by Sandra Bats
“You know you’re outnumbered, right?” Boone threw Jayden a bored look.
“Has never stopped me before. Anyway, you’ll be dead before your guys kill me. Won’t do me much good, but you’d still be dead. So no win for you, either. Besides, I think Rowan would like to have me alive. Let’s find a solution that has all of us walking away alive, ok? We’re handing over our weapons, you can pat us down. I choose the guy that searches her though. What do you say?”
I wasn’t sure where Jayden was heading, and none of the guards looked like someone I wanted to pat me down. Boone took a step back, inclining his head towards Jayden. I followed as Jayden easily placed his gun and other weapons on the floor. I put the gun at my waistband next to his, then my knife as well as the second one hidden in my right boot. Looking at the ground, I felt vulnerable, disarmed and was starting to worry whether Jayden knew what he was doing.
“I expect those back later,” Jayden said, his eyes scanning the crowd of guards before he pointed at a tall, lanky guy with black hair and a pale, almost shy face. “Smitherson searches her.” At least he seemed to know him. “If you touch her longer than necessary, you’ll regret it.”
A few guards chuckled and Smitherson smiled as he stepped forward, his hands up.
“You know she’s not my type,” Smitherson replied dryly.
Once we’d been cleared we followed Boone down a hallway. He turned towards Jayden as soon as we were out of earshot.
“Well, nice move Quinn. How’d you know Smitherson isn’t into women?”
Jayden laughed. “We’ve met before.” He looked over at me and, with a smile, elaborated. “Smitherson hit on me the last time I looked for Rowan. Told him I felt honored but he’s not my type.” He sighed theatrically. “I’m just too charming for my own good.”
Boone had dropped his tough guy act. He chuckled and led us up a set of stairs. Rowan waited for us at the top, surrounded by more armed henchmen and I recognized Bram standing by his side, sporting a shiner on his face. He didn’t acknowledge knowing Jayden or me in any way.
“Look what the cat dragged in,” Rowan said, his voice raised. “Quinn, can’t say it’s a pleasure to see you. And the girl. Odd of you to bring her here. I’d thought you’d be the last to mix business with pleasure.”
He stepped forward, holding his hand out to me. “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced. I’m Rowan MacEachern. You may call me Rowan, though.”
I crossed my arms in front of my chest. “Elin Danes. Not pleased.”
Rowan chuckled and threw Jayden a look. “You like them feisty, don’t you?”
There was a small change in Jayden’s demeanor, something likely invisible to anyone else. His jaw clenched a bit, despite the nonchalance he feigned and the muscles in his back and arms seemed to tense. His voice was level, but with a new edge to it. “Let’s skip the pleasantries. Bet you can imagine why I’m here.”
“To try killing me again? I still don’t know what I did to deserve it the first time,” Rowan mocked, tapping a finger to his chin.
“How about being an ass? I told you last time, you killed one of my men at the diesel storage. If that’s not enough you also injured another.”
Rowan was silent for a second, then rolled his eyes and sighed. “I told you the last time. I’m sorry. Collateral damage. These things happen, you know that.”
Jayden snapped instantly, lunging forward and cussing when the guards held him back.
“Collateral damage? That’s what you call it when someone dies? When you nearly blew her to bits and pieces.”
Rowan threw a glance at me and when he grinned, Jayden cussed again. He settled down, the guards released him and he returned to my side.
“Ah, now it all falls into place. She was hurt that night?” Rowan asked but continued to speak before anyone could answer. “I should’ve known there was something between you two. I’ve never seen you with the same lady twice.”
Jayden pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. His voice was tense when he pointed out that he wasn’t there to kill Rowan, but only wanted to know what information Rowan had regarding Abby. Rowan grinned wickedly and told us that we had no way to pay for that kind of information, at which point Jayden looked directly at Bram. After analyzing Rowan’s right-hand man, Jayden turned his attention back to Rowan.
“Did Bram tell you where he got that shiner?” Jayden asked.
“He flirted with some girl and her boyfriend didn’t like it,” Rowan responded. “I’m guessing you know more?”
“I think by flirting he meant drugging and by her boyfriend he means me. Which makes me wonder — wasn’t he supposed to report back immediately if he spotted me? Because we’ve seen each other every single night for the last two weeks. We sat in the same bar.”
Jayden’s voice was mocking, and Rowan turned towards Bram, asking what he had to say about it. Bram didn’t deny it, instead he lied, saying he’d intended to gather information from me regarding Jayden.
“You didn’t follow command. Instead, you drugged his little girlfriend and when he beat you up for it, you lied again. You know how it’ll look if I don’t punish you, my most trusted advisor, adequately.” Rowan shook his head. “Kneel!”
Bram knelt without flinching, but his hands shook as he clenched them into fists. Rowan held his hand out for one of the guard’s guns. I glanced over at Jayden — he showed no emotion whatsoever. I brushed my fingers over his for a second, my breath shallow with fear for what would happen next.
I attempted to drop my gaze to the floor, but I couldn’t. Instead, I stared as Rowan trained his gun on Bram’s head and put his finger on the trigger, asking Bram for his last words. I wouldn’t be able to hold back a scream if I watched Bram’s execution. Rowan’s posture changed, his finger tightened on the trigger and — at the last moment — he moved his arm, lodging the bullet in Bram’s shoulder and knocking him backwards. Without haste, Rowan handed the gun back to the man beside him.
“Lucky for you, I think you’ll make a great example of why my commands should always be obeyed,” he spat towards a writhing Bram. “Somebody take him to the infirmary. No anesthesia. And clean up this mess.”
I flinched at Rowan’s words, at the instant memory of Jayden saying the same exact thing when Alex fought him. There was no time to recover; Rowan had stepped towards us while two of his men took Bram from the room.
“Well, that was unpleasant, yet kind of convenient for you. Before I can give you what I have on your sister, I need to ask something else of you. Stop trying to kill me. It’s a hassle and I don’t have time to deal with it. I have bigger things in the works, and I can’t be dead to execute them, pun intended.”
Jayden grimly agreed and Rowan turned to a desk in the corner of the room and pulled out a drawer. Somehow, we’d made a deal with the devil.
He smiled as he handed an envelope to Jayden who quickly snatched it from him.
“You’re free to go. Unless you want to take a job with us, of course. I might have a position opening as second-in-command, you know. I mean, I could spin something for you. After all, we’re friends, aren’t we?”
“No thank you,” Jayden uttered and without another word he turned, and I hurried to keep up with his strides. We weren’t escorted back — we were unarmed anyway — but Rowan called Jayden’s name. For a moment, I feared Rowan would change his mind and put bullets in our heads right there.
“I just wanted to remind you, you owe me now. I’ll come collect someday. One wrong move — if I even think you’re trying to stop what I’m doing here — and I make an anonymous tip to the labs. One mention of your sister’s name and she’ll be moved, or killed. You’d be smart to remember that.”
Jayden didn’t turn to face Rowan. His hands clutched the envelope and he ground his teeth. “I know.”
We hurried out, gathering our weapons and returning to the motorcycle. Jayden was silent the whole time, moving mechanically and driving home as fast as poss
ible. Silently, we walked into the office where Cam was waiting. Jayden tossed the envelope onto the desk.
“How’d it go?” Cam asked.
“I got whatever info he had,” Jayden said and when he dropped into a chair, making no move to open the envelope, Cam shot me a look. I didn’t know what to do, just frowned helplessly but apparently Cam thought I’d manage, giving us privacy. I turned towards Jayden.
“Are you ok?” I carefully put my hand on his arm.
“I’m about to find out if she’s dead. I don’t think I can … I don’t know if I want to know,” he uttered.
I understood. Having Maddy back was great but I still had no clue whether Norah was alive and sometimes I wasn’t even sure if I hoped she was, because being alive also meant suffering.
“Mind if I take a look?” I asked, reaching for the envelope. He made a gesture for me to take it and I opened it carefully, revealing a stack of papers. It occurred to me that they could be blank and Rowan could’ve betrayed us, but when I scanned them, I saw it was a prisoner’s file. Prisoner number 0221740104, a girl named Abigail Maria Quinn. Her age was on it, as well as picture and her current health status and location.
“She’s alive,” I told Jayden, already holding the paper out to him. “There’s a pretty recent picture, too. She looks a lot like you.”
That was a bit of a lie. While they shared the same eye and hair color, the same straight nose, the woman in the picture looked broken; her face too thin, her eyes sunken and dull. Still Jayden eagerly reached for it, his face lit up with relief.
Thirty-Four
Jayden
I stared at my sister. Well, her picture in the file. For eight years I’d wondered whether she was alive. I shook, and I should’ve felt relieved, but somehow, I was far too numb.
The face blankly staring from the picture wasn’t the tiny freckle-faced eleven-year old I remembered. It was the face of a stranger. Someone she’d become the moment they had kidnapped us. The moment her shrill screams had woken me when they had loaded her into their van. When she had cried next to me as they’d driven us to the labs. When she had thrashed in their arms when they had pulled her from me.
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. Time stood still, reversed and I felt myself become that horrified, desperate elven year-old kid again. I did the same thing I’d done then. I counted to ten. I locked it all away, refused to feel anything at all.
“Ok, well, she’s in the downtown labs? I can get her out of there. I just need a plan.” My voice sounded like a lunatic’s. Hurried and frantic, and if I’d been Elin, I wouldn’t have trusted a word I said.
“It’s virtually impossible to break into the labs and get back out. You know that,” she said carefully.
“No. I’m so close to getting her back. Don’t tell me I can’t actually do anything.”
“I’m not saying there’s not a solution. But you need to think this through.”
“Would you?” I met her eyes and grew angrier. Crap, here she was preaching patience when I knew her to be the least patient person in the world. “You’d run into danger headfirst if it were Maddy or Norah. Why do I have to be calm?”
She ignored my anger. Same with my shaking hands. Took my face into her palms. “Trust me, Abby will be safer this way. We’re getting her out together. Now I want you to calm down while I get Cam. Another set of eyes will help, and when he reads the file, we can brainstorm, ok?”
I reluctantly agreed. I wanted to be halfway into town already. Elin was right. I recognized her words; I’d spoken them to her when she’d seen Maddy.
We sat together for hours. We went over Abby’s file paragraph by paragraph, marking everything that seemed important. We grasped at snippets of ideas and half thought-out plans. It seemed impossible.
The letters started to melt before my eyes. Sentences blurred into each other. Eventually Elin sighed and put the file onto the desk.
“We should take a break. I don’t know about you, but I can barely keep reading,” she announced.
I stayed behind. I couldn’t be around people. I was only barely holding myself together. If I were to be around happy, safe people I’d surely be unable to keep from going to find Abby that moment so she’d be safe, too. As it was, I found myself out back by the bleachers on my way to the motorcycles. I never made the trip. I stopped myself because deep down, I knew Elin was right. I was no use to Abby in my current state.
I sat on the bleachers, where Elin found me a while later. She glanced at me as she sat down beside me. She took my hand and slipped her fingers between mine.
“For a moment I thought you’d gone into town.”
I lifted my head to look at her. “I almost did.”
“What kept you?”
“I can’t focus. And you were right. I’d only endanger Abby if I went now. I just … need to get her out.”
“You don’t have to do it alone. Cam and I talked about calling in an assembly. Gathering everyone who knows anything about the labs. Anyone who’s ever talked to someone about the labs, who knows someone who’s been captured and of course Jane and Maddy. We’ll ask all of them for help and tell them what we know so far. Maybe we can figure something out.”
It was better than any idea I’d had so far.
◆◆◆
We were the first in the auditorium the next morning, but it didn’t take long for people to file in. A voluntary assembly. I was stunned by how many people showed up. Nearly everybody who’d had any contact with the labs in any way. I glanced over at Elin in disbelief.
“I didn’t think so many would come,” I uttered.
I was used to only asking for help if it was for the good of everyone else and not for personal help. For maybe the first time I understood what family really was. I’d not given these people enough credit
I got up on the stage and cleared my throat to get their attention. This wasn’t a regular meeting. I didn’t feel as confident as usual.
“Ok, well, thank you all for coming. I don’t know what Cam and Elin have told you, but I need your help.” I glanced around. Elin smiled and gave me a thumbs-up. I inhaled deeply, because the next words would be hard to say.
“I’m trying to get my sister back. I have her file but so far, we haven’t come up with an idea on how to rescue her. I hope that maybe one of you has an idea. Elin will pass the file through the rows, so if you’d take a look, that’d be great. Meanwhile, I’ll just give you a quick rundown of what we know so far. Please, if you have any ideas, let me know, no matter how ridiculous they might seem.”
I ran a hand through my hair. Elin passed the file off — that was her idea. I wasn’t keen on everybody reading such personal information about Abby. It could help her though. I rambled off everything I thought might be of importance. When I was done, Josh was the first to raise his voice.
“How about causing a diversion? I don’t know; steal a car, let it roll down the hill into the fenced area. Second team could infiltrate, get to the fifth floor and get your sister out?”
Cam pointed out that breaking into the building seemed impossible even with a diversion.
“The labs are highly secured. Breaking out’s been only done once so far. All other escapees were already out of the building,” I said.
Chloe — who used to be a prostitute in the area surrounding the labs, thus having met a few guards in her time — stood up. “How did that person escape? Maybe we could modify that plan?”
I threw a quick glance at Elin. It wasn’t my story to tell, but she smiled encouragingly and I went on to tell them about the woman who’d shot three guards and leapt out of a window. I didn’t mention that the girl was Elin, but I explained that I was one of the guards.
“How did they get through the fence?” Chloe asked, but I didn’t know.
Elin got up from her chair. At first, nobody noticed. They were busy tossing around ideas for getting through the fence. She called out, but nobody paid attention and her voice was far too timi
d. She called out again and the others quieted down. I stared at her. Tried to let her know she didn’t have to do it. Everyone stared at her.
“There’s a small concrete pipe running out of the compound. It’s just big enough to squeeze through and there used to be a wire fence inside, but it was broken and even if they repaired it by now you could use a wire cutter to pierce it,” she said
Her hands shook when she paused. I wanted to move to her side and hold her. Her voice shook too, yet she told everybody her darkest secret just for me.
“It was pure luck, though. A guard dropped his gun and I grabbed it. I was on the first floor; any higher up and jumping out of the window would’ve probably injured or killed me. It’s not a solid plan — well actually it never was a plan. It’s impossible to break out of the labs without a fair share of luck but it is possible to break out of the courtyard.”
Her chest rose and sank with every heavy breath she took. People around her chattered loudly. They meant well, but they weren’t discreet in their surprise at Elin’s revelation. I stared at Elin in awe. She met my eyes, and I tried to somehow convey how proud I was of her. She must’ve been mortified, but she held her head high as she sat back down next to Cam, who gave her a pat on the shoulder. She buried herself in her chair, tried to make herself smaller.
“So, um, does anyone have an idea how to get Abby into the courtyard? That might be our best chance,” I asked.
“Fire alarm?” Someone called out. Maybe Brady, sitting in the back.
“It won’t work,” Elin interjected. “They tend to not evacuate all of the girls. They’d only send her into the courtyard by chance.”
“You sure?” Ray asked.
“Yeah.” Elin swallowed hard. “I nearly died from smoke inhalation when they didn’t evacuate me during a fire on the upper floors.”
To my surprise, Maddy spoke up next. “I know your sister. I recognize her from the picture. She gets special treatment. Some of the girls, the ones they did promising experiments on, get more food, better cells and medical care. And they’re sent outside into the courtyard for half an hour every single day.”