I replay the conversation in the restroom. She is working with Melanie. There is no other explanation. But why? And how is she alive when her Authentic is dead? She should be terminated.
“What’s the matter? Did she mean something to you?” Linc asks. He walks toward me slowly, obviously concerned by whatever he sees in my expression. I struggle to smooth it over.
I need to think. I need to understand. I contemplate calling Daniel and confronting him. But I know that would be foolish. Maybe it’s time to talk to Gus.
“Raven, talk to me,” Linc says. His frustration is mounting. I can hear it in his voice. His hands grasp my shoulders and he shakes me gently. It snaps me out of my thoughts.
“I’m sorry, I just—yes, she means something to me. It’s a shock.”
“It’s more than that. What are you thinking? What does that girl have to do with all this?” He gestures to the empty room but we both know he means the big picture. Me. This place. Rogen Tower.
Here is my moment. I should tell him about Daniel. About Titus. What I am. For the first time, I want him to know everything. But Rogen Tower has too many ears to say anything in this room. I look away.
“You still don’t trust me,” he says quietly.
“It’s not that. I—”
His hands drop from my shoulders. They hang limply at his sides in a gesture of defeat. “Dinner’s ready.” He stalks out, leaving me trailing behind him in a silence threaded with half-truths and fear.
***
There are two people already seated at the dining table when I arrive. One is Titus. The other is Daniel.
My heart seizes and I have to force air into and out of my lungs. For once, I welcome my role as Authentic Raven. It allows me to shove the fear aside and smile as if nothing else matters but pleasing these men.
“Good evening, Raven,” Titus says as I take my seat.
I nod at them both. “Good evening, Father. Daniel.”
“You look beautiful, as always,” Daniel says, his eyes roaming over me in a way that means more than just appreciating my appearance. I wonder if he’s looking for damage—evidence of my run-in with Melanie. When it’s obvious there is none, he turns his attention back to Titus.
The meal is served. Conversation flows and topics are brought forth and overturned at a rate faster than my mind can keep up. I force aside everything but the automatic motion of feeding myself and nodding at the appropriate places.
I don’t allow myself to think past this moment and whatever Authentic Raven would say. I eat. I smile. I answer flippantly when they ask a question. The entire time I am in awed disgust that I am capable. Even Titus looks pleased.
When the meal ends, Titus leaves us alone—something about a speech to write for some benefit for orphans who will never see a dime of the charity money given—and I am swept away to the small parlor that I have come to think of as Daniel’s room. I have not been in there since the first time we were alone together. Did he know what I was then? The thought of being in there with him now has me swallowing back a brick-sized lump. I can sense one of the security team shadowing us. Another no-name.
Linc wasn’t at dinner. I thought I saw him halfway through the appetizers, but it was only a flash of a face before he disappeared back into the kitchen. I have no doubt he’s still angry with me.
I stand awkwardly beside the small couch. Daniel goes directly to it and sinks down, either ignoring my hesitation or oblivious to it. “Sit,” he says with a smile that doesn’t reach past his lips. It makes me nervous, that smile. I don’t trust it. But I sit.
He leans closer and brushes his hand along my hairline. I am a statue as his fingertips trace a trail down to my shoulder. My face heats under his touch—anger, boiling hot, bubbles to the surface.
“How’s your father?” I ask, just centimeters from our lips meeting.
He sits back abruptly and the frown that deepens the lines around his mouth is every bit as potent as the smile he wore just seconds ago. “He’s well. Why do you ask?”
“He hasn’t seemed like himself lately.”
“I wasn’t aware you’d spent time with him lately,” he says. His tone is a warning.
I am on dangerous ground and I know it, but I can’t stop the words now. I am in too far. Backpedaling would be fatal. So I forge ahead—with no real plan except to survive the encounter.
“I haven’t. Not really. I’m just concerned. I know how much he means to you.”
“Yes. He’s all I have now.”
“Your mother …?” I stop myself before I can fully ask the question. I remember Linc and the pictures he showed me that first day. There was a smiling woman with an arm around Daniel. I remember Linc telling me she died last year. I don’t know how.
“Well. She’s gone, isn’t she?” There is a dull pain in his eyes as he says it, but it is fleeting. I wonder if he ever felt the loss of his mother or if he’s found a way to turn it off. Anger doesn’t seem like the most logical emotion to me, but then I have nothing to compare it to. I’ve never had a mother.
I don’t feel sorry for him, exactly, but at least he’s stopped trying to kiss me. “Do you want to talk about what happened?” I ask.
“What’s to talk about?” he shoots back. “The cancer took her faster than we could fight it. Faster than we could grow a cure.”
I nod like I understand but cancer is a foreign concept to me. No Imitation has ever had anything so deadly. “If that’s the case, there’s nothing anyone could’ve done. Including you.”
“Least of all me,” he agrees. “But they could’ve worked faster. Expedited the growth.”
I open my mouth to murmur reassurances but the words don’t make it out. Something he said has my attention. “What do you mean the growth?” I ask.
His expression clears, his shoulders deliberately relaxing as he studies me. “Nothing, kitten, just me ranting, as usual.” He pats my knee like one would a small child who doesn’t understand a simple concept. “Don’t pay me any mind. Do you want some tea? I can ring the maid.”
“No, thank you. I think I’m going to call it a night,” I say, rising. I’m not sure what to make of the turn in our conversation but I want to sit and process it alone. There is something there, something important—I just don’t know what.
“Call it a night? But we haven’t even started yet.” And just like that, the smile is back and he is leaning in again.
“I have no intention of starting tonight. I am here for you about your mother but—”
“Do not pretend to understand about my mother. You couldn’t possibly understand anything so complex.”
I rise and make a show of smoothing my dress. “I don’t like your tone. I’m saying good night.”
I have taken two steps when his hand grabs mine and he spins me around. “You will say good night when I tell you.”
“You don’t get to order me around like you own me,” I say, packing so much venom in those words my gut aches.
“No, of course not. Titus owns you.” He pauses to reach around and grab my ass. Using his grip as leverage, he pushes me into his chest. He flashes a lip-curling smile. “I just get to play with you.”
I slap him. He winces and when he looks back at me, his pupils are dilated, his mouth set.
The door opens and I realize the sound of my hitting him must’ve been loud enough to alert the sentry in the hall. He steps into the room and watches us curiously. He doesn’t move toward us and I can see him trying to assess the situation, to determine the threat.
“Leave us,” Daniel snaps at him.
The guard hesitates.
“I said, leave us!”
The man shuffles out and the door clicks shut behind him. Something that feels an awful lot like hope drains out of me. I feel empty.
“That was a mistake,” Daniel says in a low voice. He takes a step toward me. I take one back.
“The mistake is yours,” I say, “to think I would just roll over and give up so eas
ily.”
“Easy or hard, it will happen.”
“Why? I’ve done nothing to you.”
“Don’t flatter yourself. This isn’t about you.”
“Her, then. The redhead.”
Daniel registers surprise but it doesn’t last. “I’ve underestimated you, product.”
I ignore the sting left by his words and press on, determined to return the focus where it belongs. “I saw the two of you kissing. Is this for her?”
“Melanie?” He waves a hand. “Please. She is not important.” He laughs and it sounds like a short bark. I know then that he does not love Melanie. That he is using her just like he’s trying to use me. But there is another.
“Not Melanie, then. Raven.”
In an instant, his expression is deadly serious. I’ve hit a nerve. “I should’ve known the moment he switched her for you.”
“You hurt me. When you thought I was her,” I say. “And you pretend you care for her?”
“I would never hurt Raven. Her own father, on the other hand, would ship her off while he waits around for her product to bite it just so he can neutralize a threat to his precious company. His products are all that matter to him. Ironic if you think about it, considering how choosy he is with which ones he decides to grow.
“Wouldn’t it be a shame if slowly, one by one, all of his precious creations were taken from him? Siphoned away until there was nothing left in his underground empire but test tubes and his own obsession with imitating life.”
I know then that everything I suspected is true. Daniel is the one stealing away Imitations. And Melanie is helping him do it. Did Raven know that? Did it get her in trouble? “Killing me won’t accomplish any of the things you’re talking about,” I say.
He blinks. “I’m—I’m sorry, Ven. He deserves everything that happens next.” For a split second, all of the crazy goes out of his eyes and he’s just a boy. And the sad acceptance in him makes my heart ache. In that moment, I want to help. I am willing to hurt for whatever cure we can find him. But then the acceptance is resignation. And the resignation is cruel resolve. And the Daniel I know is back.
He takes another step toward me. I take another one back. “You don’t have to do this.”
With a lingering touch of sadness left in his voice, he says, “You have no idea what I have to do.”
My back bumps the bookshelf on the far wall. I’ve gone as far as I can.
When his hands reach me, I don’t fight it. In some pre-programmed part of my mind, I am willing to sacrifice certain things if it means survival. I’m not sure which things. I hold my breath and pray he doesn’t take it further than I’m willing to go.
His hands slide down my face roughly, pulling on my still-tender cheeks, before falling lower. He drags his palms down my sides from shoulders to hips. When he reaches my waist, they trail up again, pushing forcefully against my abdomen and then breasts in a too-rough caress.
He’s close now. Too close. I can smell the cologne on him that I don’t have a name for but reminds me too much of the shallow-yet-wealthy that fill the ballrooms at parties. His expression twists as he leans toward me.
For a panic-filled moment I think he is going to kiss me, to force himself on me. But then his hands close over my throat and he squeezes and I am relieved to realize no, he means only to kill me.
Despite the relief, I fight.
I have to—if not for myself, then for Anna. Or Lonnie and Ida. Or anyone else’s Imitation Daniel will try to use after I’m gone in his mission to destroy Titus.
I claw at his wrists, my nails raking down his flesh, but it’s not enough. His grip doesn’t loosen. If anything, it only seems to enrage him further. When I realize there’s no real damage to be done that way, I stop trying to pry his hands off my neck and reach out for his face. My fingers find purchase against his cheeks and I dig my nails in as hard as I can and wrench them sideways. I hear him cry out but he doesn’t let go of me.
Black spots swim across my vision. I realize I have only seconds before I pass out.
I try again with my nails and find an orifice that I pray is an eye socket. I can’t see well enough to know for sure, but when I dig in and rake downward, I am rewarded with a sharp cry and a significant decrease in the pressure around my windpipe.
It is not a long-enough reprieve. The pressure returns as he redoubles his efforts. I try to cough but it is cut short and comes out as a strangled gasp. My vision swims. I am pulled under what feels like a churning ocean. I can’t get my legs under me. I can’t break the surface.
God, dying is painful.
When the noose of pressure around my throat suddenly disappears, I am so grateful and desperate to breathe, it takes me a moment before I wonder how it happened. I suck in gulps of air that burn as they slide into and out of my lungs. But I will take the burning over the drowning any day.
There is a scuffle to my left. A fist lands in Daniel’s gut. His shoes—polished and shiny—arc upward as he’s driven off his feet. I scurry out of the way and stare at the sight of Daniel grappling for the upper hand while Linc pounds on him from above.
Linc.
I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. He always seems to be here when I need him most. But I am so overwhelmed by the sight of him, tears well and spill over and it’s all I can do to blink through the blurriness and twist out of the way each time they come closer to making me collateral damage.
Daniel is pissed—as evidenced by the wild grunts and wholehearted way he has thrown himself into the fight. Linc is grim and silent in his determination. Daniel’s nose is bleeding and Linc’s pants have a hole in the thigh where the pocket seam has ripped loose. The door bangs open. I jump as it hits the wall.
“What the hell is going on here?” Gus demands.
The boys break apart. Gus looks back and forth between them in disbelief. When he spots me, his gaze zeroes in and I can only imagine what he is thinking. “You,” he says, pointing a finger at me, “come with me.”
“Gus—” Linc begins.
“Shut it! We will talk about this later,” Gus snaps. “Wait for me in my office.”
Linc rises to his feet, shoulders stiff and hands fisted as he walks to the doorway and slips past Gus.
I get up slowly, very aware of my proximity to Daniel and how much he would like to strangle me. I keep my hair in my face as I near and don’t see his hand shooting out until it is too late. It strikes me in the side of the head and sends me sprawling.
From behind Gus, Linc roars and rushes for the doorway.
“Stop him!” Daniel shouts.
Gus backs up so he is blocking the door and plants his feet. Linc barrels into him and for a moment I think the force of it will knock Gus away but he sways and then rights himself and pushes against Linc, holding him outside the door, though barely.
“Get out of my way!” Linc is growling and roaring and cursing at Daniel. At Gus. At anyone who will listen.
“I trust you will remember who signs your paychecks here, Gus,” Daniel says over the noise.
Gus doesn’t answer but I suspect it’s only because all his energy is diverted to holding Linc at bay.
“Gus, you don’t have to listen to him. This isn’t an order from Titus. He’s acting on his own,” I say.
“Shut up,” Daniel tells me.
“Gus, I know you’re like me and he’s using you. He—”
“I said shut up!” Daniel screams. He is standing over me now but he is looking at Gus. “She’s obviously been hit on the head one too many times.”
“Sir,” Gus says uncertainly. He is barely holding Linc out anymore.
“Keep him out. That’s an order!” Daniel turns from me to scream at Gus and I know it is the only chance I will get. In a flash I am up on my knees, wrenching my arm back and smashing my fist into his groin. It is the only thing I can think to do and I wonder if it will even be enough. I am rewarded for my efforts when he doubles over and stumbles, groaning, bent at the wai
st.
I scramble to my feet and run for the door. I see Gus, whose jaw has gone slack as he watches it all play out. Behind him, even Linc has stilled. I am only inches from slipping around them to safety when Daniel lets out a roar and I am yanked backward as his fist closes around my hair.
I cry out and lurch sideways, pulling up short.
Daniel is raving mad. He yells something unintelligible and then his fist slams into my nose and I see stars and blackness. I land hard on my back. Pain shoots up my spine but I can’t cry. It feels as if all the oxygen has been stolen from me.
I gasp until a wretched choking sound escapes my lips and air is forced into my windpipe. My vision clears in time to see Gus tackle Daniel—Linc close at his heels.
They are a tangle of arms and legs and even teeth as they grapple with each other, grabbing and clawing and pushing and pulling.
There is a soft clicking sound amidst the groans and grunts and then someone cries out sharply. The pile of limbs goes slack as we all crane to see who is injured. I see the glint of metal—a knife—as the three of them separate and crawl away from each other.
Linc positions himself in front of me, blocking my view of the other two. I strain to see around his heaving shoulders as he catches his breath.
“Linc, move,” I say.
“I … can’t.”
At once, my irritation becomes concern. “Are you hurt?”
“No.” He shakes his head, quick to assure me. “But I don’t want you to see …”
“Linc, move,” I repeat.
His shoulders droop as he seems to accept I’m not going to let him shield me. He shifts sideways, and I can just see the side of Daniel’s face as he stares at Gus. I scoot around Linc and stop.
At first, I don’t understand why no one moves. Or why we’re all staring at Gus. His shoulders heave as if he is winded. His face is set in its usual scowl. Other than that …
But then I see.
Just below his left shoulder, a crimson stain slowly seeps and spreads across the light blue fabric of his shirt. Through the small tear in the center of the stain, I see a hole in his skin.
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