An image popped up on the wall of a man who looked distinctly like Edwardian Remwald. Felix had the same shrewd, intelligent expression. His black hair was slicked back, and he wore a crisp suit. He had a moustache and a trimmed goatee. With the exception of minor feature differences, I might have mistaken him for his brother.
“He never worked at the school,” Michael said.
“And you know this, how?” Yutika asked carefully, like she already suspected what he was going to say.
The same, awful assumption was growing in my mind, too.
“Because.” Michael swallowed. “That was my school. And I was at that massacre.”
CHAPTER 36
Michael had gone out with Sir Zachary, saying he needed to go for a walk. The rest of us stood in frozen silence as we tried to digest the twin bombshells Michael had thrust on us.
The first was that Michael’s actions in California now made more sense. After what he’d been through, it was a miracle he’d managed to stay sane at all.
The second revelation was that Felix Remwald hadn’t been an employee at the school. That meant either the newspaper had made a mistake, or—
“I guess it’s possible he’s still alive,” Graysen said, tapping his fingers on the table. “He’d be in his sixties now.”
“But there’s nothing,” Smith muttered from behind his laptop screen. “No credit card receipts, no bank accounts…nothing.”
“Remember those receipts in the foreman’s office?” I said. “Maybe Felix sends the foreman out through the mine’s supply shaft to do all his shopping, while he stays hidden in the mine.”
“It’s possible,” Kaira said thoughtfully. “But to stay down in that mine for—”
“Fifteen years,” Smith said.
“I would say no one is nuts enough to do that,” A.J. said, shaking his head. “But these are the Remwalds we’re talking about. They’re a special breed.”
“Okay,” Yutika said, drawing out the word. “But if his brother was alive and just chilling in the mine all this time, then here’s what I don’t get. Why did Edwardian bother with giving all those clues to Pruwist and the other board members? I get that he had his memory wiped so he could keep everything a secret when he was arrested. But couldn’t his brother just have given him a call later to remind him what he forgot?”
“They probably figured Edwardian would be monitored and his thoughts might not be secure,” Graysen suggested. “Felix would have had no way of knowing when it was safe to reach out to his brother. Edwardian must have thought the only safe route was for him to be the one who made contact after he put the pieces back together.”
Kaira held up a finger. “But that would only make sense if Felix Remwald is actually alive and behind all of this.”
“It doesn’t really make a difference whether he’s alive or not,” I said, feeling antsy. All I could think about was Lilly.
“Kaira.”
The single word came from Oliver.
We turned to Smith’s father, who I was pretty sure we’d all forgotten was even in the room. He marked the spot in his book, closed it carefully, and stood up.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Now?” Kaira asked, still looking like she wanted to punch someone…namely Diego.
Get in line, I wanted to tell her.
“Now,” Oliver agreed. “In your office.”
When Graysen started to follow, Oliver added, “Alone.”
“What’s wrong?” Graysen demanded, looking from Smith’s dad to Kaira.
“Nothing,” Oliver said. He left the kitchen without another word, heading for Kaira and Graysen’s study.
Kaira and Graysen looked at each other. They seemed to have an entire, silent conversation in the space of a few seconds. There was something strangely intimate about it, and I looked away.
“Do you know what this is about?” Kaira asked Smith.
The Techie shook his head.
“Alright, I’ll be right back.” Kaira brushed her hand down Graysen’s back as she stood up.
“So, I guess there’s nothing else to do right now. We’ll enact operation mine take-down in the morning,” Smith said.
“Uh, yeah,” Graysen said. He didn’t even look at Smith. All of his attention was on the hallway where Oliver and Kaira had disappeared. His expression revealed nothing, but his fingers tapped incessantly on the table.
A minute later, Oliver reappeared in the doorway. I couldn’t read anything from his expression.
“She wants you,” he told Graysen before disappearing again.
Graysen was gone without another word.
“What do you think’s going on?” Yutika asked in a hushed voice.
The rest of us exchanged worried looks.
“Okay, all of you,” Ma said, coming over and pursing her lips at the sight of our still-full bowls. I didn’t think I’d have an appetite again until I had Lilly back, and the rest of my friends seemed just as uninterested in food. “You all need to get some sleep before you collapse.” She made a shooing motion with her dish towel.
There was no way I’d ever be able to sleep with tomorrow looming over all of us, but there was no bucking Ma when she was in one of her moods. So, we helped clear the table and headed upstairs.
There was a light on under Kaira and Graysen’s bedroom door, but I couldn’t hear anything that would offer a clue about what had happened. I would have been more worried, but my mind was at capacity for horrible thoughts for the day.
As I mechanically went through my workout routine and got ready for bed, my only lucid thought was that Lilly was alive. Well, that, and the fact that I was going to wring Diego’s neck for using my niece to control me.
Even as fury ate through me, I couldn’t help the niggling guilt that was there, too…that I’d forced his hand because I’d gone back on my word.
But preventing MRP from getting out into the world was worth betraying a single person’s trust.
I idly tossed my phone from hand to hand as I lay in bed. After I’d come down from my initial rage at Diego, my first instinct had been to call Brent and tell him that Lilly was alive. But then I’d remembered what my mom had said about Sarah not surviving. I couldn’t give them false hope. The only thing that would help now would be to get them their daughter back. And I would…or I’d die trying.
A soft knock came at my door.
“Come in,” I called.
I’d learned my lesson from Diego’s unexpected visit the other night and was now fully dressed.
The door cracked open, and Yutika poked her head in. She was wearing flannel pajamas and fuzzy socks.
“Hey, what’s up?” I asked before noticing Yutika’s puffy eyes.
“Can I—” Yutika’s voice cracked. “I don’t really want to sleep in our room…alone.”
“C’mere,” I said quickly, flipping back the blanket and scooting over to make room for her.
Yutika settled back against my mountain of pillows and rested her head against my shoulder. For several seconds, we just sat like that. I wasn’t sure what Yutika needed to hear right then, so I kept quiet and waited for her to speak first.
“Michael thinks I’m avoiding him because I can’t cope with the violence of what he did in California.”
I’d assumed the same.
“That’s not it, though,” Yutika continued, nestling deeper under my covers. “I mean, it was shocking and gruesome, but our lives were in danger. He acted to protect us, so I can’t really fault him for that, can I?”
I shook my head, recognizing that Yutika just needed to talk through her feelings without interruption.
“I love him.” Yutika toyed with a loose thread on my blanket. “So much it hurts.” She pressed her hand to her heart.
“I know.” I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed. “He loves you, too.”
There wasn’t a single doubt in my mind about Michael’s feelings. He and Yutika might not be as openly affectionate as Kaira and Gr
aysen, but their love was just as obvious. It was there in the way they looked at and spoke to each other, and in the little touches they thought the rest of us didn’t notice.
“It’s not enough though, is it?” Yutika’s gaze searched mine.
“What do you mean?” I asked, puzzled.
Yutika wipe away an errant tear.
“I was never cool with him keeping his past so secret, but I thought it was something we could work through. I thought he would come to trust me enough to open up. But he never did.” Yutika scrubbed at her eyes. “I learned more about his past today than in the whole time we’ve been together.”
“I think,” I said carefully, “if I’d been through something like that, I would be doing everything I could to forget. Talking about it would make me relive it over and over again.”
It was why I hadn’t even mentioned Lilly to my friends until I’d been with them for more than a year. And I was a social creature. Michael was much more reserved.
“I understand that,” Yutika said. “That’s what makes this so hard. I’m not mad at him or disgusted or scared. We talked a little while ago, and I told him I didn’t need anything from him this second but that I had to know we could move forward at some point.” She huffed out a breath, making her bangs fly off her face. “I even told him he could write it all down if he didn’t want to talk about it.”
Yutika turned her face away from me as she wiped away more tears. I passed her the tissue box on my nightstand.
Yutika blew her nose loudly before saying, “He said he didn’t want to drag me into that bloody part of his life. He said he couldn’t give me any more of himself than he already had.”
“He’s trying to protect you,” I said, hating that two of my best friends were in pain.
“I get that, too,” she said. “But I realized that, emotionally, we’ve gotten as far as we’re going to get.” She laughed darkly. “I know more about Diego’s history than I do about Michael’s. How messed up is that?”
I started a little at the mention of Diego.
Yutika reached for the channel changer and switched on the TV, making it clear she didn’t want to talk any more. We cuddled up together and hunkered down for a marathon of Magic Bachelorette reruns.
“Your bed’s really comfy,” Yutika said half an episode later. She yawned.
Yutika had less appreciation for Magic Bachelorette than A.J. and me.
A few minutes later, her snores cut through the drama unfolding between the bachelorette and her ex-boyfriend, who had shown up unannounced. I lowered the volume but kept the TV on, just in case shutting it off would wake Yutika.
I pulled the blanket up to her chin and turned over, wishing I could fall asleep so quickly. I’d be needing all of my strength in the morning. I closed my eyes and tried to empty my mind.
It was hopeless. Yutika snored like a banshee. She was also a terrible blanket hog.
After about fifteen minutes of watching the clock and shivering, I got up and tiptoed out of the room. There were plenty of spare bedrooms in the house, but I wasn’t tired. I padded downstairs, planning to make hot chocolate and curl up on one of the couches to finish my TV binge session alone.
Clearly, I wasn’t the only one of the Seven with insomnia. Smith, Michael, and A.J. were sitting at the kitchen table. Sir Zachary, who was wearing a doggie bathrobe and had been asleep in one of his extra-fluffy beds, trotted over to greet me.
A.J. and Michael had mugs of coffee in front of them and were talking quietly. Smith was sitting apart from them, a can of grape soda in one hand and his laptop balanced on his knee. His headphones were in and his back was turned to Michael and A.J.
When I glanced at the laptop screen, it was dark. Smith was staring at the blank screen, his gaze unfocused.
I didn’t think I’d ever seen him not doing something on his computer. I wasn’t sure what to make of it, but I knew better than to try to ask him if he was okay.
Smith shied away from emotions the way most people avoided the flu.
“Is she okay?” Michael asked when he caught sight of me.
I nodded. “Sleeping now.”
Michael let out a sigh and hung his head. A.J. patted his arm and said something too quiet for me to hear. Michael dragged a hand down his face. He looked terrible.
I sat down next to him. My butt had barely hit the seat when Smith yanked out his earbuds and stood up.
“Someone just tripped one of my motion sensors in the backyard.”
“Could be one of the Super Mags,” I said.
Smith shook his head. “None of them have left the house tonight. And whoever it is knows exactly where to go to stay out of my cameras.”
I got up from my seat, my pulse hammering as I blew on my fists. The three guys followed as I headed for the back door.
We kept our footfalls quiet and stayed in the shadows as we slunk around the side of the house. Sir Zachary stayed by my side, but he didn’t growl or bark fire the way he would if there was real danger.
I heard muffled sounds at the same moment Michael put out a hand and said, “Wait.”
When I listened harder, the sound was unmistakable. A man was crying.
My stomach cramped at the reminder of my dad’s sobs after we’d been told Lilly died. It was the first time in my life I’d seen an adult cry, and it had scared me senseless.
“We should go back,” Smith said, a nervous kind of helplessness reflected in his wide eyes. “It’s not a threat.”
That was when I saw movement under the big oak tree.
Ma and Oliver were sitting with their backs to the trunk, their hands clasped. Oliver was sobbing with enough force that his entire body shook.
I could see tears glistening on Ma’s dark skin from the garden lights on the grass.
I backed away, keeping my silver skin out of the light and softening my steps so they wouldn’t hear me. My friends and I didn’t make a sound until we were back in the house.
Without discussion, we went into the living room and sat down.
“Does this have to do with what he told Kaira earlier?” A.J. asked Smith.
“I doubt it.” Smith lifted a shoulder. “It’s just, ah—” He tugged on a lock of greasy hair and glanced at the door, looking like he was considering making a break for it. “My mom died ten years ago today.”
My heart lurched.
“Smith,” I gasped, at the same time A.J. said, “Oh, honey.”
“Do you want me to talk to your dad?” Michael asked Smith. “I can make it easier for him.”
Smith shook his head. “It’s not something we talk about…ever. Except with Ma, apparently.”
I wasn’t sure if I imagined a twinge of bitterness in Smith’s voice.
“I don’t like to talk about it either,” Smith said quickly.
“We know,” Michael assured him.
For several seconds, we were all quiet.
A.J. cleared his throat. “I’m having a hankering for some ramen,” he said. “Anyone else?”
A.J. never ate anything with artificial ingredients…including ramen.
“I’ll have some,” I said, catching on.
Michael and Smith nodded.
“I was thinking,” A.J. said as a pot filled itself with water in the kitchen. “I’ve been meaning to watch that new documentary on Alliance cover-ups. I’m forgetting the name.”
“Overreliance, Compliance, and Defiance,” Smith said immediately.
A.J. snapped his fingers. “That’s the one.”
“I’ll get it going,” I said, grabbing the channel changer to download the movie.
“Do you want a cold or room temp grape soda?” Michael asked in a gruff voice as steaming bowls of ramen floated in from the kitchen.
We spent the next four hours watching all sorts of experts talk about Alliance conspiracy theories. The only sound aside from the movie was our slurping of ramen noodles and Sir Zachary gnawing on a bone.
My eyes were starting to cl
ose when Smith’s voice startled me awake.
“Thanks for this,” he said quietly.
“We’ll do it again next year,” I said.
“Yeah,” A.J. agreed. “Maybe by then, they’ll have a conspiracy movie about us. It’ll be totally meta.”
Smith chuckled.
Lulled by each other’s company, we drifted off. The last thing I remembered was A.J. pulling a fleece blanket over me and tucking a pillow under my head. Sandwiched between him and Sir Zachary, I finally fell asleep.
CHAPTER 37
We were all a sorry state the next morning. We picked at our breakfasts because Ma wouldn’t let us leave the house until we ate something. None of us spoke.
We all snuck peeks at Kaira and Graysen for some sign of what Oliver had told them the day before. Their expressions revealed nothing and they offered no explanation. They kept exchanging furtive looks, and it was clear they were having one of their silent arguments.
When Graysen narrowed his gaze at her, Kaira snapped, “If you’re going to start treating me like a china doll, then I’m taking up skydiving lessons.”
“I’ll come,” I said immediately.
“I’m not going to apologize for being obsessed with you,” Graysen shot back. “Deal with it.”
He and Kaira exchanged a fiery look. I shook my head and went back to my coffee.
Yutika and Michael avoided each other, although I caught them both stealing glances at the other when they thought no one was looking.
Sir Zachary was doing his best to cheer everyone up. He offered Michael his favorite stuffed elephant, licked Yutika’s hand, and then fell asleep with his chin resting on Smith’s foot.
Even Ma was quiet as she moved around the kitchen with none of her usual enthusiasm.
Emory and Charlotte joined us a short while later. I was grateful they were coming with us. Of all the Super Mags, they were the most trustworthy and least likely to do something unexpected.
Graysen tore his attention away from Kaira. “Once we get that Energy Manipulator Super Mag out of the picture,” he said, as though we’d been in the middle of a conversation, “Bri will be the only working Steel.”
Mags & Nats 3-Book Box Set Page 95