“I told you. I’ve told you, like, twenty times. I had to blow up a car.” Milo shifted around in on the floor and picked at a crack in the cement.
“Yeah, that’s pretty vague. What car? Why?”
Milo shook his head. “It was a random car. What are you getting at?”
“I had to kill a person. A person. So did Dennis. Marie did something catastrophic. And what did you have to do... get some random person? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I don’t know,” Milo said. “How am I supposed to know why they made me do that?”
Simon got a few feet away from Milo who had pressed his back firmly against the wall. This time, however, he didn’t wince like he had been doing. “Eh,” Simon said. “How’s your back?”
Milo’s eye fell to a glare. “What are you implying, Simon?”
“Boys...” Marie started to say.
Simon grabbed Milo’s shirt collar and yanked it up as hard as he could. “Show me your back.”
“No.” Milo didn’t break eye contact. They stood there at a standstill. But Simon was much stronger. He hadn’t wasted his energy taking care of anyone. They had given him all the extra food to keep up his strength. Milo wasn’t competition. With a flick of the wrist he got Milo’s body turned towards him enough to pull up the back of his shirt.
Nothing.
His back was smooth. Not a scratch.
“You seem fine to me.”
Milo pushed away from Simon’s grip. It was the defensive fighting of a man caught in the middle of his own elaborate lie. He slapped with an open hand and it landed somewhere on Simon’s neck.
He’d suspected Milo for the last few days. After that blonde woman came down and doted on him, it solidified his suspicions. The jobs that the others were given were gruesome and crafted to break each one of them down. Milo could hardly articulate what they had made him do and when he spoke the story always changed just slightly. One time he was on a highway, another time it was a dirt road. One time he blew up a car with people in it another time the people were near the car. He couldn’t keep his own lies straight.
“You were in magazines. People know who you are. Why would they have you do something so dumb?”
“I don’t know,” he shrieked as Simon’s grip of his collar tightened.
“Bullshit,” he muttered as he threw Milo against the wall. His skull smacked against the wall and he fell to the ground.
Simon watched as a trickle of blood fell just next to his eye. He was taking control. He was getting them out of here. “Tell them,” he muttered.
Milo wiped the blood from his face with the ratty sleeve of his hoodie. “What are you talking about?”
Edwin had stood in the doorway every afternoon for nineteen days. At two o’clock he would walk down the stairs with a new set of toys. One day it was a belt, another it was a piece of barbed wire he found in the backyard. He’d turn down the lights, take off his jacket and attack Simon until his arms grew tired. Edwin had tied him up to a pipe with, what he claimed, were unbreakable locks. For eighteen days he didn’t try to get out. He let that man walk down those stairs and just took it.
On the nineteenth day he found a pin. From five in the morning until 1:50 he used the small range of motion the cuffs allowed him to pick the lock. Twelve times he dropped the pin and had to contort his feet to meet the flailing fingers that were trapped six feet in the air. Finally, at 1:52, there was a click. It felt so gigantic to him that he was sure Edwin had heard.
As the cuffs loosened and slipped off his hands like melted chocolate, he knew that he didn’t just want to escape. He wanted Edwin to pay for what he did. So that is why, when Edwin came up to him with a steel baseball bat that he tossed from hand to hand, Simon let his animal instincts take over. Edwin raised the bat above his head and readied himself to break a few ribs. As he swung, Simon flung the cuffs to the ground and caught the bat milliseconds before it would have made contact. He had seven inches on Edwin and twenty pounds of muscle, atrophied and beaten muscle, but muscle nonetheless. He blacked out as he took the bat to Edwin. The next thing he remembered was sitting in the back of an ambulance with a blanket draped over his shoulders and a cup of water being forced into his shaking hands.
Simon pointed up towards the door. He’d spotted the camera the first day. It was the same sloppy surveillance system his mom had put in his room after he was found. She couldn’t bear the idea of losing him again so she kept obsessive tabs on him, especially after Dad left. “They’re watching. They’re watching this. So tell them to let us go.”
Milo shook his head. “I don’t know...”
Simon kicked him square in the ribs. Milo fell to his side and clutched his stomach. “What the fuck, man?”
“Tell them!” he shouted.
“I can’t...”
Simon kicked him again.
Marie put out a hand in protest. “Please. What is this accomplishing?”
He pointed at the cameras. “They can see us. And that’s why this asshole has been acting so weird. Was any of it true?”
Milo stayed on the ground and coughed a few wheezing breaths. “Stop,” he whimpered.
“Then tell them.”
“They won’t listen to me,” he said.
Simon pulled his foot back for another kick.
“Stop! Just stop!” he said.
“Then do it.”
Milo pushed himself up to a seated position, still clutching his undoubtedly broken rib. He winced as he adjusted himself to his usual nonchalant posture. “Why should I?”
Dennis groaned in the corner. “Milo?” He sounded more betrayed than pained.
The room seemed to tunnel in on the boy against the wall. Simon wanted to rip him apart and feed him to the wolves outside. How could he have sat here with them all these days and lied to their faces.
“Because we trusted you. Now help us.”
Milo looked around the room like he was about to get support but even Marie had stopped looking his direction. He was alone and trapped. He was defenseless against them.
His gaze shifted from doe-eyed and worried to a fixed stare. He seemed solid and had gained his strength back in an instant. “And what if I don’t?”
Simon didn’t have answer. There was no bat. There wasn’t even a stick to shake at him. The room was filled with nothing but bodies. Just as he was about to pull an answer out of thin air, the comforting sounds of footsteps echoed above them.
“You tell them something. Anything, I don’t care.”
“And what if they say no?” Milo spitted out.
“Then try harder.”
Simon stood by the door with his legs bent and his arms ready to pounce. He’d been spying on the guards as they walked in. There was always at least one, usually two. There was the guy that had driven him and another one. Both were a few inches taller than he and much stronger. However, what they had in bulk, Simon had in speed.
“When they get in here, you are going to tell them to let us go,” Simon whispered.
Milo shook his head.
Simon didn’t have time to respond. The footsteps hurried to the door and the knob turned with a frantic twist. It swung open to reveal just one guard, the driver of the SUV. As Simon went to lunge at him, he bumped into the person being tossed inside. Benjamin fell to his knees as the guard hurled him inside. “And be quiet,” he said.
The door didn’t shut right away. This was his chance. He didn’t trust Milo for a second. In the time it took Simon to get to the boy by the wall, the guard had another person by the arm. He was slumped against the guard’s shoulder and groaned.
“What the—” Milo shouted as Simon grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and yanked him to his feet. He grabbed Milo’s chin in one hand and the back of his neck in the other. His grip dug into the skin it felt good feel the kid squirm under his power. With one yank of his arms, Milo would be dead on the floor.
“Let me go,” Milo muttered.
Simon was
n’t negotiating with them anymore. When the guard finally noticed the melee in the corner, he dropped the man on the floor and pulled out a cell phone, ready to report. “Put ’im down.”
“No,” he said.
“Do it. Put him down,” the guard said.
Milo trembled under the hold. It would be so easy.
“Let us out.”
The guard laughed. “I don’t think so.”
He squeezed and twisted just enough for Milo to squeal.
“Keep it up and I’ll zap you. Got it?” He patted his pocket to reinforce how it easy it was to kill them.
“Now,” Simon said to Milo. “Do it now.”
When no words came out, Simon twisted a little more, making sure he pinched the carotid artery to make Milo feel more disoriented. “Shit,” Milo said. His voice broke as he spoke.
The guard looked at Milo differently than the rest of them. He seemed almost self-conscious around him. The guard had his hand clasped against his pocket and his finger seemed to curl around the handle of a gun. He never took his eyes off Milo as he incrementally wrapped his fingers and primed himself to shoot.“Eduardo,” Milo said. “It’s okay.”
Eduardo relaxed his hand, not completely, but appeared to back off. However, Simon still had the kid in his hands so it was not safe. Not yet.“What’s going on?” Eduardo said as he took two small steps toward them.The man that had been thrown in started to groan and wriggle on the ground. He had a bruise that formed on the top of his head and bits of leaves and dirt stuck to the back of his suit jacket.Marie crawled over to him and felt at his neck for a pulse. She pulled at his eyelids and moved her hand in a slow clinical way down his body. “He’s okay,” she said to a room that had no interest in him. Her words fell to a thud on the floor as Milo attempted, and failed, to get out of his hold.“Let me go see him,” Milo said.
Eduardo gestured, almost imperceptibly, up towards the ceiling.
“Yes. Take me up there.”
“I don’t know—”
Milo snapped. “Now. This is an order.”
“All right,” Eduardo said as he came towards Milo and started to pull him away. Simon didn’t want to let him go. There was no telling what would happen if he was out of earshot. He had already upset the delicate balance and sniffed out the rat. For all he knew his device would be activated the moment Milo stepped out of the room.“Let me go,” Milo said through gritted teeth.Simon loosened his arms just enough for Milo to wriggle out. As he freed himself, a different boy stood before them. Gone was the hunched posture and bratty speech. He seemed noble and determined. Milo simply pointed to the door and walked out without so much as saying a word.
Hannah’s phone buzzed in her pocket. The talk with the kid from the club had yielded that photo but not much else. Disappointed, but still determined, she slipped into the car and turned on the radio.
“... fired in the auditorium. Former vice-president Trayhorn was taken to El Trajo Hospital where he was declared dead.”
The blood rushed out of her face. Kyle was there. That was his speech. Immediately she grabbed her phone where she saw a dozen missed calls and messages. She had been so taken in by the kid that she hadn’t even noticed that he had been trying to reach her.
With a trembling finger she called his number. “Answer,” she whispered as the empty ringtone played.
He didn’t answer.
Hannah looked at the message he sent.
As she soon as she saw what it said she wasn’t nervous anymore. She was terrified.
She slammed into the police station going fifty miles an hour. The moment the car stopped she burst out and ran inside. She felt her pulse race up and down her body as she nearly collapsed at the front desk with her phone clutched in her hands.
“I—need—to—” she could catch her breath. She held out her phone to the confused man behind the glass.
“What? What is it?”
The police station was mostly empty, with a few officers left to tend to non-national news level business. After hours of interrogation, she had met quite a few of them. One, a younger woman with a severe ponytail and sympathetic brown eyes sat in the back of the station with one eye on the fruitless conversation in the front.
The receptionist spun around and waved her over.
“What’s up?” she said as she strolled to the front.
Hannah took a deep breath and made sure that what she was saying didn’t sound as crazy as it seemed in her head. “Kyle. My boyfriend, Kyle. He’s at the house where the guy that killed the vice-president is.”
The woman’s entire face changed as she attempted to process the information. “What? What are you talking about?”
Hannah showed her the text messages.
I’m OK.
Following the shooter.
Here. 1943 Crest St.
There was a picture of a simple white two-story home. It wasn’t anything special. There weren’t any gargoyles or motes in front guarding the home. It looked like any other place on the street.
“He was there at Grental. He was with Trayhorn. I was talking to him right before—”
The policewoman quickly wrote down the address. “Have you spoken to him since he sent you these messages?”
Hannah shook her head. Tears of fright began to form in the pit of her stomach. “No. He didn’t answer.”
The woman had trouble concealing the knowing face of a professional who knew what that meant. Kyle had done something stupid. That was the reason he wasn’t answering. Something terrible had happened to him.
Hannah had spoken to this woman for at least twenty minutes in her marathon session. Of all of the police, she seemed to have a shred of trust in the crazed girl with an indecipherable note.
“He could be in trouble,” Hannah said. “He always answers his phone.”
Against all of her better judgment, the policewoman grabbed the keys from her desk and pointed to the door. She spoke in codes and jargon on her walkie-talkie. The pair of them speed-walked out to the only cop car left in the parking lot.
“Get in,” she said.
Hannah didn’t know if she wanted to actually go there. A murderer lived in that house and Lila had died under their powers. Neither of them knew what these people were capable of doing. Still, Kyle was there. For that reason, she had to go.
The policewoman bolted out of the parking lot and threw on the sirens the moment they were on a road. “They buy the clue. They’re bringing in a bunch of other guys. We’re nailing this creep.” There was a huge smile on her face as she spoke.
They flew down the freeway at ninety miles per hour. Hannah had never been in a cop car before, especially one rushing to a serial killer’s home. She felt a certain amount of power as the cars in front of them peeled out of the way like the parting of the Red Sea.
“What’s going to happen?” Hannah asked. “Are you going to get Kyle?”
The woman raced past an exit as the speed crept up to a hundred miles per hour, but she answered as if she was strolling a country road. “We need to assess the location. If you’re right, and I think you are, we need to be careful. Fucked up guys like this are usually paranoid as hell. We need to make sure it’s safe before we just go in. We’ll get your Kyle, don’t worry.”
And the others. Those people that Lila talked about could be in there. She prayed they were still alive and being kept somewhere at that house. The policewoman snaked around sharp turns and ran through stoplights without blinking an eye. She seemed unflappable even as a car’s brakes squealed as they avoided the police car.
They sat in silence as she got to a residential area and turned off the siren. “I don’t want to spook them,” she said.
It didn’t take long to find the house that Kyle had sent. It was even less spectacular in real life. There were a few bushes and shrubs along the sidewalk edge and a nice elderly couple walking their dog right in front of it.
“Where’s the car? The SUV? Kyle said—”
; The woman raised a hand. “They’d never keep it out on the street. My guess is that it’s in a garage somewhere in the back.”
They moved forward past the house, clear down to the end of the block. Kyle was in there and he was in trouble. All she could do was wait.
He stomped on the ground in front of her face. The floor underneath her body shook. Irene opened her eyes to a sore body and his feet inches from her face. She went to touch her face but her arms would not move.
“What did you give me?” she mumbled.
David bent down and grabbed her chin. He lifted it up but she could hardly keep her head up much less comprehend why he was so upset.
“Sit up,” he said.
He’d brought her to his office. Her wrists were yanked behind her back and tied together with cold handcuffs pulled so tight that she felt her shoulder almost pop out of its socket with every slight movement.
There was no help to get her up. She pushed fruitlessly against the floor to get from her side to an upright position. After one excruciatingly painful try she fell back to the ground. Whatever he had given her had made her muscles like rubber.
When it was clear she wouldn’t get up on her own, he grabbed her by the ponytail and jerked her up. She screamed but he didn’t flinch. Once she was placed against the chair he backed away.
“What kind of goddamn idiot are you?” he said.
She’d learned the hard way that most of his statements were rhetorical.
“He followed Eduardo. All the way from the school to here. That asshole that Ed wouldn’t notice but of course he did. I only hired the best right?” He emphasized hired to make her realize she wasn’t employed. She was there voluntarily.
“I didn’t—” She stopped herself from explaining. David didn’t care. She could have invited the man in for tea or shot him with a machine gun. It didn’t matter. All it mattered was that he was furious and she was there to take it.
“I need to leave,” he said.
Leave. She had to bite her tongue to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. He had really said the word leave. It took her another moment to realize he’d said “I” not “we”.
The Six: Complete Series Page 25