
“No. I broke out of there for you, Gillie-girl. I’m not going anywhere without you.”
Not now. Not until you’re ready.
The world seemed so big. Gillie had all but forgotten the feel of the wind on her face; today it didn’t matter if it smelled of exhaust, not as fresh as she remembered. There wasn’t much sun either, a gray day threatening rain that hadn’t materialized yet. But the hint of it hung in the air, a touch of damp that charmed her. She remembered rain and she’d seen it on TV, but the visceral feel of the droplets hitting her skin . . . not so much. Would it strike lightly or sting? She so looked forward to finding out.
Though her feet hurt and her thighs burned from the long walk, the fact that she was free made all the difference. She wanted to dance and spin, but people would stare, and that’d piss Taye off for sure. He had been muttering about staying under the radar all morning.
They passed through the shabby downtown area and kept moving. She hoped he knew where he was going. Apparently he did, because he stopped outside a bank.
Gillie watched as Taye strode up to an ATM machine. He touched his fingers to the screen and sent a gentle jolt of power. To her astonishment, the machine spat out a number of bills. He palmed them smoothly and hurried away, tucking the money into his pocket.
She followed. They’d hiked all the way to Altoona, across the Pennsylvania state line. He’d turned down two offers of rides even on the back roads, and she was wary enough to appreciate his caution; she knew their value to the Foundation well enough. They couldn’t risk trusting strangers right now.
He eyed all the storefronts as they passed, until she felt impelled to ask, “What are you looking for?”
“Thrift shop.”
“I guess we do need some stuff.”
Eventually they found a secondhand store in a shopping plaza that had clearly seen better days; they bought jackets, jeans, T-shirts, and sneakers, as well as battered backpacks to put the clean things in. Since the place also sold irregular socks and underwear, it set them up to keep moving, blending in on the lower edge of normal. They changed in a
convenience store bathroom, discarded the stolen clothes, and then walked on.
Taye tucked the food he’d stolen at the house in Virginia into his pack; they hadn’t eaten since the day before because she’d been worried about buying more. After that ATM trick, maybe she didn’t need to fret quite as much. Still, she didn’t feel right about it; the money had to come from somewhere. The bank would pass the loss on to its customers, and that wasn’t fair. But Gillie would do whatever it took to keep from going back.
God, sometimes it seemed crazy—the idea she could function in the real world. She’d never stood on her own two feet. Things other people took for granted—milestones like dates, job interviews, and birthday parties—she’d never known, and she hungered for the normalcy she’d seen on TV.
“I watched a movie,” she said to Taye’s back. “About a man who was in prison so long he forgot how to be free. He couldn’t survive without someone telling him what to do.”
“That’s not you,” he said roughly.
She didn’t argue. He wasn’t in the mood to bolster her insecurity, so it was better to ask, “Where are we headed?”
“Right now? The bus station, if I can find it.” He stopped at a graffiti-covered pay phone then. This wasn’t a nice neighborhood and the directory had been chained to the pedestal to keep people from running off with it. Many of the pages had been torn out, probably by people without pens who needed to take an address with them.
Fortunately, Taye found what he was looking for in the yellow pages under transportation. He didn’t pull the page, just read it aloud. “Twelve-thirty-one Eleventh Avenue.”
“I don’t think that’s far.”
He glanced at the addresses on the nearby buildings and nodded. “Just a little longer. You can rest on the bus.”
Taye has a maddening tendency to think I’m made of spun glass. But if they spent enough time together, he’d get over that. He would see she wasn’t an ornament.
“I’m fine,” she said.