Raven: The Young Adult World of Genetically Modified Teens and the Elite (Swann Book 6)

by Ryan Schow

  “She’s beautiful,” Orianna admitted.

  Rebecca started mopping up the milk and cereal. “Yes, but Bethany’s not as beautiful as you are.”

  “Do you really think that?”

  “Yep.”

  Just then the front door opened and Christian and Bethany walked in. Christian knew she was there because her Mercedes was parked out front. She hadn’t been going for the element of surprise.

  “Orianna,” he called out.

  “In the kitchen,” she said, trying to sound pleasant, even though what she was planning in her mind was anything but that.

  Rebecca was all done cleaning the mess, but she still had to eat. “You should get another bowl of cereal, sweetheart,” Orianna said.

  Don’t act like Margaret, she thought as she contemplated the consequences of acting like an icy, controlling bitch all over again.

  Be Orianna.

  Christian strolled into the kitchen with Bethany at his side. Beautiful Bethany with the cute dimples and the perfect charisma, and the sweet, sweet laugh. Beautiful Bethany who saw Orianna and lost her smile instantly. Recognition slapped her across her brilliant, flawless face. Orianna felt herself smile. That’s right, she thought: Whole Foods. The thing about Bethany’s reaction was Orianna didn’t need to say a word. Christian smiled, kissed her on the cheek and said, “Orianna, this is Bethany. Bethany, Orianna.”

  Orianna reached out and the ladies shook hands. She made sure hers was the stronger of the two, but just barely. Bethany the beautiful became Bethany the insecure. And then she was Bethany the inferior.

  “Let’s go get started,” Bethany said to Rebecca, forcing a smile.

  Christian, of course, was oblivious to all the underlying posturing and strategy, as well as Orianna’s establishing of hierarchy. Orianna was the woman; Bethany was the help. If Bethany knew this, but Christian didn’t, that was fine. That was the point.

  “I have to eat first,” Rebecca said.

  “You can eat and learn at the same time,” Orianna told Rebecca. Then, looking directly at Christian, Orianna said, “Although it is my fault she hasn’t eaten. I startled her, and she broke a bowl.”

  “She’ll be okay,” Christian replied. She couldn’t take her eyes off him, how handsome he looked, how she wanted to devour every last bit of that face, that body. Him.

  “I’m going to leave,” she said.

  “But you just got here,” Christian replied. Bethany was looking on, but trying not to act like any of this was happening. She was definitely crushing on Christian.

  Definitely.

  “I’ll walk you out, then,” he said.

  “Nice to meet you,” she said over her shoulder to Bethany as she was leaving. The way she sounded was ever so cheerful. The Queen confidently leaving the squire. Outside, she said, “She’s too young for you, and way too chipper.”

  “You’re just jealous,” he replied, taking her hand and stopping her.

  “No,” she said. “I’m not.”

  “If you weren’t jealous, you would have stayed and joined us at Whole Foods.” Her eyes flashed with surprise before she could conceal them. “And you wouldn’t have thrown coffee on the writer you used to screw when I was Atticus.”

  “How did you—?”

  He held up his finger and silenced her instantly. “And if you weren’t jealous, you would not have come here to wait for me, only to show yourself to Bethany to prove I’m yours and she can’t have me.”

  “Has she had you?”

  “Not yet.”

  She shook her hand out of his and unlocked her car. He didn’t say anything. She finally spun around and said, “Go fuck her then, if you want.”

  “That word sounds horrible coming out of that gorgeous mouth. Those were Margaret’s words, and they looked terrible coming out of her mouth, too. But I got used to it. Not you. If you use that word with me again, if you use that word in front of Rebecca or our daughter, at all, you won’t be aloud to see either of them again.”

  Her mouth dropped. Then she slapped it shut, got in her car and started it up. She put it in reverse as Christian was turning to go back inside. To Bethany. She rolled down the window, called out his name. He came back over.

  “Why can’t you just wait a little longer for me?” she said.

  “I’m in for the long haul, but that doesn’t mean other offers won’t come along while I’m waiting around for you. Besides, you’re still too much Margaret, and not enough Orianna.”

  This wasn’t the answer she expected. “What does that mean?”

  “It means, find out who you are, then let’s talk again and we’ll see how compatible we are. Besides, you’re making so much progress with Abby. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  They stared at each other for a long time, then Orianna said, “Did you ever love me?”

  “Once,” he said.

  “Is it possible…to maybe…I don’t know, find your way back?”

  “I tried already.”

  “Are you going to sleep with that girl?” she asked. It wasn’t malicious the way she was asking, or even hostile. She just wanted to know.

  “No.”

  She then put on her glasses and slid the car out of the driveway, leaving Christian behind, not knowing where to go, only that Paris was nice this time of year. Perhaps she’d catch the first flight out. Or maybe she’d just go home, curl up on the couch with a bottle of wine and catch up on Game of Thrones.

  “That’s what Margaret would do,” she said. And he doesn’t want Margaret.

  Not anymore.

  Still, the moment she got home, she poured herself a glass of wine, smoked a joint, then booked herself a ticket to Paris.

  To hell with this life.

  Plan B

  1

  It all happened at once, the unrelenting urge to get away. When something overwhelms you like this, it could be your internal flight mechanism triggering. At first I’m disgusted by my reaction to school. I survived here before. Why shouldn’t I now? Cognitive reasoning, however, takes over. People run from a lot of things, I tell myself. I’m no different. Who am I to feel bad about wanting to escape this place? I’m no longer part of anything.

  I am nothing, I tell myself.

  I am no one.

  At this point, with no strings attached to anything or anyone, I’m thinking, why fight this feeling? Why not just go?

  So I take my million dollar check, call the rental car agency that picks you up, then rent a car. It was a bit tricky, trying to rent a car when you’re under twenty-five years old and you have no car insurance, but whatevs. It’s all easy work when you’ve got mind control skills like I have mind control skills. (Holla!) Heading to San Francisco in my perfectly reasonable, perfectly not sexy car, it’s at an almost leisurely pace. If I have any regrets, it’s that I’m in a freaking Dodge Charger and not my Audi. God almighty, I’m going to miss my S5!

  San Francisco.

  First stop: Wells Fargo. The banking institution of choice for one Enzo Holland. There’s no issue with the funds in Holland’s account being available, but the way you would think of the President coming to town as a big deal, that’s how everyone’s behaving about me putting a lot of money held in their bank into another account to be held in their bank.

  It’s not like I stole it.

  Wink, wink.

  Okay, technically blackmailing Holland out of his money is stealing, but whatevs. The point is, my name’s on the motherfreaking check. Which is being held for five days because a million dollars is a lot of money, and with my Gothic chic type of look—not having an IMDB page, my own band or a seven figure Twitter following—apparently it’s pretty difficult to take me seriously. What I wanted to say to the crustacean of a woman looking down her nose at me, telling me that’s a lot of money for a kid, was that a million dollars is hardly shit when you’re a billionaire’s child. But I’m not a child of anyone anymore. Unless you count science, then yes, I’m a child of science.

/>   After I left the bank, with the cabbie, the credit card part of my ID package ran through. And thank Christ. There’s a five thousand dollar limit I intend to cut in half once I hit the mall, but not before I reach the Financial District and book myself a room at the Omni. Say what you want about swanky hotels, the truth is, I like a doorman and the sound of cable cars.

  Because I’m on a budget, I choose the Deluxe room with a single King bed for a bit more than five hundred a night. This makes me feel responsible. Like I’m being frugal. Which I am. Before leaving, to the desk clerk, I’m like, “So where’s the pool?” and he’s like, “It’s but a short walk to the beach,” which makes me wonder if I’m speaking in tongues.

  “No,” I say. “The pool.”

  And he’s like, “Ma’am, we don’t have a pool.”

  “Okay, weird,” I tell him. “You have a spa though, right?”

  He makes a face like he’s just stolen a bite of warm fudge only to find it’s really packed human fecal matter and says, “Ew, the germs.”

  “Are you going to tell me there’s a bath in the room and you have hot water?”

  He smiles and says, “I am.”

  “Even in the budget room?” My sarcasm can be felt from space.

  His complimentary smile breaks open even wider, but at least it’s not a creeper’s smile. “I think you’ll find the bathrooms to be more than generous.”

  I smile back and say, “Someone should be generous since I don’t have a pool or spa and my room is five hundred and forty-five dollars a night.”

  “The difference between our establishment and a Motel 6 is not just a pool and a spa,” he says. Okay, now we’re sparring.

  “F*ck the Motel 6,” I quip. “I’m a billionaire’s child and I’m slumming it. And this isn’t the Four Seasons, or the Fairmont. For the love of Jesus, this isn’t St. Regis.”

  “Perhaps you would be more comfortable there,” he jabs, the smile gone.

  “Perhaps, but there’s something about your diet hospitality and the historic feel here that intrigues me, so I’m going to risk a night here anyway.”

  Yep, I just insulted him and his place and he knows it. When you can do anything you want, when you have no past, no one to embarrass, no one looking down on you or judging you for your crap manners and your rampant distaste for everything social because everything seems beneath you, sometimes you end up saying things or being a certain way you will come to regret sometime in the very near future.

  Or not.

  “You know I’m messing with you, right?” I say. It’s time to turn a corner with my bad attitude. “I’m totally infatuated with this place.”

  “You are?” he says.

  “Yep. I’m a history buff, so places like this give me serious lady wood.” He laughs and I laugh and that’s my cue. “I’ll take the key and be on my way.”

  “I like you,” he says, genuine. “I was sure I wouldn’t when I first saw you, but I do.”

  “Most people don’t,” I reply. He hands me the key, tells me to enjoy my stay, and I hope to God I will, but maybe I won’t.

  Who can really say what form joy or sorrow will take anymore?

  2

  One can literally lose track of time in a place like San Francisco. What I do until I figure out what to do with my life is tool around the city for a couple of days, eating, drinking, shopping and people watching. I spend an entire day on Market Street and never tire of the sights. When my money finally clears, I use my new debit card to get cash to then buy a burner cell phone.

  First call: the illustrious Dr. Enzo Holland.

  “Hello?” he says.

  “It’s me,” I say, and wait. I can’t resist messing with him.

  “Me, who?” he says, irritated. “Raven?”

  “Look at you,” I say. “Brand new and still brilliant.”

  “Will you be making it to work today?” he says like the idea of me is giving him crabs.

  “Perhaps next month.”

  “If what you’re doing is disappearing for a month, then the million dollars was worth it.”

  “And here I thought I was charming.” On the other end of the phone is complete silence. As in no laughter. “Anyway…”

  There is a click on the end of the line and it’s the sound of Holland hanging up on me. Wow. Okay, whatever.

  In the back of my mind I’m thinking he can do a lot of damage in the next month, but I can’t stop him from doing his experiments. I never could. I might never be able to. And at this point, that psychotic butthole matters so little to me I’d love to not see his stupid face for a few weeks.

  Second call: a cab. I’m going to get me a new car. The problem is I don’t know what kind of a car I want but the one I had. Me and my Audi, we didn’t have enough time together. So naturally, I end up at an Audi dealership. In Oakland, to be precise. When I called asking if they had any S5’s, he said all he had was an RS5, which apparently is a S5 on steroids. Instead of having three hundred and thirty-three horsepower, you get four fifty. Plus you get a far sexier grill, beefier tires and a body kit guys will go sterile just looking at. It’s basically what you buy when the S5 just isn’t enough.

  When he told me the car was black on black with twenty inch five-arm bladed rims and tinted windows, I was like, “Do you take personal checks or should I bring a cashier’s check?” He asked about my credit and I said I came from money, so credit wouldn’t be on the menu. I asked again about a cashier’s check and he asked about a warranty and maintenance plan.

  “Yep. Add it on at a twenty percent discount and give me the total.”

  He did. I got the check.

  Three hours later, I drove off the lot with my new car. The guy, the car salesman, he was more than right. This RS5 was all balls and grit. Push on the gas and it was like it needed to eat up the road.

  What came next was me being at peace. And then a deep and much needed breath, and a very genuine, very unconscious smile.

  3

  Naturally, that evening, I find myself driving to Sensei Naygel’s dojo in the city. Not as Abby, of course, but as a guest. I do miss Sensei’s lessons, but mostly I miss Netty and I’m hoping to see her. I shouldn’t be doing this, but I can’t help myself.

  She’s my best friend!

  Karate starts right at seven; I slip into the dojo and sit in the same place I sat the first time I came to watch Netty’s class. Netty is already in line, bowing in.

  I want to cry when I first see her. She looks at me, turns away, then looks back one more time. People like me—they’re too beautiful to be natural. I’m still too perfect looking no matter how much I hide behind dark makeup and this hair. What I’m doing with this Goth look of mine is putting up a wall. It’s necessary. What I want inside, however, is to be seen, to be noticed and at some point, to matter. The fake Abby? Apparently she’s making it so that no one misses me. She makes it so my disappearance is not a disappearance at all. I have been erased, reborn fresh into the world, as someone almost no one knows.

  My past is a clear sky in the middle of nowhere. I suppose it’s time to fill in the blanks.

  I’m about to leave when Sensei looks at me and gives a very slight head nod. Huh? Now that I’ve been acknowledged, I can’t leave. So I stay. And I watch Netty and the class. The way Sensei keeps looking at me, though, I’m wondering if he recognizes me. He can’t know me. I’m totally different looking. Or can he? Damn it. Now I have to know. I just have to. But I won’t invade his mind, not Sensei’s.

  Not ever.

  4

  When Netty finishes class, she packs her gym bag and prepares to leave. Lowering my head, my eyes watch her. She glances at me several times. It’s out there—this energy between us—that unspoken connection that requires words and introductions to solidify. It’s how we first became friends.

  Bag in hand, she bows off the floor and heads my direction. I look up, relax my face into something affable and warm, something inviting. She sees me; I see her. I
smile, then she looks away, heads right past me and leaves without looking back.

  My heart breaks.

  Instead of us becoming friends, I’m left to shiver in the icy wake she leaves behind. Half of me is livid, cursing her shitty Russian attitude, but the other half of me gets it. I crawl inside her brain and the curiosity I thought I recognized in her expression was not curiosity at all. What she felt was disdain. Another perfect bitch, is what she was thinking.

  My body deflates at the revelation. Students are leaving, but my eyes aren’t seeing them. Not until I pull out of her mind. When I do, my eyes blink and there is someone standing right in front of me. Sensei Naygel. I startle at the sight of him.

  “You have an inquisitive eye,” Sensei Naygel says. “Or a poor sense of sight. I haven’t decided yet.”

  I straighten my slouched body. “That’s your big introduction?”

  His gaze feels like a thousand razors dissecting my mind, looking for motivations, angles, intention. Then he says, “I recognize you.”

  “Impossible,” I say.

  My mind wants to slide into his, but I don’t. I have too much respect for him, or perhaps I’m afraid he’ll feel me inside his head and get rattled. Sensei’s secrets will be his own, I decide.

  “Your look is familiar,” he says. “You are a martial artist, are you not?”

  “I am.”

  “And why, may I ask, have you come to my dojo?”

  “A friend recommended you.”

  “Abby,” he says.

  My jaw drops. I can’t breathe. How does he know this? As I sit here, flabbergasted, my eyes wide and staring, I’m seeing and smelling the departing students, smelling the pungent scent of a well-worked dojo and wondering if there is something supernatural about him.

  I close my mouth, then say, “Yes.”

  “Where did you study?” he asks, motioning for me to step out on the mat. I stand, and it is just like the old days: I slip off my designer sandals (which were hurting my feet), bow first to him and then to the dojo, and then I step onto the soft, competition-style mats.