by Ashley Maker
Pulling both knees to my chest, I frown. “I don’t know. Maybe. Do you want me to go?”
“Yes.” He sighs again and comes further into my room, shutting the door behind him. “Look, the way I see it is there’s no point in kidding ourselves. Living with me is only going to get harder on the both of us. It would be easier if you went away.”
The finality in his voice makes me flinch, and I hate myself a little for caring what he thinks. But why should I care? He obviously doesn’t trouble himself over me, at least not like I thought he did. I know living with him hasn’t been easy, and last night proved we are both at our breaking points, but does he really want me to go away?
One look at the earnestness in his eyes says he does.
Every time I think Chris is out of ways to hurt me, he pulls out some new trick, the sting of this one cutting deeper than the others. If that’s how he feels, I’ll leave. I’ll go to the fancy boarding school, and I won’t look back.
There’s nothing left for me here.
3
Mathias stares at me from the front passenger seat, and it’s all I can do not to fidget under his gaze. I wish he’d stop. He’s been doing it ever since we left Chris’ house.
I start to lift a hand, to run it through my black curls, but stop when I remember my hair’s in a ponytail. So I awkwardly adjust the hairband instead, like I’d meant to do that in the first place.
Like he isn’t still staring at me.
Trying to ignore him, I glance out the tinted window of the SUV, still buzzing from the freedom of getting out of Chris’ house. After learning how Chris really felt about me, it wasn’t surprising he looked relieved right before I left. He even flashed a smile, a genuine one for once.
“Watch out for the Dark Ones. I’d hate for them to get you,” he said, his last words to me as Mathias’ terminator-wannabe loaded my bags into the trunk. There was no real goodbye. No hug or kiss or fond farewell. Only those words before a haunted look returned to his lean face. I thought I saw his eyes soften. Until he lifted his bottle of whiskey—a celebratory drink for getting rid of me, I think—and shut the door in my face.
I don’t know where I’m going or what the new school will be like. I have questions, but a weirdness in the air keeps me quiet. A part of me is excited to go since it will be a new start, and because Mom went there. She rarely talked about her childhood, and now that she’s gone, I want to know more about her than ever. Chris refused to talk about her, practically shutting down anytime I asked. Or, like last night, the mention of her would send him off on a tangent impossibly hard to follow.
What I don’t get is why he took me in at all when it’s clear he never wanted me around, regardless of his many “I searched for you” speeches. I swallow past the sharp ache forming in my throat. Never mind what he thinks. He doesn’t matter anymore. I didn’t need a father as a kid, and I don’t need one now. Living with him proved that. Swallowing again, I focus on the scenery, on the sides of Highway 74 mounded with new snow, fresh and clean and pure. If only my life could be as untainted. I want that so bad it hurts.
“Are you all right, Miss Palmer?”
I startle, blinking rapidly, and try to keep my voice level. “I’m fine…and you can call me Clare. I don’t mind.”
Ignoring me, he says, “Your father told me you know very little about the compounds, if anything at all, but I find that hard to believe.”
The space between my eyes feels as scrunched up as my stomach at his words. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Today’s the first time I’ve ever heard of a compound.”
His expression is unreadable. “Your full cooperation is paramount, Miss Palmer. To put it simply, I need to know what you know. Everything your mother and father told you.”
“About what?”
Elbow on the armrest, he leans closer. “I need to know what you are.”
“What do you mean, what I am?”
Eyes narrowing, he spouts off questions rapid fire, “Are you an Idem or a Cora? Do you know of the Experior serum? Have you ever been to the Underground? Was your mother in league with the Rogues? Have you been through the expertus?”
Whoa. I push myself as far into the backseat as I can. Air stings my eyes, and I have to force myself to blink. The things he said are both foreign and familiar, but I’ve only ever heard Chris say them. And he’s crazy.
Mathias gestures to the driver. The tires crunch and slide over the new snow as the car slows, stopping at the side of the road. My heartbeat jolts when Mathias pulls something resembling a rag out of the glove compartment. He takes out something else, but I can’t see what he does with it. An odd, sharp yet sweet smell fills the SUV, and I wrinkle my nose, trying to identify the scent.
Mathias unbuckles his seatbelt and opens the car door. The driver follows suit, and cold air immediately sweeps in, scattering goosebumps across my skin. “This isn’t the way I prefer to do things, Miss Palmer. But you’ve left me no choice.”
The way he says it makes my heart stop.
What have I done? There is no school. They’re as insane as Chris, and who knows what they’re going to do to me.
Some sort of buzzing paralysis takes hold of my body. For a second, I can’t move, until the crunch-squeak of Mathias’ footsteps through the snow sends me scrambling to unbuckle my seatbelt. A glimpse out the window confirms no other cars are on the road. There’s no one to come and save me from these psychos. The door to my right pops open at the same time I fling the shoulder strap away, fingers already reaching and fumbling for a way out. My hand closes around the silver door handle, but Mathias is faster.
He grabs my ankle and yanks, flipping me over so my back slides across the tan leather seats. When he pushes the white rag toward my face, I kick at his chest. He stumbles, but his expression doesn’t change. He doesn’t even flinch, just moves toward me again.
“Please—” My voice rises. “Please don’t.”
“Relax, Miss Palmer. I don’t intend to hurt you.”
His words do nothing to calm my racing heart. As if I’m going to buy into them for one second. I start scooting backward across the seat, away from Mathias.
“I want to go home,” I say, choking on the words, barely able to get them out.
Mathias gestures to the driver again. The man opens my car door. A hysterical sob squeezes my throat. There’s nowhere left to go other than the front seat. I lurch for it, but a meaty arm catches me around the waist and pins me against the leather with pressure on my chest. “Go,” the driver tells Mathias, his voice gruff. I try to jerk out from under his arm, but he’s too strong. I’m trapped.
“This would be a lot easier if you would cooperate.” Mathias looms over me with the white rag; the fumes assault my nostrils as he pushes it toward my face.
Trying to turn away proves futile. My head feels funny. I let it fall back against the leather seat as every muscle becomes useless and slack. The noises around me—the hiss of winter battering the open car doors, the sound of Mathias’ voice as he leans closer—start to blend together into one whirring hum that pulsates with the blood near my ears.
“Don’t worry, Miss Palmer.” His voice goes in and out like static. “I am taking you home.”
My eyelids flutter. I gasp in air. And then…
Nothing.
4
When I wake up, I’m no longer in the SUV. I’m stretched out on a mattress so firm it feels like lying on plywood. I sit up and put both hands to my head as a painful ache pounds against my temples. All at once, I remember what happened, and I whip my head up to look at my surroundings.
I’m in a cell. Or maybe a padded room. It’s like some strange combination of the two.
The bed with its stark white sheets takes up most of the available space. Across the room is a steel door and a tiny glass window with bars over it. A large mirror is on one of the other walls, reminding me of the two-way mirrors on crime shows. I read somewhere there’s a test to determine an ord
inary mirror from one of the transparent ones. Something about placing your finger on it and a gap.
Then I notice the mirror isn’t hung on the wall; it’s set into it. Why else would a huge mirror be set into a padded wall, if not for spying on people? I start to get up, just to test out the whole finger and gap thing, but stop when my foot bumps into an object on the floor.
My bags—all three of them—are there. And my purse, too. I fall to my knees and clutch the closest one to my chest. Tears spring to my eyes. They let me keep my things.
That has to be a good sign. If they planned to murder me and feed me to pigs or something, my bags wouldn’t be necessary.
Swiping at the tears, I turn back to the mirror and glare at it. “This isn’t funny,” I say. My chest tightens. What kind of sick joke are they trying to pull?
I stand and point a finger. “Have you never heard of emotional trauma, you sick scumbags? And was the chloroform really necessary when I was already with you? I know you’re listening! Nobody just up and puts a mirror in a cell.”
No answer. The silence makes me want to break the stupid glass. I look around for something to throw at it, something hard or sharp. There’s nothing in the room I can use, but maybe something I packed…
My knees scrape against the concrete as I drop down and begin rifling through the bag closest to me. I know I packed the snow globe Mom brought back from her trip to New York. Different fabric textures sift through my fingers as I dig to the very bottom, but the snow globe isn’t there. A search of the other two bags ends with the same result. In fact, everything considered hard or sharp is missing, including the nail file from my purse. No cell phone either, although that doesn’t really surprise me. Back on my feet, I check the door. Locked. And it totally figures I can’t see out of the little square window, not even when I stand on tiptoes.
The room, if it can even be called that, is way too small. How do they expect me to breathe in here when the air is so warm and stale? I roll my shoulders but can’t get rid of the tightness at the base of my neck. My gaze keeps flickering to the mirror.
Those peeping lowlifes.
Canvas rubs against both hands as I pick up my green bag and hurl it at the mirror. It bounces off and lands at my feet, not heavy or sharp enough to even scratch the glass. But there has to be something. Something I’ve overlooked; something that will get me out of here.
The silver ring attaching the handle to my black purse gleams like a shiny beacon from the floor. It’s the sturdy kind, not the flimsy ones that break under a little weight. Jackpot. I pick it up, my cheeks twitching with a smile I can’t hold back. The ring isn’t exactly sharp, but it stands to reason that if I bash it into the mirror with enough force, the glass should eventually break.
It’s not like I have anything else to do.
The metal digs into my palm. For a second, I stand in front of the mirror with my hand raised, staring at my reflection and breathing hard. Most of my hair has fallen out of the ponytail, pieces sticking out every direction. There’s a cut on my lip and dried blood on my chin, though I don’t know how either got there. And my eyes. Man, do they look awful. They’re all bloodshot, with dark circles underneath them.
I look deranged.
The thought almost makes me laugh, until I remember why I’m standing there looking at myself in the first place. I pull back my arm and start amping myself up for a mirror-shattering strike.
Right when I’m ready to let go of the energy, a deep male voice says, “Don’t even think about it.”
With a squeak, I jump back, dropping the purse to the floor.
I take another step back from the mirror. “Who said that? Who’s there?”
The voice is silent.
“Oh, come on,” I say, retrieving the purse and holding it up again. “I’ll so use this. It’s not like anyone’s here to stop me.”
Mirror-Voice laughs.
“Sure, it’s funny to you now, but maybe I know karate and am a force to be reckoned with. You know, breaking cinder blocks with one punch, that kind of a force.”
His voice is a low rumble. “I doubt you know karate. Even if you did, it wouldn’t help you here.” A pause. “If I have to call someone to restrain you, you’re not going to like it.”
My hand lowers. There’s no way I want to be restrained. “Fine,” I say, tossing the purse onto the bed. “Why am I here?”
“They told me you came of your own free will, and with your father’s permission.”
A retort freezes on my tongue since he’s technically right. I glare at the mirror, hating that this guy—whoever he is—was able to catch me off guard. “Okay, first of all, this isn’t what I signed up for. Second, I’m pretty sure free will doesn’t involve knocking someone out with chloroform. Did they tell you that part, too?”
“No, but that would explain your appearance.”
Errant strands of hair tickle my cheek. I frown and tuck them behind an ear. “Yeah, well they did. And they lied to me about coming to a boarding school. This is clearly not a school. If I’d known this was how it was going to be, I never would have come.”
“They didn’t lie about the school.”
“Excuse me?”
“You are at a boarding school.”
I snort. “You’re kidding, right? Are all the new students locked in cells and forced to communicate through mirrors?”
“Only the special ones,” he says, and it sounds like he’s smiling.
They knocked me out, locked me up, and he thinks it’s funny. My chin lifts and I cross my arms. “You’re a real creep, you know that? Go ahead and hide behind your little mirror.”
The bed shifts as I sit down and draw both knees up to my chest, hugging them tightly.
“I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re not. You don’t know me,” I say. “Or why I agreed to come here. I bet you don’t even know my name.”
Mirror-Voice is quiet for so long I think he’s done talking. I hug my knees tighter, wishing I could be anywhere else. Then he says, “I know your name is Clare.”
I rest the side of my face on my knees and squint at the mirror, as if that will somehow let me see who is on the other side. As much as I hate talking to a pane of glass, I’d rather do that than be alone in the silence.
“At least tell me who you are.”
“My name is Kade.”
I sigh. He would have a cool name. “What do they want from me? Are they going to kill me?”
“I don’t know,” Kade says, his voice softer. “I’m not sure why they brought you here.”
My breath hitches, and I shiver at his words, trying not to focus on the last thing he said. “Where am I?”
He doesn’t answer.
“Okay, why might they kill me then?” I ask, and then I say, “Please, tell me something.”
“This is actually an observation room. If it makes you feel better, they probably only used the chloroform so you wouldn’t know how to get to the compound.” He sighs. “I don’t have access to your file, so I can’t tell you more than that.”
I raise my eyebrows. “They have a file on me?”
“They have a file on everyone who comes here.”
His words make me want to scream. It’s as if I’m walking in a circle when I desperately need to go in a straight line. Only Chris would allow me to go to a place where they might want to kill me. And, for what, I have no idea. I’m about to ask Kade another question when a buzzing sound crackles through the speakers.
“What do you think you’re doing, Karen?” says another male voice, a familiar one. “You weren’t cleared to talk to the subject.”
Did he call me a subject? And who’s Karen?
“Sorry, sir,” Kade says. Shuffling follows.
The static turns to silence that makes my heart drop.
I can’t wait for these people to decide what’s going to happen to me. Kade, whoever he is, wasn’t supposed to talk to me, but he did. I can’t lose him. Not when he’s t
he one and only person who’s given me answers, miniscule as they’ve been. If I can find a way to keep talking to him, maybe I can find out more about what in the world is going on, and what Mathias wants from me.
Words tumble from my mouth. “I won’t talk to anyone else.” I know they can hear me. “If you want to know what I know, you’ll let me talk to him. And I want to see him face to face.”
I wait to see if anyone will answer me. Right when I think it’s not going to happen, the familiar voice says, “Very well, Miss Palmer. I’ll make the arrangements.”
5
They leave me in silence for what feels like forever. I can’t stop looking at the mirror, wondering who’s behind it and if Kade is still there. It’s a reminder of how powerless I really am. I didn’t have a choice when Mom disappeared, or when Social Services sent me to live with Chris, or when Mathias and his goon knocked me out in the SUV and dragged me to this place, whatever it is. But I do have the choice to not look so torn up and demented anymore.
The first thing I do is comb fingers through my hair. I don’t have water or hair gel to tame the massive mound of frizz, but at least it no longer resembles a black poodle that got electrocuted. I rub at my mouth, ignoring the raw rush of pain under my fingertips, until all traces of blood are gone from my lips and chin. Checking the bag with my toiletries, I find they left the toothpaste but took my toothbrush, as if that makes any sense. I roll my eyes and scrub at my teeth with a finger. I’m itching to change clothes, but there’s no way I’m doing that when who knows how many people are watching.
There. I look presentable again, more like myself.
With nothing else to do, I sit on the edge of the bed and wait, ignoring my growling stomach and parched throat. It’s not like it would have killed them to leave a girl some crackers and a bottle of water.
The scraping sound of a key inserted into the door makes me jump to my feet. When the door swings open, I frown at the man standing in front of me.