“We should go,” I told Calahan, my voice thick with emotion. The others were close to losing it, too: even Carrick looked like he was one step away from tears. “I guess this is the last time we’ll talk. Thank you for...everything. We wouldn’t have gotten anywhere if it wasn’t for you.”
“Maybe that would have been a good thing,” said Calahan bitterly. He sounded as sorry for Sylvie as we felt.
I couldn’t think of a response so I put my hand out to end the call.
“We’re not quitting!” yelled Sylvie, bursting through the door.
I froze, my finger a hair’s breadth above the end call button. We all looked at each other, then at Sylvie.
“It’ll be okay—” began Louise in a calming voice.
“No!” yelled Sylvie. “No, it won’t!” She jerked her head at the garden. “I thought what I needed was to pound it out. But this isn’t something I can get out of me. They changed me. Do you understand that? They changed me like it was nothing, in just a few h—”—she closed her eyes, her hands balling into fists. God, it must still feel like it was hours, to her. “Days,” she corrected. “In just a few days.”
Aedan stood up. “You’re safe now,” he said, reaching for her. “They can’t hurt you.”
“They already have!” Sylvie’s voice was so raw, it made all of us wince. “You don’t understand. This is my mind and I don’t feel like I’m in control of it anymore. Jesus, I went in knowing that everything they told me would be bullshit. I knew it then. I know it now. But it still worked. Those drugs they gave me burned this stuff right into my brain. Don’t you get it? I still want to be back there! I know they’re evil and part of me still wants my—my—” She choked on the words. “My friends back!”
I’ve never wanted to kill anyone so much as I have right then. Just give me one of those bastards. I glanced at Aedan. He was shaking, he was so mad. Aedan and me, in a room with a couple of them. That’s all I’m asking.
Sylvie gulped and looked at the ceiling. “I—I don’t know when I’m going to feel like me again. Or if.” She glanced at Aedan, her face tortured. I got it, then, why she kept pushing him away, saying she needed space. I’d felt that same way, when I’d come back from Iraq: tainted. Poisonous. You want to stay away from everyone, especially the people you love. I understood but it tore me apart, seeing the two of them like this. Sylvie drew in a deep, shaky breath. “But I know what I can do. I can stop these bastards doing it to anyone else.”
She picked something up off the side table: the thick pad of paper she’d been clutching when we’d brought her home. Her personality test. She slammed it down on the table. “They took this out of a box,” she said. “Do you understand? They’re getting them delivered by the box.” She leaned over the table, hands flat on the surface. For the first time, I saw that her knuckles were raw and bloody. “There were three of us new recruits in that house. And Martin was back at another fair three days later. Do the math. That’s well over three hundred people a year they’re bringing in and that’s just one group. How many more groups do they have around LA? How many more around the whole country?” Her voice was rising. “Even if only one in five stays with the cult long term—and I bet it’s closer to four in five—there still have to be thousands upon thousands of people being...changed, every year!” She looked around our faces. “This isn’t just about Bradan anymore, or about me. We have to stop them.”
I felt sick because I could hear the need in her voice. If we stopped now, I was worried she’d never get closure. But... “I can’t let anyone else get hurt,” I told her.
“People are getting hurt right now,” she snapped. “Right now, some single mom is talking to Martin. He’s inside her head, getting her to pour out all her secrets, drawing her in. And some truck driver has Julie whispering in his ear, telling him how great things can be, how he can be a part of something that really matters.” She turned to Louise. “And some kid only a couple of years older than Kayley is getting all starry-eyed about James, she’ll do whatever he tells her to, he’s passing her a Coke or a Starbucks and she doesn’t realize that—”
“Alright!” yelled Louise. Sylvie stopped and both of them just stayed there, panting at each other, eyes brimming. Louise gave a little nod and Sylvie nodded in return.
There was silence for a few seconds. All of us were in pieces. No one wanted to be the one to say it. In the end, it was Carrick who spoke. “We can’t,” he said, more softly than I’d thought him capable of. “We can’t trace the cult beyond this group. We didn’t get anything—”—He broke off as Sylvie’s face started to crumple. “No! I mean, you got plenty! Jesus, you found out all about them! But...we haven’t got anything that lets us find the person at the top.”
Annabelle picked up the personality test. “Maybe we do,” she said quietly. “All the groups are disconnected, but they all use these, right? You said they were delivered in boxes: I bet they’re printed centrally and shipped out.” She showed us the hundreds of little “check the box” boxes. “These are designed to be scanned into a computer—it’s kind of old-fashioned, really. Like, why aren’t they just using an app, on a tablet? But anyway: that means the tests have to be mailed somewhere for processing.”
Aedan was shaking his head. “If you’re thinking of going back to the house and getting them to tell us where they mail the tests to, forget it. It’ll be a PO box, untraceable, I guarantee it.”
Annabelle sighed, staring at the test. “There must be some way.” She flipped it over, examining every page. “Like Sylvie said, they need thousands of these. Some company must be printing them and they must know who pays for them.”
Calahan’s voice came from the phone, making us all jump. We’d forgotten he was still there. “There might be a way,” he said.
“How?” asked Annabelle. “I’ve looked all over it. There’s nothing to say where it was printed: they’re too smart for that.”
“I know someone who might be able to help,” said Calahan. “She’s retired but she does know a hell of a lot about computers and printing...and tracking people down.”
33
Annabelle
As soon as the call ended, we scattered. Everyone was shaken and we all needed space. I wandered out into the garden: so beautiful, with the trees and swing and the area with the long grass I thought of as the meadow, full of wildflowers and butterflies. Back in Haywood Falls, the lawn that separated Carrick’s house from our neighbors was an intimidating jungle, probably with some old bike parts buried in there like lost treasure. When we get back, we’re really going to have to do something about that.
I wound up at the one place I hadn’t been yet: the big greenhouse down at the end of the garden. Curious, I opened the door and crept inside. It was like walking through a rainforest in a far-off land: plants hung down from overhead racks and scaled support beams. The air was damp, warm and loaded with exotic scents. All that was missing was the sound of a waterfall: if a snake had slithered past, I wouldn’t have been surprised. Huge flowers in bright colors filled a central table and I didn’t recognize any of them. I leaned closer to look at a glossy white and pink flower whose petals were the size of my hand.
Then Louise suddenly stood up from behind the table, just a few feet from my face, and I screamed and jumped back. That scared her and she jumped back, too.
“Sorry,” I said. “Didn’t know anyone was in here.”
Louise shook her head. “It’s okay. I was just...thinking.”
I looked at where she’d been crouching. She’d been examining trays of tiny seedlings, each one no bigger than my fingernail.
“This place is amazing,” I told her, looking around. “This stuff isn’t American, is it?”
She shook her head. “A few things are but most of it’s from South America. There are all sorts of laws about what you can import but, once you get past the red tape, you can raise them and sell them to collectors.” She suddenly seemed to catch herself and flushed. “You know. It�
��s a hobby.”
Why is she embarrassed? “It’s amazing,” I said with feeling. “I never understood this stuff. I don’t...get plants.” I caught her eye and flushed myself when I saw the curious look she was giving me. “I’d like to. I’d love to be able to grow stuff.” I was thinking of Mom and her trailer with the window boxes: I could help her look after them. “But plants are too...squidgy.”
Louise blinked. “Squidgy?”
I flushed deeper. “Organic and...imprecise.” God, I sound like such a nerd. “I’m used to, y’know, numbers and metal.”
Louise shook her head. “It’s just inputs and outputs.” She started talking about sunlight and precision watering and soil acidity. And slowly, the light flickered on in my head: they were really just tiny green machines which told you how they were doing through color instead of noise. I’d had no idea it was science. And Louise seemed to genuinely love teaching me about it. We crouched beside the seedlings for nearly an hour as she told me about root systems and moisture in the air. Then she seemed to catch herself again. “Sorry,” she said. “I’m just...into this stuff.”
And suddenly, I got it. I’d been thinking of Louise as my opposite but she was just like me, geeking out on plants the way I did on machines. I started to get a warm glow inside: I’d finally found a kindred spirit. “We should go out,” I said on impulse. “You must know all the good bars in LA. We could have cocktails.”
Louise grinned. “That would be great. I might pass on the booze, but—” She cut herself off.
And suddenly it clicked: her staring at the seedlings; the throwing up I’d heard; her sudden cry of shock from the bathroom, the night we’d arrived; the avoiding alcohol. “Oh my God!” I breathed. “You’re pregnant!”
Louise grabbed my arm, horrified. “Don’t tell anyone! I haven’t told Sean yet!”
I grabbed hold of both her hands. “He doesn’t know?! Does Kayley know?”
“No one knows!”
“Why?!”
“It was unexpected!” She let out a sigh and then it all rushed out of her. “I don’t know if he wants a family! And all of...this was going on and then Sylvie went missing...there was never a good time and—” She bit her lip and looked at me. “What if it scares him off?”
Part of me wanted to run. This was exactly what I wasn’t good at: people and social stuff and girly chat. I’m the last person someone should go to with a problem. But...she needed someone. And just seconds ago, I’d been thrilling at having my first actual proper female friend. Well, this was part of that. I manned up. Or girled up.
“That isn’t going to happen,” I said firmly. “I’ve seen the way Sean looks at you. It’ll be great. But Louise: you have to talk to him.”
34
Bradan
The blue light came on but it wasn’t morning. The alarm was ringing with a different tone, the urgent beeping that meant See Me: Now.
I scrambled into my clothes and raced downstairs to his office. Dad always kept it cold, said it helped him stay awake through the long nights. I wasn’t sure when he slept or if he ever did.
Two women were just leaving, hurriedly pulling their clothes on as if they’d been interrupted. There were usually women. Dad would select one or sometimes two to be with him for a night. Their partners were Insiders too, so they didn’t mind.
Dad was standing on his office’s balcony, back ramrod straight as he stared out at the world. When I opened the door, he turned to me and I saw the anger in his eyes. He crossed to his desk in three big strides and nodded down at the photos that were strewn across it.
“There was an attack,” Dad told me. “Someone broke into a Group house. Kidnapped one of the Recruits. Beat up some Guides.”
I drew in my breath as I looked at the photos. Blood poured from broken noses, bruises stood out dark and ugly on a man’s neck. There were action shots, too, taken with the hidden camera. All of the Group houses have them, for security. I could see four men invade the sanctity of an Initiation and begin assaulting people. One man was up against the wall, pinned by his throat. Anger rose and uncoiled like a waking serpent. How dare they?! “Did we catch them?” I asked, my voice choked with fury.
“No,” said Dad. “We’ve tracked them down, now. It took us a few days but we found them. But that’s not the point. Look at them.” He pushed five photos across the desk to me.
The first was of a young woman sitting at a dining table. She was a slender, frail-looking thing, with dark hair tied back in a ponytail. She’d been caught off guard and was looking up at the camera with a big, natural smile. I recognized that she was pretty but only in the same way I’d recognize if the two halves of a picture were symmetrical, or that a puzzle had all its pieces. Beauty, love...I’d learned, when I was chosen to be a Prime, that all those things were weaknesses. The only person I should love was Dad. And I did. And he loved me.
Even if he’d never said it. He’d praised me, thanked me...but he’d never once said he loved me. I was self-conscious about how much I wanted to hear him say it.
The other four photos were a little blurry: they were freeze-frames from the video the hidden camera had shot. Four men, all with black hair. One was in a suit, one was in a biker’s leather cut, one was in a hooded top and one was in a tank top. I could see tattoos on one of their backs. That would make him easier to identify: it’s exactly why we Primes don’t have them.
“Do you know who they are?” asked Dad.
I looked at him in surprise. There was a tone in his voice I’d never heard in all the years I’d known him. A sort of...fear. And Dad wasn’t scared of anything.
“No,” I said.
“You used to know them,” said Dad slowly. He was watching me intently. “Before we found you.”
My chest constricted: I didn’t like to think about the time when I was Outside. I know it was chaotic, without Order. I have memories of it but they’re far away, down at the end of a dark corridor where I don’t venture. Sometimes I can hear a muffled sound, like someone’s banging on the other side of thick glass, but I know to turn away, when that happens. I focused on the photos again but the faces didn’t mean anything to me. I looked at Dad and shook my head.
Dad seemed to relax a little. “They tried to hurt us,” he told me. “They might try again.”
My chest went even tighter, this time with shame. My old life was threatening us, threatening everything Dad had worked so hard to build. “I’m sorry,” I croaked, my throat closing up. “What can I do?”
He pushed a slip of paper across the desk. “That’s their address. Tail them, see where they go. Keep me informed. If they take any more action against us…”—he looked me right in the eye—”...stop them. Is that clear?”
I nodded firmly. “Yes, dad.” The rage was back now, burying the fear. I snatched up the paper and pocketed it. I’d find these four men. And if they tried to hurt us again?
I’d kill them all.
35
Annabelle
I opened the door of the diner and let out a little squeak of delight.
The place was out in the desert, just off the interstate. Clearly, the owners had taken some inspiration from all the tourists heading from LA to Nevada and Area 51, because we’d parked next to a life-sized statue of a gray alien with shining black eyes. Inside, it got even better: the walls and ceiling were painted to look like space and every booth was an enclosed flying saucer, with curving vinyl seats either side of a circular table and a doorway either side to let the waitresses lean in with trays of food. Kian and Carrick both rolled their eyes but I loved it. We settled ourselves in on one side of the booth.
It was just the three of us: Aedan, Sean and Louise had stayed home to look after Sylvie. Really, only Kian needed to come but when Calahan had called to tell us he’d set up the meeting, he’d specifically requested that Carrick and I be there, too. Why?
We’d barely sat down when a man’s head poked into our UFO. Beneath his cowboy hat, I could see c
urls of soft brown hair and his eyes were the color of dark, melted chocolate. He put me in mind of the outdoors, but in a very different way to Carrick. Carrick made me think of hard, weather-beaten rocks, howling winds and freezing rain. This guy’s deep tan made me think of deserts and big skies, and his accent sealed the deal. “Here,” he called to someone. “They’re in here.” Pure, unapologetic Texan.
He ducked his head and slid into the booth opposite us: God, he was as big as Carrick! The woman who followed didn’t share his outdoor look: she wasn’t as pale as me but she had the very dark, shining hair and olive skin of someone with Italian heritage. I’ve always thought of myself as a little top heavy but her curves put mine to shame and she rocked them in a daringly cut silky blouse and tight jeans. She slid right up to the cowboy, her leg pressed against his just as mine was pressed against Carrick’s.
I opened my mouth to say hello but then another woman slid in from the other doorway. She had long, luxuriant mahogany hair spilling down over her scarlet sweater and she was followed by another man. This one was in a black suit and tie and white shirt, and he had the sharp cheekbones I associate with Eastern Europe. He gave Kian’s suit an approving nod as he sat down. He was as big as the cowboy and it was a tight squeeze with all four of them crammed around their side of the table.
“Which one of you is the one Calahan told us about?” asked Kian, looking between the two women.
“Me,” said the Italian-American woman. Her accent was nothing like the cowboy’s: it was straight out of New York. “I’m—”—she exchanged a look with the cowboy—”Mary. This is Luke.”
I was pretty sure those weren’t their real names.
Mary nodded to the other two. “That’s Gabriella. And that’s Alexei.”
Brothers Page 16