MILA 2.0: Redemption

by Debra Driza

  Somehow, I doubted that Hannah had narcolepsy.

  I put the lid back on the jar and shoved the packet in my pocket, to dispose of later. The drug itself wasn’t that surprising. Illegal, yes, but it sounded like the kind of thing kids might use if they were pushing themselves to work too hard. But the packets . . . those had been specially made. Designed to hide the evidence, not something your run-of-the-mill student dealer was likely to bother with. Or even know how to do.

  Hunter had mentioned J.D. had headaches. I wondered if he took the same stuff to “fix” them.

  Holland was involved. I was sure of it, though I didn’t know his motive, and I still lacked proof. But he probably had someone on the inside too, dispensing this stuff to the grant kids. Grassi was right about drugs, it turned out. This just wasn’t the sort of drug I’d thought he meant.

  Hannah’s phone might tell me more, if I could ever find it.

  I hunted through the room one more time. If she hadn’t powered it off, I could just scan the room and find it.

  Wait. Did that mean she had taken it to the bathroom?

  I opened the door to the hall. Still clear. I rushed toward the bathroom, praying that none of the other girls would pop out of their rooms. This spur-of-the-moment plan only worked if no one else was around to see.

  I eased open the bathroom door and walked into a wall of hot air. Clouds of steam fogged the entry and water pounded a tile floor somewhere in the distance.

  She was still showering. But for how much longer?

  I ran a quick scan.

  1 human presence detected.

  Just me and Hannah. For now.

  On careful feet, I crept past the toilets. I moved into the hallway that led to the showers.

  I rounded the corner and counted three stalls. The first two were empty. The last one had the curtain drawn, with steam rising over the top.

  I could see her shower caddy on the bench just outside the door. Only steps away. But also only a few steps away from Hannah.

  I would have to creep in and grab it.

  I crouched, drawing up against the section of wall that served as a divider from the middle shower. When I got closer, my heart lodged in my throat. Hannah’s curtain was partway open. Not much—only three inches.

  But if she turned around, that three inches was enough to ID me.

  Over the top of the wall, I watched white, soapy bubbles foam up on her head. I’d never felt more like a stalker than I did right now.

  New low, Mila. Stakeout in the girls shower, waiting for your naked roommate to close her eyes.

  I was mortified, but I knew I had to seize this opportunity. When she rinsed, she’d close her eyes. Five, maybe ten seconds. That was all I’d have to nab the phone . . . then only minutes to gain access.

  If I was lucky.

  Like a predator staking out prey, I went very still and waited. Hannah kept sudsing her hair until the bubbles grew another two inches. Good grief, how dirty could her hair be? After what seemed like hours but I knew had only been thirty-two seconds, she finally tilted her head back. She closed her eyes an instant before the spray hit her face.

  That was my cue.

  Hoping like hell that she rinsed as long as she shampooed, I darted forward.

  One second.

  I went to make a grab for the phone, but her lotion bottle was in the way. If I knocked something over, she’d know I was there.

  Angling my arm around the side, I could just barely reach her phone. I pulled it toward me with my fingertips.

  Three seconds.

  The phone slid toward me, and I tightened my grip.

  There.

  Five seconds.

  Every second, more suds drained away.

  I thought I heard a noise outside. I jerked, and bumped the bottle.

  To my horror, it tottered. Crap. I lunged toward the caddy so my other hand could grab the bottle before it toppled onto the ground.

  The bottle was safe. But I wasn’t. I was fully exposed, standing right in front of the crack in the curtain, with a clear view of her profile from only a foot away.

  Ten seconds.

  All the suds were gone.

  I backed away, toward the cover of the other stalls. Her eye popped open just as I rounded the corner.

  I waited without daring to move. Had she seen me?

  A couple of seconds passed before I could breathe again normally. For now. But I still had to finish.

  Retreating into the next shower down, I looked through her apps until I found the messaging one and opened it. The last text message streamed to me, but it was gobbledygook.

  Even with their own VPN, they texted in code.

  That’s when the water stopped. My head jerked up. No!

  Saving the text into my hard drive, I tiptoed out of my stall. I hadn’t heard the curtain slide on the rod, so she hadn’t noticed the missing phone. Yet.

  Panic beat a frantic rhythm in my chest. I had to get out of the bathroom, and back to the room. Before she knew I was here.

  The curtain rustled, and the panic rose, making me dizzy. I was out of time. But what now? There was no way to return the phone to her caddy. And I couldn’t take the phone back to our room. She’d know instantly.

  I looked around, and did the only thing I could. I crouched and set the phone on the tile floor, sliding it silently into the empty stall between us. Maybe she’d think it had fallen out of her caddy.

  I retreated as silently as I could. My hand had just touched the door leading to the hallway when I heard a hiss of indrawn breath, followed by the clatter of plastic. The sound someone might make if they were digging around to find something they’d lost.

  I hauled butt back to our room, replaced the cord where I’d found it, kicked off my shoes, and plopped into bed behind my laptop.

  Less than forty-five seconds later, I heard her approach. She rushed inside, cheeks flushed, hair still uncombed. Shirt damp from where she hurried through the drying process. I felt her gaze on me, but I kept my own firmly planted on my monitor.

  Her caddy clattered onto her dresser, so I finally looked up. Her phone was clutched tightly in her right hand.

  “Everything okay?”

  Three seconds passed before she responded. “Ever have one of those moments where you’re sure you know where you put something, only you find it somewhere else?”

  I made a noise and hoped it sounded sympathetic. “All the time. Especially when I don’t get enough sleep.”

  “Sleep. Right.” She shook her head again; looked down at her phone. Finally, she gave a small laugh. “That must be it.”

  While she ran a brush through her hair, I assessed the one text I’d managed to extract.

  Code analysis: Initializing.

  The answering prompt appeared faster than I’d expected.

  Deciphered.

  The code shifted into words.

  CRA meeting tomorrow, 12:00 a.m.

  Not much, but enough. Now I just had to alert the others. The text didn’t say where the meeting was, but I was pretty sure I knew. Tomorrow, we were finally going to get a peek at whatever secret lay hidden in the locked building.

  And CRA? That was also the name of the network that connected the grant kids’ phones.

  Lucas?

  I had to talk to him, but I wasn’t sure I could initiate contact from my end.

  Hi.

  I smiled and filled him in on the new development, telling him I’d inform the others at breakfast.

  Hang on a sec.

  When a minute passed and he hadn’t returned, I tensed. Had we lost the connection?

  I’m back.

  His voice soothed away the frantic flutter beneath my ribs.

  Go to the dean’s office in an hour. We need to fix something.

  The tension crept back into my chest.

  Fix something?

  But his answer was unsatisfying.

  Can’t explain now. Talk later.

  Since I di
dn’t have a choice, I echoed him.

  Later.

  When I showed up outside the dean’s office, my “dad” and “stepbrother” were already waiting for me.

  Lucas held out the small duffel bag. “Here you go. Next time, make a list so you don’t forget stuff.”

  I accepted the bag. “Sorry. I’m a sucky packer. I admit it.”

  My voice sounded light. My acting was impressive. Because the familiar sight of Lucas, the familiar smell, did funny things to my stomach.

  “Daughters,” said Daniel, as in, “What can you do?”

  The natural way he said the word packed an emotional punch of its own.

  Both of them, so close, made my heart swell unexpectedly. I’d missed them these last two days.

  Last two days. In my head, the words were a warning.

  Today. Tomorrow. That was all the time we had left at Montford.

  “Take a walk?” I asked, all too conscious of the video camera that perched on the gate.

  We ambled down the path that led away from the administrative offices and toward the outer entrance to the dorms.

  “What’s up?” I almost whispered.

  “We just wanted to make sure you had fresh clothes. Your toothpaste. Oh, and your flash drive. And new burn phones, for the others,” Daniel said in a low voice. “Lucas made some . . . adaptations.”

  Fixing something.

  As we walked, Lucas pulled a tiny square from his pocket and slipped it into my hand.

  “You want me to use it now?” I whispered, scanning the area. No one was in front of the building, but I detected two students around the far right corner.

  Daniel lagged behind and took up the center of the path. “I’ll give you two a little privacy.” I realized what he was doing then. Blocking the view of the video camera and anyone who might happen by.

  Lifting my sleeve with one hand, I slid the square beneath, fumbling around under the fabric until a seam in my skin parted, and the plastic slid inside.

  “Fine, but I’m starting to feel like a human pincushion. An android pincushion,” I corrected. I sensed Lucas’s smile but the app appeared right then, capturing my attention.

  Secure text app: Installing.

  25%.

  50%.

  75%.

  Complete.

  I withdrew the disc and placed it in Lucas’s hand. He surprised me by closing his hand around mine, disc and all.

  My skin heated up, like magic. Distracting me. “What did I just install?”

  “My version of a hands-free texting app for you. One that you can command with your mind. I realized that in all the chaos of getting to Montford, we’d never given you a way to communicate with your team. I created a program to link their burn phones to this app. Why don’t you give it a try?”

  Secure text app: Open.

  A pause, and then:

  Open.

  Message recipient?

  The list scrolled, showing all my partners in crime, with one notable addition.

  “William Wallace?” I said. “As in Braveheart?”

  He shifted his weight and toyed with the hem of his gray T-shirt. He looked good in T-shirts, actually. Really good. Lucas was lean, but in a wiry, strong way. I guessed he got out from behind his computer pretty often to do something more strenuous.

  “Just a reminder, if you start to feel down.”

  I quipped, “Because nothing picks you up quite like seeing a Scotsman drawn and quartered.” But I was pretty sure that something inside me had just melted.

  The tips of his ears turned pink, and his eyes locked on mine. They spoke of hope and belief. Of conviction and kindness. Of support, no matter what.

  His presence, his being: it was like a magnet, pulling me in. Daniel was only five feet away, but I didn’t care. Not then. I leaned into Lucas, hoping, praying he wouldn’t pull away. He didn’t. Emboldened, I bunched my hands in his shirt, my gaze going to his mouth.

  That’s when an alarm blared from his pocket. I sprang back while he looked blank for a minute. Then his jaw went slack.

  “What is it?” I knew it wasn’t good.

  Daniel turned at the same time Lucas plucked the phone out of his pocket. He nodded at whatever he saw, as though he’d been expecting it.

  “What’s wrong?”

  The hazel eyes that met mine were steady, despite the pallor of his cheeks.

  “That was an alert from my doctor friend, who helped me pretend to be sick for so long. He’s letting me know that Holland sent someone to investigate my story.”

  “And?” Daniel prompted.

  “Now he knows I’m not really sick.”

  Daniel and I stared at Lucas aghast, our expressions probably identical in their fear.

  “We talked about this,” Lucas reminded me gently. “We knew this could happen.”

  “I know. I just . . . never thought it would happen now.”

  I drew in a breath and focused on not falling apart. Lucas was the one in danger this time.

  “My uncle doesn’t like his worker bees to escape him,” Lucas said grimly.

  “Does he know . . . everything?” I whispered. Still daring to hope.

  That hope shattered the instant I met his eyes. “I imagine he was able to put two and two together pretty quickly. The timing, your escape from the lab. Yes, he knows I helped you.”

  He knows I helped you.

  So I’d done it again. I’d fallen for someone, only to put his life in danger.

  Hunter had been right. Getting close to me was like signing your own death warrant.

  There was only one solution. We had to abort the mission. “I’ll tell the others. We’ll leave early, find you a safe place—”

  Lucas’s jaw tightened. “Absolutely not. Just because he knows about me doesn’t mean he knows anything about you. You guys are close to finding answers. I’ll be fine.”

  I opened my mouth to argue, but Daniel reached out and squeezed my shoulder. “I know you want to keep him safe, but those kids in there need you too. We’ll be okay. But we probably need to get going. Your laptop . . . ?” Daniel prodded.

  Lucas nodded. “I need to shut it down. All of it. And warn my brother. I don’t think Holland would find him or even look for him, but just in case . . .”

  Just when I thought he was going to hurry off, he pulled me into his arms. His mouth lowered to my ear, his words feathering across my skin, warm and firm. “Don’t worry about me. Just focus on your investigation. In two days, you’ll have what you need. We’ll take down my uncle, then we’ll get the hell out of dodge.”

  I returned the hug, but instead of just soaking up his warmth and comfort, I tried to comfort him as well. “Stay safe. And check in. Often. If there’s a six-hour stretch where I don’t hear from you . . .”

  “Deal.” He pulled back, stared into my face. Opened his mouth like he wanted to say more, but Daniel barked at him to hurry.

  I watched them retreat, all the way through the gate and to the van, before I turned back toward the school on leaden feet.

  My fear refused to budge. It clung to me like a second skin.

  I hurried back into the main building and headed for the cafeteria, where I ushered the gang to a table in the back corner, by the emergency exit. No one ever sat here because frigid air seeped in from under the door. The cafeteria was just starting to wake and stir with bleary-eyed students.

  Once everyone had grabbed food and gathered round, I distributed the burn phones under the cover of the table, and explained how they were linked to me. Then I filled them in on what I’d found. The coded message on Hannah’s phone, and the meeting we would intercept tonight. The modafinil packets, too.

  At that point, Abby interrupted. “Packets? Little white ones, like sugar? Sharon has a box of those, on her dresser. She told me they were fiber supplements, so I didn’t go near them.”

  “Are those the same as J.D.’s headache meds?”

  Hunter nodded.

  “
I think we can assume that Claude and Ben have them as well, then.”

  “It’s not much in the way of smoking guns, though, eh? Not here. I knew a guy who used to snort NoDoz to pull all-nighters,” Samuel said. “It’s not exactly unusual.”

  “Maybe not a smoking gun, but someone went to a lot of trouble to disguise them. If we can figure out which staff member is supplying them, we might find the connection to Holland. Do any of the grant kids seem close to the faculty?”

  Mrs. Tate, the PE coach, Mr. Frost, the math teacher, and Mr. Grassi came up as a few student favorites, so we agreed to try to focus our attention on them. It wasn’t the most scientific plan, but for tonight, it was all we had.

  Samuel was eyeing me with a frown. “What’s wrong?”

  With my heart pumping pure dread, I filled them in on Lucas.

  “He was careful,” I reassured them. “It will take Holland a while to track him down to Montford, and hopefully by then, we’ll be long gone. But I can’t make any guarantees. If you want out, now is probably the time.”

  They didn’t even need to think it over. They all agreed to stay. Even Hunter. Who maybe—just maybe—could see why I had to finish what we had started together.

  As we headed for our classes, I initiated the countdown until midnight. Yesterday, I’d been worried that we’d run out of time before we could finish our mission.

  Now, the opposite was true. Every minute felt like another opportunity for Holland to move in on Lucas . . . and me.

  Lucas checked in at two, to let me know he was okay. He’d shut down his remote connection to Holland’s workstation and alerted Tim, just in case. No sign of trouble, he told me. Yet.

  If I really was a prospective student, there’s no way Montford would have admitted me. I spaced out during classes. I got lost on the way to PE. So much for class participation—all I could do was think about what would happen after class. After dinner. After homework and lights-out. Finally, we might get some answers about what Holland was doing here—and what had happened to Sarah.

  I feigned sleep as soon as it seemed believable. At eleven thirty, I heard Hannah rustle around on her side of the room. Like she was changing clothes again. Then I heard her pad to the door and open it quietly. When I opened my eyes, I was alone in the room.