He took a step toward her. She withdrew and pressed her back against the wall. She seemed to shrink.
“The art schools,” she said. “They might not want her.”
“They might not.”
“She’ll say what they want her to say, and they’ll let her out. But you … I don’t know what you’ll say. I don’t know what you’ll do. I never know what you’ll do, until you do it.”
Now that made no sense. Clay couldn’t be more predictable. He rubbed his aching eyes.
He went to the bedroom and grabbed his sports bag from the closet and filled it. Toiletries. Enough clothes for one night only. No sense tempting the inner coward.
Natalia stood in the doorway a long moment, a framed, cherry-haired sprite. Then she pulled her neon green duffel from under the bed and headed to the dresser.
“Nat?”
She tugged open her underwear drawer and pitched three silk panties into the bag. A bra. “I probably won’t need socks, you think?”
26
Even if she weren’t at the mercy of strangers, Violet should have wakened Khloe first thing. They should have taken turns in the shower, whispered plans or commiseration, performed the bracelet-bump, and gone downstairs side by side. Violet shouldn’t have crept to the closet for fresh clothes and glanced over her shoulder to make sure Khloe’s eyes hadn’t opened.
She showered in five minutes and pulled on a blue V-neck shirt and a pair of Capri jeans that sagged a bit at the hips. Whatever. They wouldn’t fall down, and she hadn’t seen any belts in the closet. Okay, now for breakfast. Her stomach rumbled, but her feet held back. She wasn’t scared, not exactly. Belinda wasn’t going to poison her. Marcus wasn’t going to hit her. But facing them prickled every nerve in her spine. Violet pulled in a breath. They knew what she’d done. She knew what they’d done, were still doing. Go down and face them. Like an adult. And do what Lee had told her to do—watch and form her own opinions.
Lee was halfway down the stairs when Violet reached the top. She spotted Violet through the banister and waited for her. Her short black hair gleamed, still damp. Her jeans and crew-neck top fit too perfectly to be on loan from Belinda’s closetfuls. Maybe she kept a change of clothes in her car.
“Good morning.” The words held complete calm. This version of Lee didn’t know how to hyperventilate.
Who are you really? “Hi, Lee.”
Lee continued down the stairs. Violet was obviously supposed to follow. At the bottom, she halted again but didn’t meet Violet’s eyes.
“I would appreciate your discretion regarding what … happened to me last night.”
“I don’t really have anyone to tell. Marcus won’t even look at me, and I won’t tell Belinda, either, if that’s what you want.”
Lee’s glance ricocheted off Violet. “Thank you.”
They entered the kitchen without further words. The scent of bacon and eggs enveloped Violet along with Belinda’s buoyant twang.
“You’ve got no reason to doubt my eggs. You’ve never tasted them before.”
On one side of the stove, Belinda wore her orange apron over a flowered housedress and stood over a deep-bottomed skillet. At the other burner, clad in carpenter jeans and a fresh ivory T-shirt, Marcus bent his head over a smaller skillet.
“It’s not doubt,” he said.
“Get away from here.” Belinda shooed at him with her free hand and flipped something with the spatula.
“I can flip eggs.”
“I don’t need you flipping anything. Just go sit at the table.”
“And Lee likes them scrambled. Don’t make them all for me.”
“I’m not planning on over-easy for all of them. I got plenty of eggs, and I got plenty of kitchen savvy, so you go sit down and stop pestering me before I send you home with no breakfast.”
He reached for the spatula.
“Marcus!” Belinda shoulder-bumped his arm.
He didn’t budge. A smile creased around his eyes. “They’re done.”
“Go. Sit. I’m fixing this food, not you.”
He turned, and his gaze landed on Lee and Violet with a quick furrow of confusion, as if surprised to find an ally and an enemy side by side. “Hi.”
“Good morning, though not morning for long.” Lee pulled out a stool from the counter bar.
Marcus’s mouth twitched. “Belinda wants us in the dining room.”
“That’s right. Everybody in the dining room, out of my kitchen. I’ll bring the food when it’s done.”
Restrained amusement glimmered in Lee’s eyes. Marcus glanced from her to Belinda with another twitch of smile. Violet followed them both through the kitchen to the connecting dining room. Lee crossed in front of Marcus, and his fingers curled at his side. Like last night, they were about to touch each other and then didn’t.
Marcus sat, folded his arms on the table, and frowned. “You sleep? You look tired.”
Lee sat across from him. “I’m fine.”
He hesitated, then nodded.
“You seem rested,” Lee said, and he nodded again.
A silence closed in, asking “How do we talk with a spy standing here?” Violet focused her attention on the closest item, a chair tucked into the table. Should she sit? She traced one of the swirling leaves carved into the back. On the far wall, the clock’s second hand seemed to tick too slowly. Maybe the battery was dying. Maybe the seconds felt stuck because nothing filled them but bacon grease, hissing from the kitchen.
“How’s the baby?” Marcus said.
“Seven pounds, two ounces, and nursing well.”
“Wren?”
“Given a few days to recover, she’ll be fine.”
Belinda hustled in from the kitchen as Lee spoke. She carried a plate in each hand, one of eggs, half over-easy and half scrambled; the other of steaming pancakes and bacon. “You know she’s welcome here as long as she needs.”
Her tone held nothing uncommon, as if she and her husband often sheltered people for days or weeks. This must be how the network operated. Violet had expected Marcus to rush Wren to a new location immediately, but, then, he hadn’t done that with her and Khloe, either. Maybe fugitives stayed here until they had a permanent place to go.
Lee pulled out the chair beside her. “Sit, Violet.”
Robot legs carried her to obedience. She pressed her back to the chair and let it dig across her shoulder blades.
“We’re about to discuss you,” Lee said. “You should be present.”
Marcus studied Violet too long, then sighed. He reached for the plate of eggs and slid three of them onto his plate, followed by four strips of bacon.
Lee folded her hands and hid them in her lap. “I made certain she didn’t leave the house last night.”
“You … I didn’t think.”
“You were past coherent thought. It was fine. But there are decisions to make now.”
“We can’t let her go, and we can’t keep her.”
Violet’s mouth went dry, and her underarms began to sweat. They’d told her no one would hurt her. Belinda promised.
Belinda had started back to the kitchen, but now she turned to Marcus. “And why’s it one or the other? Keeping her or letting her go?”
He poked his fork at her. “Keeping is kidnapping. Letting go is …” He shook his head and sawed an egg in half with a rush of yolk.
“That’s what I’m trying to say, son. Both choices have some problems.”
Oh, God, save me.
He grabbed a pancake from the stack, curled it in his hand, and mopped up the yolk. “Well.”
“There is no third option,” Lee said.
“Wouldn’t be kidnapping if Violet agreed to stay.”
The fork in Marcus’s hand froze halfway to his mouth. The bite of egg dripped gold back onto his plate. Lee
folded her arms and cocked her head at Belinda, not curiosity but challenge.
“What?” The word blurted from Violet, and she pressed back harder against the chair. She’d been given no voice here.
“You don’t know enough to understand,” Belinda said. “Hold that thought, now. I’ve got a pan on the stove.”
In the minute she was gone, Marcus consumed his eggs and bacon with unwavering focus. Violet breathed in and out, since she’d probably get to keep doing so.
Lee ignored the food altogether. “Marcus, there’s only one option in reality.”
“I know. I have to keep her here.”
Before Lee could answer, Belinda bustled back into the room with a gallon of orange juice and three glasses, rims squeezed between her fingers.
“Lee, you eat up.” She poured a glass of juice and offered it to Violet. “Now, what was I saying? Somebody needs to explain how things are, and why—”
“She can’t be given more information,” Lee said.
“She’s a child, Lee.”
“I’m aware of that.”
She’s sitting right here in front of you. Hadn’t Lee told Violet to observe, to mold her own self, based on the truth? Maybe Violet’s intrusion on her nightmare had somehow changed her mind. Violet ducked her head to hide the heat in her face.
“She’s not responsible for the lies people told her.” Belinda poured another glass and set it in front of Lee. “You’re not giving her a chance.”
“She’s old enough to understand right and wrong.”
“That’s what I’m saying, she might could choose to do right, if we explain to her—”
Clank. Marcus stabbed an egg straight through to the plate. He pushed to his feet and paced the length of the table. “No.”
Belinda froze with the orange juice gallon in her hand. “Marcus, I’m only saying—”
“I know what you’re saying. I’m saying no.”
Violet couldn’t look up at any of them. She was pretty sure Lee’s eyes were boring straight into the top of her head. She stared at the table. Marcus’s egg was bleeding gold.
“Y’all are treating this girl like a Constabulary agent.”
“She is,” he said.
Yes. She was. Look what she’d done so far. “You took their freedom.” Exactly what she was supposed to do. She ignored the bitter taste.
“What’ll you do with her, then? Keep her here until she’s old and gray like me?”
“I don’t—”
From somewhere across the house, a lock clicked and a doorknob rattled. A door swung open. Marcus’s pacing stalled, Lee turned toward the threshold, and Belinda plopped down the juice gallon and scurried toward the sound. Her eyes shone.
“There he is,” she said.
“Where’s my Pearl, and what’s she wearing? Not much, I hope.” The booming voice lacked Belinda’s accent.
Belinda giggled like Khloe. Barely into the living room, still in sight of all her houseguests, she rushed into the arms of a paunchy, olive-skinned man who swept her feet off the floor with his embrace. Silver crept into his black hair, starting at the temples. He leaned down to kiss her, but Belinda shoved at his chest.
“Behave, Chuck. We’ve got guests.”
The man’s gaze lifted, froze, then traveled over each person around his table. It settled on Marcus. “Little early in the day for a powwow, isn’t it? And who’s this?”
“This is Violet,” Lee said.
“She’s a spy,” Marcus said.
Belinda huffed. “I’ll get the syrup.”
Chuck grabbed a chair and sat. He eyed first the food, then the clock. “Better start at the beginning.”
“The Constabulary sent her.” Marcus sat back down, and his fork prodded his remaining egg like a hunter testing if his quarry was really dead. “She texted addresses to them.”
Chuck hunched forward, and his dark eyes narrowed at Violet. “Not my address.”
“N-no,” Violet said.
“The church, then, Marcus’s church? And that porch house?”
Violet dipped her head, half a nod, half submission.
Chuck shifted to shove a thumb into his empty belt loop. “So they’re using children now. Can’t quite get my head around that one yet. Give me a minute.”
None of them understood, not really. Lee was the only one who credited Violet to make her own choices. Well, and Marcus, but he also wanted her locked in a medieval tower for the rest of her life. Violet heard her own throat clear before she realized that she had to talk. Suddenly, they all watched her.
“I’m seventeen years old, and I do have a brain.” She traced the flower design looping over her empty plate. “Maybe all Christians don’t need re-ed, but the ones who hurt people, I think it’s a good thing to teach them how to … to think, and feel for other people, and …”
Marcus’s fork impaled his egg, but he didn’t take a bite. Chuck frowned at Violet as if she’d announced an ability to breathe underwater.
“For the moment,” Lee said, “let’s indulge that theory. Some Christians require re-education in order to grow past their erroneous beliefs and treat people properly.”
Yes, exactly. Lee said it so perfectly.
“Violet, do you believe Belinda would be benefited by re-education?”
Carrying a glass pitcher of syrup in one hand and a butter dish in the other, Belinda froze three feet from the table. The butter dish trembled.
“She’s not intolerant,” Violet said, and the dish steadied.
“No, then?”
“Yeah. I mean, no.” But that didn’t prove anything. Not really. Belinda was only one person.
Lee’s chin tilted up, and the calm hardened. “Do I belong in re-education?”
“I don’t think so.”
“What about Marcus?”
Let me go and I won’t turn anyone in. The words hovered in her mouth, tasting like a green apple, sour because of their truth or because of their lie. Belinda seemed to duck as she set the butter and syrup on the edge of the table. She shuffled back to the kitchen, and dishes began to clatter.
“Violet,” Lee said.
Enough of this. She wasn’t some dog learning tricks, reciting the proper response to buy her release. “He’d probably be a better person after.”
If she hadn’t ventured a glance toward him just then, she’d have missed his momentary flinch. Hurt that she saw him that way? Hardly. But fear didn’t fit him, either, despite what he’d said to Lee when he thought only she could hear. He surged to his feet and paced again.
“A better person?” Lee ran a finger around the rim of her juice glass.
“Calmer, or safer, or something.”
“All right.” Lee’s voice turned the room into an iceberg. If Violet had wanted to purchase her trust with a lie, she should have professed absolute faith in Marcus.
“She can’t leave,” Marcus said.
Chuck rocked his chair back on two legs. “What’re you saying?”
“Nobody would be safe.”
“Fair enough, but your plan is to hold her here? Are we taking prisoners now?”
Marcus paced, and Lee spooned scrambled egg onto Violet’s plate with an indifferent command. “Eat.”
“Marcus,” Chuck said. “What you’re talking about is the opposite of invisible. This girl has parents—you do, don’t you?” He pointed at Violet.
Violet forked a bite of egg, perfectly salted. She still had to force herself to swallow it. She nodded.
“Okay, so the parents report her missing, probably by tomorrow if they haven’t already.”
Actually, that might take a week. Or two.
“The regular cops start a search, it comes out that she was on some kind of Constabulary mission, next thing you know her face is all over the news and she
’s presumed murdered by the Christian crazies. How’s that for under the radar?”
“You want me to let her go,” Marcus said. His feet slowed.
“It’s not a great choice, but it’s the only one.”
“Chuck, I know—missing persons, the media, the cops—I know it could happen. But if she leaves, she’ll talk.”
“I can’t keep her here.”
“Well. You’re going to.”
Wow, Marcus knew how to overstep. This wasn’t his house. Chuck and Belinda were adults—good grief, could be his parents. But Chuck didn’t bristle at the order. Didn’t seem surprised or even annoyed.
His chair thumped back onto all four legs. He looked from Marcus to Violet, then back again. “You’re really serious about this.”
“It’s this or prison. For everybody.”
“So to avoid prison, you’re going to kidnap a child.”
The pacing resumed. “We don’t have a choice.”
“This is not ‘we,’ Marcus, not for one minute. This is you. I have a choice, and I’m telling you, son, I won’t follow you if this is the road you’re taking.”
Follow him? The slope of the debate had slipped right over Violet’s head until this moment. These people had begun arguing as equals, but … they weren’t.
“If I let her go”—Marcus’s words bit the air with quiet steel—“they will lock us up.”
“And if you lock her up, how are you any different?”
Wait … lock her up? Were they talking literally, throw her into some bedroom and board up the window?
Marcus dug his knuckles into his neck and drew in a deep breath.
“Marcus is different,” Lee said, “because he isn’t threatening or mocking or brainwashing her.”
Chuck shook his head. “I know that, but it’s still holding a defenseless kid against her will.”
A long sigh lowered Lee’s shoulders, and she turned to Marcus. “He’s right.”
“He’s … what?”
“She’ll escape if she wants to, unless you confine her, and you can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“Marcus. You cannot physically force your will on her like this. You’re not that kind of man.”
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