by M. A. Phipps
Spinning around, I grab hold of Ezra’s arm. “Get inside. Now,” I hiss.
I force him back into the house with a violent thrust and quickly follow him over the threshold. In a panic, my hands slam the door shut behind us. Before he can take a step, I shove him to the floor. He looks up at me but says nothing as we huddle beneath the nearest window.
His ragged breaths beat against my neck, and the heat from his body grows more intense as the humming becomes louder. My arm shoots out when he tries to move, reaching across his chest to pin him in place. Casting a sharp look in his direction, I bring my forefinger to my lips.
Our breathing hitches when the sound hovers over us, loitering on the other side of the window. It lingers there for what seems like an unnatural length of time, and I feel my body tighten—my instincts taking over as I ready myself for the possible fight ahead.
Ezra’s hand intertwines with mine, calming the sudden blood thirst twisting my gut. Exhaling through my nose, I press against the wall, trying my best to stay out of sight.
A few seconds later, a blue light seeps in through the moth-eaten curtains, coating every inch of the room in a blinding glow. It repeats this process multiple times, scanning the inside of the house for life forms.
For me.
Several moments pass before the light disappears, and gradually, the humming dies away. When the sound is out of earshot, we both turn onto our knees and risk a cautious glance through the dirtied glass panes. Through the tattered fabric of the curtains, I notice two black machines retreating toward the Heart.
“Surveillance drones,” Ezra grunts under his breath.
My eyes never leave the receding black specks. I watch them until they disappear into the shadow of the city—its very existence imposing and threatening, even from this distance. The entire time, my thoughts dwell on what information they’ll report to their owner and if Dr. Richter was the one who deployed them.
“They know I’m here,” I whisper.
I notice Ezra shake his head, but I don’t turn to look at him.
“We don’t know that,” he says.
I only meet his gaze when his hand touches my shoulder. Peering up, I’m taken aback by the concerned expression on his face—by the unspoken way his eyes ask me if he’s wrong. If I know this or if I’m only guessing.
Gripping his arm, I pull him down with me as I slump to the floor. He blinks a few times as I wrap my finger around the collar and lean in close until our bodies are touching.
“They can track me.” My voice is steady and clear, but I can feel my temper flaring. I’m unable to suppress it when my next words breach my lips. “Did you honestly think the State wouldn’t keep tabs on their precious weapon?” The statement comes out far more aggressive than I intend, but it has to be said.
Ezra needs to understand the gravity of what I’m involved with.
He shakes his head once more. “We deactivated the tracking chip.” As he says this, he casts an uncertain glance at my collar. His lips curl as if the very sight of it disgusts him.
I wish I could fake my emotions to appease him, but I can’t. Not when I know the lengths the State is willing to go to—that Dr. Richter is willing to go to.
Lowering my eyes, I focus on the jagged protrusion on my wrist. My fingertips caress the skin, feeling along the bumpy and awkward tissue. Although I still have no idea how I got this scar, I do know what lies beneath it—or rather what should lie beneath it. After all, I now realize mine is no longer there, hence why the DSD installed a tracker in my collar.
“So Nolan claims,” I grumble, “but this isn’t like the chips they put in our wrists. If the State wants to find me, I’m not sure you can stop them.”
Turning away from Ezra, I lean back against the wall and fix my eyes on the dusty interior of the room. He repositions himself next to me.
“We’ll remove the collar. Nolan said they couldn’t, but we’ll find a way.”
His words are soft—an arrow in the silence piercing straight into my heart.
My eyes widen as I gape at him. A powerful anger courses through my veins, traveling along every inch of my body on its way into my throat. It expels from my mouth before I’m able to stop it.
“Then you may as well kill me now,” I snarl.
He reels back, his expression a combination of shock and bewilderment. My cheeks flush as I close my eyes, and counting backward from ten, I inhale a slow breath—filling my lungs with as much air as possible to calm myself down.
Running my hand across my forehead, I scoop back my hair.
I know I’m not being fair to him. He doesn’t know what I know, so how can I expect him to understand? I can’t. At least not without spelling it out for him in the most brutal way imaginable.
I peek over at him out of the corner of my eye.
He needs to hear this.
“Don’t you find it odd that I’m so different from how I was before?” I ask. “So in control?”
His left eyebrow twitches. I can see the gears working in his brain, turning my words into information he can process. I know he’s beginning to grasp what I’m saying because I notice the confusion transform into fear.
Although, what I fail to comprehend is why he doesn’t know when Nolan does. Why would Nolan keep such an important piece of information hidden from the one person most intent on helping me?
“Without the collar, the control ends,” I murmur. When he doesn’t respond, I press him further. “Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
Clearing his throat, he averts his eyes and nods his head.
For a long time, neither of us speak. I can feel the emotions rolling off him like heat, but I can’t make sense of what he’s actually feeling. Unable to bear the silence any longer, I put my hands on the floor and shift my body to stand up.
The abrupt sound of Ezra’s voice holds me in place.
“Richter said there was a cure.”
His tone is dejected, but when his eyes lift to mine, I can see the ray of hope shining behind them. He stares at me, waiting for me to tell him that everything will be all right.
Waiting to hear me say we’ll figure this out together.
“Don’t you get it?” I breathe.
A sudden guilt bears down on my chest, gripping my heart like a metal vise. As if Ezra can sense what I’m going through, as if he finally understands, a similar darkness flashes across his eyes—smoldering the faint light of hope.
The guilt grips tighter.
In a dejected voice, I whisper, “The collar is the cure.”
Ezra hasn’t spoken since I told him the truth about my collar. The truth about the cure—or lack thereof. The hope in his eyes when he mentioned it was painful to witness, but the emotion that took over when I crushed that hope was truly unbearable.
From the instant the confession slipped from between my lips, I could tell it shattered something between us that I had no way of fixing. Nothing I say now can undo the damage I did.
So, I haven’t tried to.
This revelation, just like everything I’ve endured over the last few years, arose because of Dr. Richter’s lies. His relentless need to twist the truth for personal gain, regardless of what it does to anyone else. The promise of a cure was nothing more than another falsehood, and one that we all clearly fell for.
The metal noose around my neck is the only cure I’ll ever see.
I follow Ezra back through the compound in silence. There was a desperate urgency to our steps when we last walked these corridors, but now that aura of importance is gone. Instead, all we’re left with is a strange acceptance—an unwilling resignation of everything I’ve been through and the harsh reality that Ezra has, in turn, been forced to come to terms with. With each step, it feels less like we’re former lovers and more like we’re criminals on our way to death row, biding the time as we await our executions.
The air between us is charged with tension. Before, Ezra made any excuse to touch me, but now he
seems determined to keep his distance. He won’t even look at me.
His feet drag as he walks a few paces ahead of where I trail behind him. I’m not sure what to make of this entire situation. Is it fear causing this response in him? Confusion? Disbelief? Whatever it is, one thing is certain above all else.
He isn’t taking it well.
My eyes dart to his waist when a soft beeping emerges from the depths of his left pocket. He stops short, and I pause just beside him, watching his face for any noticeable changes.
Clutching his communicator, he glances at it once before cursing under his breath.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
He looks over at me, then glances down the length of the corridor ahead of us. With a nervous glimpse back the way we came, he clears his throat but still doesn’t speak. An unnerving expression crosses his face, making me wary of his impending answer.
“I wasn’t supposed to let you out of that room,” he admits.
He appears embarrassed, although his words come as no surprise to me. The unconscious guard was proof enough that he was breaking the rules.
In an awkward murmur, he adds, “Jenner’s been keeping watch for us. We both knew it was the only way I could be alone with you.” He stares at me as if gauging my reaction.
Taking a deep breath, I shift my weight, unsure of how to handle such an uncomfortable silence and even more unsure of how to break it. I don’t know what to say to him. I can sympathize with how he must feel, but at the same time, what about how I’m feeling? What about how difficult this is for me?
I exhale, feeling more lost than ever.
“Let me guess. They found out what you did, and now everyone is panicking because I’m gone.”
Ezra runs his hand along the back of his neck. He avoids my gaze, but I don’t need to see his eyes to comprehend what he’s thinking. The stress taking hold of him is visible in his rigid posture, boiling beneath his skin like lava waking a dormant volcano, ready to explode at any moment.
“More or less,” he says.
Shaking my head, I ask, “What’d you do to him anyway?” When a dumbfounded expression crosses his face, I elaborate. “The guard outside my door.”
“Oh, him.”
Ezra’s lips pull into a devious smile, and I take a step back when he lets out a hollow laugh.
“His name’s Quinn Stohler. The guy used to be an Enforcer, if you can believe it.” He pauses for a moment to let this information sink in.
I picture the man’s face, remembering the hostile way he looked at me. The hatred there was unmistakable, although the basis for it remains a mystery, even now.
My eyes scan Ezra’s face, narrowing as I penetrate him with my judgmental gaze. He clears his throat, and all traces of humor vanish from his features.
His tone is indifferent as he shrugs his shoulders. “I may or may not have put him in a chokehold until he passed out.”
A growing irritation swells inside my body, building up in my lungs as a strangled scream. It takes every ounce of willpower to reject the foreign emotions threatening to overtake me. Biting my lower lip, I glare at the floor.
“You’re going to get yourself into trouble, and for what? It’s not worth it.”
I’m not worth it.
Shaking my head again, I begin to walk past him, ignoring the heat from his skin where my shoulder brushes against his arm. I can feel his eyes watching me, but I don’t turn back.
Without warning, he grabs my wrist. Startled by the sudden movement, I glance back over my shoulder, but I’m silenced by the ominous way he looks at me.
The ferocity of his gaze carries over into his words as he growls, “That’s where you’re wrong.”
For a moment, it feels as if I’m staring at the sun. He’s too luminous—too intense for my eyes to handle. My heart beats in fitful pulses until I find myself turning away, unable to bear the overwhelming passion lighting up his face for a moment longer.
It feels like an eternity before he releases my arm.
“We should head back.” His words are void of emotion, and he says nothing else as he trudges past me.
My eyes follow his every movement, but I don’t respond. Instead, I shadow his steps as we retrace our path through the corridors. This time, the hush between us is different—full of the same confusion I always find myself drowning in. It builds until I can no longer take it.
I stop in my tracks, held back by the words that expel from my throat.
“Why wasn’t it you?”
Ezra wavers. Turning in place, his brow furrows, but I cut him off before he can speak.
“On the helicopter.” My hands clench into fists as I take a step forward.
His breathing accelerates as the distance between us closes.
“If what you said about us is true, then why wasn’t it you?” I ask.
He drops his eyes and licks his trembling lips.
“I wanted to, believe me, but Nolan wouldn’t allow it. He said I was too close to the situation emotionally. I think he felt there was a chance I’d screw it up once I saw you again, or maybe he thought you’d be more likely to know what was going on if it was me there instead of someone else.” Releasing a sigh of frustration, he runs a hand through his blond hair, disheveling the strands. As he peeks back up at me, he whispers, “About Jenner . . . You don’t remember it right now, but he means a lot to you.”
His words rush through my head, but I don’t know what to do with them. I never asked for PHOENIX to come to my rescue.
I never asked for any of this.
Silence overtakes us once more as we continue through the hallways in a sullen march. In spite of the unknown message Ezra received on his communicator, we don’t come across any resistance on our way back to my prison cell. It’s only when we round one of the final corners that we even see another human being at all. Unfortunately for us, the person standing at the opposite end of the corridor is the last person we could hope to encounter right now.
Heavy stomps echo off the concrete as Quinn storms down the long pathway.
Ezra and I both freeze in place.
“Well, he looks pissed off,” I grumble.
A part of me is tempted to say, I told you so, but I resist that urge as I glance up at Ezra. He shifts his body, repositioning himself so he’s standing between me and the oncoming wave of anger. Sensing my gaze, his eyes meet mine.
We stare at each other as the sound of Quinn’s footsteps increases in volume, bringing him closer to us. My lips part to speak, but the feel of Ezra’s fingers intertwining with mine causes a soft gasp to rush out of my mouth instead.
In spite of my conflicted emotions, I don’t pull away.
My eyes lock on our conjoined hands, forcing me to embrace the familiarity of his touch. It’s calming as if the mere sensation of physical contact with him can provide the answers to countless questions I never even knew I had.
His thumb moves across the side of my hand, caressing it and sending a seizure-like shudder throughout my body. A memory emerges from the back of my thoughts. The recollection overwhelms me, springing out of hiding after all this time.
I see a flash of what appears to be an intimate moment between us. Our faces are close together, and my hot breath kisses his skin as I whisper against his lips.
“I love you . . . .”
A warm blush reddens my face as the blood collects in my cheeks. My heart pounds in wild repetition, suffocating my every breath.
I try to make sense of the strange ache gripping my chest, but the sound of Quinn’s voice distracts me from the sensation. Snapping out of the memory, I find myself back in the present. As the ex-Enforcer barrels toward us, his words are hazy in my ears, although I can tell from his tone that they aren’t directed at me.
“What the hell were you thinking?”
Ezra squeezes my hand. “I just needed to talk to her alone, away from the cameras.”
Quinn’s footsteps cease a short distance away, leaving
only a small berth to protect us from his wrath. His eyes narrow as they dart between us.
“All that just to have a little catch-up with your girlfriend?” He nods his head in my direction as his voice raises several decibels. “She’s dangerous. That’s why the limitations were put in place. You don’t get to make those calls!”
Ezra’s body tenses. For a split second, he seems to grow taller, blocking me from view.
“She isn’t a threat,” he bites back.
“You know what she’s capable of,” Quinn counters. “What she’s done.”
Ezra’s composure is beginning to crumble, causing him to tighten his grip on my hand. The tempo of the rapid pulse beating beneath his skin increases, racing up his throat in an explosion of fury.
“She didn’t do it by choice!” His voice thunders around us, carrying through the isolated passage.
My eyes shift between the two men as I take a step forward, inspecting their expressions and the aggressive way they lean in toward each other. They remind me of a pair of squabbling children.
Pulling my hand away from Ezra’s, I utter the three words that will put this to rest. “Yes, I did.”
Reeling back, he ignores Quinn as he stares at me with an incredulous grimace. “Wynter—”
“I did what I had to do to survive.” My words cut him off, stunning him into silence. He doesn’t need to know that only part of this statement is true, or that survival wasn’t exactly my top priority at the time. Not mine, at least.
After a few seconds, his expression changes. “Stop it,” he says. “I know what you’re trying to do.”
There’s a warning behind his words. One that I choose to disregard as a stifling impatience rips away at my chest, burrowing into the core of my being.
Unable to contain my frustration any longer, the filter holding back my true opinion snaps.
“I’m trying to point out what you’re either too biased or blind to notice!”
Regardless of our history—regardless of any feelings we might have once shared—he needs to embrace the reality of the situation. If he loves me as he says he does, then he needs to accept what I’ve done.
He needs to understand that I’m not the same person I was before.