by Jody Klaire
Smyth and Jäger exchanged a glance then they both nodded.
“Samson it is,” Smyth chimed. “Now, Jäger will show you to your quarters. I think you will find them satisfactory.”
Jäger strode to the door and held it open.
“I’ll expect you at the meeting tomorrow morning to go over procedure.” Smyth didn’t bother to get up from his seat. “Locks, I know you are aware of how we do things but it never hurts to be reminded of your place.”
Oh, I didn’t like that. I hated that tone. I hated the way he ran his gaze over her and hated the smarmy grin on his face.
Frei didn’t flicker. She smiled as if he was paying her a great compliment, thanked him, picked up our bags, and walked out of the room.
Pickle juice. I was going to start stocking up.
“Samson,” Jäger said with a charming smile as we headed out onto the quadrant. It was too quiet for a school. Either it was lesson time or we’d come to an academy of mutes. “As you are . . . higher . . . you will be responsible for Locks and her actions.”
Higher? Like taller? I didn’t know what to say to that. “I can handle her.”
Frei should have kicked my butt for that but instead she smiled as if I was being sweet.
Jäger walked too close. His aftershave felt like it was attempting to suffocate me. We walked in the buffeting wind all the way around the opposite block and to an impressive looking villa.
I wanted to ask him where the togas were.
“Enjoy,” he purred, handing me the keys. “Just keep her locked up at night.”
He glanced at Frei who dipped her gaze.
“Not that it’ll stop her for long. She’s a handful.” He stepped toward her and lifted her chin. “Huber or not, behave or I’ll start finding you interesting.”
Frei said nothing. Not a word as he stroked the side of her face.
“Good girl.”
I was trying my best but I wanted to pummel the guy. I puffed out my chest. “Like I said, I can handle her.”
Jäger raised an eyebrow at me. He dropped his hand from Frei’s face and wandered to me. He didn’t stop until his face was inches from mine. “Then I’ll extend my reminder to you. Behave or I’ll find you interesting.”
I gripped the keys, fighting the wish to jab them into his wandering eyes. “Sounds like an incentive.”
Jäger laughed, licked his lips, and turned to stride off back toward the quadrant.
I was panting. My shoulders were hitched up to my ears. I wanted to take all the fury I’d locked away over my life and let it out on him.
Creep.
Good thing I didn’t have my burdens, at least some of my burdens. I didn’t want to know what icky thoughts ran through his head.
Frei’s hand on mine made me tear my gaze from Jäger’s retreating back.
“I’ll let us in.” Her tone was softer than I’d ever heard it.
“I want to poke him with something sharp,” I muttered through a rattling breath. “Don’t care what you say, they’re creeps. They make Sam look like a gentleman.”
“You fronted up to him for me.” Frei touched my arm, placed the key in the lock, and let us in. “Thank you.”
“How do you do it?” I asked, glaring around at the opulent place. Tiled floors, clean, sharp walls, colonial with a large hole in the floor filled with mosaic tiles. “How do you hold in the need to kick their butts?”
Frei closed the door and dropped the bags. She took my hand and led me around the villa. “Living room, for guests.” She pointed to the left of the door, fireplace, couple of chairs, and a coffee table. “Living room for us.” Behind a half wall, two squishy sofas, a bookcase, and a TV over the counter from a state-of-the-art kitchen.
“Gym is always at the back overlooking the garden.” She swept her hand in that direction. “Kitchen diner.” She motioned at the silver fridge. “Statues of the highest paying customers in various poses.”
There were a few. I wondered why we needed statues in a villa.
“Staircase is spiral and down the hall from the guest living room.” She took her jacket off and slung it on a chair. “Bathroom off our living room.” She cracked her knuckles. “Two bedrooms upstairs, a bathroom with a whirlpool . . .” She cracked out her neck. “. . . and lots and lots of pictures of fat men.”
“I guess that this is a cookie-cutter house then?”
Frei nodded. “It’s a senior staff villa. They rate you.” She shrugged. “Which is why you get your very own slave.”
Didn’t that make me want to stand in a shower for a week. “There is no way I’m letting some poor thing wander ’round picking up after me.”
“Good, because I suck at laundry.”
I stared at her as she buzzed around, pulling something out of her pocket and switching it on. I was pretty sure I blinked a few times too. “Huh?”
She turned, catching me staring. “Me, Lorelei. That’s why he gave you the little speech.” She shook her head, tapping her ring with her thumb. “Don’t think I’ve ever seen him that fascinated before.” She looked me up and down with a lopsided smile. “And I did not think you had that in you.”
“I was protecting you.” I folded my arms. “It was that or floor him.”
I scowled at the thought. I didn’t care who he was. I could have knocked his teeth out and not thought twice. Considering I spent so long in Serenity dictated to by some pretty big losers, this place was something else.
“So I saw.” Frei fiddled with the device on the counter and it beeped. “Good, no bugs.”
“What in Blackbear is that?” I pointed to the tiled hole in the floor.
She glanced at it and pulled her laptop out of her duffel bag. “It’s . . . a water feature.”
I cocked my head. “Why do they have a water feature in the middle of the living area?”
“Long story. It’s better you don’t think about it.” Pain flickered across her eyes. It hurt watching her. She had more courage than I could ever imagine coming back here.
“You ain’t that person no more. Look at me.” I took her by the shoulders. “You don’t belong to anyone. You got me now.” I smiled at her. “I ain’t gonna let you go through this alone.”
She studied me for a moment as if she wasn’t sure whether to believe my words. Seeing her vulnerable gave me a stomach ache. I needed to get her being Frankenfrei again.
“Fancy a workout?” I asked, hoping I could make her smile.
She shook her head. “Glutton for punishment, huh?”
It became clear why Renee always challenged her, why she made her compete. Frei came out of herself when challenged. Her spirit shone through.
“Never,” I said, hoping it sounded convincing. “Just need to keep them puny guns of yours working.”
Frei’s look was one of icy, cool calm. The Frei I knew. “Puny?”
Not even close to puny. She weren’t my size but those arms could lift way more than mine. “Okay . . . maybe not puny . . . how ’bout skinny?” I cocked my head. “No . . . no . . . scrawny?”
Frei flexed her jaw and motioned with her head to the back of the villa. “Gym, Lorelei. You asked for it.”
She strutted off and I sighed, she was gonna blitz me even in jeans and a t-shirt.
“Stop drooling and move.”
I made my feet do just that and tried not to think about how painful it was going to be.
RENEE LAY, STARING up at the white nondescript ceiling. The moonlight tinted it with silvery blue and the wind rattled the windows. A dust storm had rolled in earlier, covering everything in brown snow and she’d watched the maintenance guys shovel it off the paths before trying to sleep. She’d been in the academy for a week, she’d made contact with the two POIs as instructed. The academy seemed secure, the staff pleasant but she’d spent the entire week in fits of frustration. There wasn’t a reason she could put her finger on. Not even hormones.
Renee ran her thumb over Aeron’s necklace. She couldn’t expl
ain it but when she touched it, she felt a warm hug around her. It felt like a mother’s embrace. She should call her mother. She never called enough.
“You sober for a second?”
Renee heard the voice and sat bolt upright. Maybe someone was outside her window.
“Blondie, when you gonna stop tryin’ to stick things in a neat little box?” Renee turned and watched as something took a seat on the bed beside her. “You think better when you think with your heart.”
Renee pinched her arm, hoping it would wake her up. It didn’t. The weird mist of what sounded like Nan shimmered in the moonlight. She was officially certifiable. “Nan?”
“You expectin’ somebody else?”
“I’m having an hallucination.” Renee swung her legs off the bed, squealing at the icy cold from the . . .whatever it was . . . and hurried to the bathroom. She threw water on her face. She’d put the drunken episode down to just that, drink. This, how did she explain this? “It’s the heat . . . it’s—”
She shrieked as an icy blast hit her cheek.
“You calmer now?”
Renee shook her head. “Do it again.”
Another icy blast hit her cheek. She shivered.
“Better?”
“Not really.” She shuddered and tucked her necklace away in case it was really Nan. She didn’t want Aeron to get in trouble. “How can I help you?”
“More the other way ’round, Blondie.” Nan breezed over as if standing at her side and taking her by the elbow. “You having some issues?”
“I’m either talking to a vivid hallucination, which means I need a long conversation with a psychiatrist or I’m talking to a ghost which means . . . I need a long conversation with a psychiatrist.”
“A spirit,” Nan said with a tut.
“There’s a difference?” She had enough trouble not offending people let alone former people. She needed to lie down. She needed whiskey. She needed therapy.
Another icy blast hit her. She shrieked.
“Focus, Blondie. You were better when you were juiced.” Nan sighed. “There’s some complications, side effects to what my Shorty did an’ well . . . you ain’t gonna find them easy.”
“You mean like I’m insane?” Renee wandered downstairs to the liquor cabinet but it wouldn’t open.
“Sober is better in this place,” Nan said.
Renee tried the cabinet again. It didn’t have a lock so Nan, delusion, spirit or otherwise was holding it shut . . . and her head hurt.
“You mean I’m frustrated,” she said, deciding to hear the delusion out. Maybe it could speak sense into her. “I haven’t been able to settle since St. Jude’s . . . I just feel so . . . so . . .”
“Restless?” Nan asked from her left.
Renee turned to the shimmering thing and nodded. “You know what that is?”
Nan swooshed past her to the right. “I do.”
Renee turned to focus on her. “So what is it?”
Nan swooshed back to the left. “Can’t say.”
Renee frowned. “Why?”
“Ain’t my place to. You gotta figure some things out on your own. Just like Shorty did.”
Renee tried not to smile at how Nan called Aeron Shorty. “Well, I can’t ask Shorty for help. I’m not meant to know her.”
Nan swooshed around to the front. “Nobody gonna believe that for a second.” Renee heard her click her tongue and . . . a cat meowing? “Tiddles is up from his nap. I gotta head on out, Blondie.”
“No,” Renee blurted, her hand held up to stop the odd shimmer leaving. “Please, you visited for a reason. I’m listening.”
Nan clicked her tongue once more. “The folks in this place gonna know you ain’t strangers, so you gotta sidestep the curveball with a good swing.”
Renee was sure some of that was baseball. Not helpful as she was a football girl. “Are we talking about a pre-emptive strike?”
“Whatever play gets the home run, Blondie.” Nan swooshed to her side as if they were in a huddle. “Figure out a plan B.”
Plan B? She could do that. “I can do that. I hope.” Renee bit her lip. “What if Aeron gets thrown off by it? She could drop her cover. She could crack and run for it.”
Nan shook what looked like her head. “I said she’d bolt like her mother for different reasons. When it comes to helpin’ my girl stays the course.”
“Noted.” Renee tried not to shiver. Huddling with a spirit required more clothing than her nightshirt. “Was I right in hearing Lilia was your granddaughter?”
“How old you think I am?”
Renee yelped as a cold finger iced her in the side. “Take that as a no . . . so I was hallucinating about Bess?”
Nan tutted. “No. Bess is my daughter too. A woman can give birth more than once you know.”
Renee frowned. “So Aeron has an aunt?”
“Some place but that ain’t exactly important now is it?” Nan tutted again. “Focus on making sure them folks watching don’t get suspicious. They ain’t the welcoming sort an’ I don’t want Shorty getting caught unaware.”
Renee straightened up. She protected Aeron, that was her job. It would always be her duty. “I’ll keep her safe.”
“No doubtin’.” A cat meowed again. “Tiddles wants to play chase the yarn.”
“Wait. What do you mean unaware?”
“Gotta scoot.” Nan’s voice faded and Renee felt alone. As if someone had turned the TV off.
She glanced around. She was standing in her nightshirt, in the living room, in the middle of the night. Good thing she had her own villa or she’d have to claim to be a sleepwalker.
Aeron was unaware? Renee didn’t understand it but she didn’t have to, delusion or not, she wasn’t taking a risk. Plan B . . . she just needed to think of a plan B.
Chapter 14
AFTER FREI’S MERCILESS workout, I slept better than I had in a while. The next morning we had our meeting with the principal and deputy.
The principal, Henry Smyth, was the money behind the place. On the public side, he was Ivy League. The heir of an oil fortune and a man who had been given awards for his generous nature. He was known to sponsor orphaned children from all around the world and give them an education, a future. They would get to study and grow in a rich environment with privileged children, gifted children. His father had been as much a devoted hero to those homeless children.
In reality, he was a second generation slave trader who had nothing to do with black gold. His fortune had been built on training up children to be criminals or goodness knows what else and selling them to the highest bidder.
It was far worse than some of the stuff I’d witnessed back in Serenity. The mentally ill had taken some lumps but boy, these kids were getting it far worse. I don’t think I’d ever felt lucky for getting locked up before but I did now.
The briefing had been short and sour. I’d chosen to stare out of the window through most of it to hide the growing fury. The staff present were the skill captains, a matron called Ms. Harrison, Smyth, Jäger, and me.
Harrison did most of the reporting to Jäger and Smyth. She looked like a prison warden. Tight, scraped-back gray hair. A thin, long pointy nose and lips thinner than her plucked eyebrows. She could make Mrs. Stein proud with the scowl she sported.
We were told that the other staff were ignorant of the true nature of the academy. The students were too. In fact some of those who were privileged could be sold should their parents wish.
My parents had a lot to answer for but not even Uncle Abe would have done it to his own children. Actually, on second thought . . .
As they rambled on, talking about profit margins, safety drills, and announcements, I found myself taking in the people and the room. Maybe it was Frei’s training but it felt as if I needed to assess them all somehow. What stuck out was they had a look about them. I wasn’t sure if it was the faint prickling of my burdens but they set off alarm bells. They felt wrong. Something about the way they interacted fel
t out of place and I didn’t know how to explain it.
Sawyer had a neck as thick as a tree trunk. Veins bulged out on the sides like he was a snake from a basket. Shaved blonde hair with streaks of scars. He wouldn’t have been out of place in Serenity. He never seemed to blink. His blue eyes were fixed on the table.
Jones watched everything. He was skinnier than Sawyer with deep brown skin that was patchy with scars. He either was real clumsy or a stuntman. His demeanor made me think of Uncle Abe back in Oppidum, perched on his nest egg, scouring for any delicious information.
His gaze rested a lot on Frei, who ignored him, but it was clear she had a checkered history here.
Sawyer, in particular, raked his eyes over her most of the time we sat there. The glint was volatile, angry, bitter. The way Frei acted like he didn’t exist told me enough. That dislike was mutual.
None of the three ever looked at Smyth, Jäger, or any of the staff. They didn’t even meet my eyes. Where they sat, to the side, placed them as less important than me and Harrison. We sat in front of the table, included. They were on the outside.
As Frei and I trudged toward the gym block opposite, the urge to know got the better of me.
“Nobody ever called you by your name,” I said, guessing it was as good a place as any to start. “Only Locks.”
“Yes. I didn’t have a name.” She didn’t sound offended, more a statement of fact. “They never used to bother naming most kids, only the important ones. Then they got named by someone or by their trade.”
“I gotta call them something.” How would they know I was talking to them?
We strolled along, her focus on the floor. “They have names now. Makes them easier to track electronically.”
“So how did you get your name?” She looked like an Ursula to me. Ursula Frei suited her.
“Renee said if I was going to work with CIG, I needed to leave Locks in the past.” She smiled. “We knew I had German roots, that much was clear.”
“So you picked that way.” She’d picked well, however she got there.
“I liked Frei, it spoke to me.” She met my eyes. “It means free.”