Lareina tried to suppress her cough, tried to remain completely still, didn’t dare to sniffle. As long as the president worried about her being alone, he wouldn’t leave the room long enough for her to steal the most important object she’d ever swiped. The clock thunked loudly. For a while she counted, trying to determine how much time had passed, but soon gave up. She kept herself awake by trying to attribute the building’s groaning to footsteps or the wind outside. A new clicking sound echoed in the hallway.
“Sir, the factory manager is here for your two o’clock meeting,” Whitley’s secretary announced.
“Take him upstairs. We’ll meet in the sitting room,” he replied softly.
Papers shuffled and metal slid against unoiled tracks. She imagined Whitley gathering up a pile of papers from his desk, sliding one of the file cabinet drawers open, pulling out a folder, and pushing it shut once again. Soft footsteps—the kind that took effort—retreated. The door creaked but didn’t click shut.
Opening her eyes, she glanced around the familiar space. Muffled light shone through thin white curtains. Keeping her eye on the sliver of light showing through the barely open door, she sat up and waited. She didn’t want to make a sound to alert the secretary in the room across the hall. Dropping to her hands and knees, she slowly crawled across the floor, hid behind the desk, and waited. No one came to check on her and the building remained quiet.
Pushing herself to her feet, she squinted at the bulletin board. Whitley’s ruthlessness could only be matched by his organization. Each key hung on its own hook with a white label revealing its purpose in uniform black type.
Factory Storeroom
Factory Boiler Room
Residence Hall #1
Residence Halls Master Key
She glanced over each label, not sure what she was looking for, but sure it had to be there. Steps clicked out in the hall. Lareina dove behind the desk and pulled her knees up to her chin. The clicking paused outside Whitley’s office. She held her breath, but the door never moved and the footsteps diminished gradually.
Feeling a sense of urgency, she sprang back to her feet, then clutched the desk chair as the room swirled around her.
Barracks Main Entrance
Barracks First Floor Rooms
Barracks Master Key
Carefully, she slid the last key from its hook and examined it as it rested in the palm of her hand. It looked dull, tarnished, old. Duplicate keys dangled from several of the hooks. She selected one labeled Administration Boiler Room and slid it onto the empty hook. In her hand she held the power to open all doors in the barracks. Squeezing the key so tight it cut into her hand, she turned to walk away, but something in the middle of the bulletin board caught her eye.
The top of one flyer stood out in a mess of overlapping papers. Big, bold, black letters spelled out WANTED. She shifted flyers advertising flood relief shelters, soldier recruitment, and notes about scheduled meetings from October.
Beneath a newspaper clipping of the fall temperature and precipitation outlook, she uncovered a picture of herself. The mug shot had slightly shorter hair and appeared a little thinner, but the recognizable image of her hung among reminder notes and old letters. Her heart sped up and her breathing became a silent, staccato choking. She remembered the winter day less than a year earlier, when cold rain coated the smooth pavement. It had been exactly seventy-four hours and twenty-nine minutes since she’d eaten anything and then she spotted baskets of cookies displayed inside a bakery window. In less than a minute she darted inside and fled from shouts behind her as her feet skidded over the sheen of ice. She knew she would fall before she hit the pavement, and she watched cookies slide down the street with her cheek against slickened concrete.
A detective pulled her to her feet and loaded her into the back of his white car. At the station they took her fingerprints and her picture. The arresting officer introduced himself as Detective Galloway. He told her stealing would get her nowhere and recommended she go to the nearest Home for Children because the next time the law wouldn’t be so lenient. Lareina had promised to do so with no intention of ever setting foot in another Home for Children.
She reached for the pendant and twirled it between her thumb and index finger. Under her picture the poster read: Have you seen this thief going by the name of Lareina? Contact Det. Russ Galloway with any information. $3,000 reward for information.
The chill she felt had nothing to do with her fever. Did Whitley know about this? Could he possibly have looked at it without realizing it was her? Working quickly, she removed the poster and rearranged the other flyers so no one would ever notice it went missing.
Feeling weak and dizzy, she crossed the room and sat down on the couch. Looking at the poster one last time, she folded it in half twice and shoved it into the pocket of her jacket along with the key to the barracks. She rested against the pillow and pulled blankets over her head.
The remainder of the day passed agonizingly slow. She dozed in Whitley’s office, then napped in her own bed after Louise walked her back to their building. Resting all day gave her enough energy to wake just before midnight. Never had she been so relieved to arrive outside Nick’s window, but the relief didn’t last long.
Nick, pale and drenched in sweat, watched her through hollow eyes.
“It’s the flu,” she told him. “Aaron sent medicine for you.” She pushed the box toward him.
“It won’t help.” His voice shook. “Everything I swallow comes back up. I haven’t been able to keep anything down since this morning.”
“It’ll be okay—”
“No,” he interrupted, “it won’t. I’m going to die here. I saw them take two people out this morning on stretchers, and that wouldn’t happen unless they were . . .”
Nick didn’t finish. He didn’t need to. The hopelessness and lack of any emotion in his voice brought tears to the corners of her eyes. She sniffled and blinked a few times, hoping he wouldn’t notice her crying.
“Come on, Nick, you’re not going to die.” The confidence in her tone didn’t match the uncertainty thudding in her chest.
He stared past her, not listening to a word she said. “Do you remember when we first met? I was trapped in that pit and I thought that was the absolute worst things could get. Now those seem like the good old days.”
She took his hand because she couldn’t think of anything else to say.
“We keep thinking things will get better in the future,” Nick continued, “but it’s always the past that seems to be better. Nothing improves—it only decays with time.”
“That can’t be true.” Although her entire life supported his argument, she wouldn’t give up the possibility of a brighter future. “Everything is going to get better. We just have to get out of here, then you’ll see.”
Nick looked down at something resting in his hand. “I was stupid to come to Texas thinking I would find Ava. We were supposed to go to a dance together, but she moved away the week before. I never even got to say goodbye—they were just gone. She left me a note saying she would call, but she never did.”
“You two were really good friends?” She hoped to get Nick focused on better times.
“We were best friends for most of our lives. A few years ago she gave me this for my birthday.” Nick placed the small, smooth object in her hand. “She found two of them in her dad’s desk and said they were kind of like friendship necklaces. I told her that was for girls, but I kept it anyway.”
Lareina stared down at the black pendant, shaped like a tear drop. The temperature plunged five degrees and she squeezed her eyes shut so Nick wouldn’t see her react. She ran her finger along the familiar outline, already sure it was identical to the one dangling around her neck. But then her fingers felt different contours on the pendant’s face. Her pendant had the letters S P E R O written across the rounded side. In the exact same place, Nick’s pendant said O P T I M U S. Ava, Nick had called his friend. Her throat constricted, tightening to the
point she felt herself gasping for air.
My dad had two of these pendants, but I took them for friendship necklaces. Susan’s voice echoed in her head. My friend is out there and he has no idea what kind of danger he’s in because of me. She wasn’t the only one who decided to lie about her name. Did Galloway know about Nick’s pendant? He couldn’t possibly, right? Only Susan/Ava knew and now Lareina, but all of that meant . . .
“My entire family is gone. Without Ava I don’t have anyone left anyway, and I’m so tired of digging tunnels.”
Forcing herself to breathe, she pressed the pendant back into Nick’s hand, squeezing it between his palm and hers. Her feverish hand couldn’t even detect any abnormality in his temperature. She shivered, too sick to be out in the cold, but what about Nick?
“No, you’ve come too far.” The force in her own voice surprised her and wind that howled like a train whistle filled any silence. “Ava is out there somewhere and I’m going to help you find her.” Usually the lies came so easily, but this one burned her throat and tasted like sour milk in her mouth.
Nick nodded. His fingers slid through hers, but she held on. Letting go felt like losing him forever. Her feverish, irrational thought process told her that as long as she could feel his hand, warm in hers, he couldn’t be sick, he couldn’t be hurt, he couldn’t die.
“I got the key.” Her voice shivered. She pushed the box of pills into Nick’s hand. “I’ll bring it to you on Friday night. Take one of these. Just try.”
He nodded, but still she held on. In cold moonlight she searched for the boy who argued about entering a stranger’s house during a storm or dug potatoes with his bare hands to win a bet, but she didn’t recognize him.
Silence ached in her throat, her hunched shoulders, and the arches of her feet. It swirled misery through the trees and into Nick’s prison cell. Nothing remained but swampy ground, gray light, and the trembling secrets between two silhouettes holding hands.
“You should go. It’s cold.” His voice was the last wisp of smoke from a dimming ember. “And don’t come back tomorrow night. Wait until Friday.” He shivered. “We can’t risk your engagement party being cancelled because you’re sick.”
“Do you promise . . .” The words stumbled across her tongue. “Do you promise you’ll be here on Friday when I bring the key?” Nick looked away. “The plan won’t work without you.” She squeezed his hand until she couldn’t feel her fingers.
“I promise.” He didn’t look at her and she didn’t let go. “I’ll be here.” This time his eyes met hers, and for an instant the stubbornness she missed flashed across his face.
She released her grip and his hand slid away. He vanished from the window, and she forced her stiff muscles to straighten. She held onto her composure until she was hidden in the tree line, then gave in to her shaking knees and allowed gravity to pull her to the ground.
“My real name is Lareina,” she whispered to the wind. “I have a pendant just like yours, Nick, because Ava is dead.” The secrets and the truths of a professional liar quivered with the pine needles. Warm tears turned cold against her cheeks. She pulled the pendant off and held it close to her face, searching for a clue in the dark. Susan, Ava, or whoever she was, didn’t know why the pendant was so valuable. Neither did Galloway. It felt hot in her hand, like a firecracker about to explode, but she couldn’t throw it away. She could only hope it didn’t blow up before she found the answers no one could give her.
Chapter 29
“Your blood-pressure is kind of high,” Aaron told Lareina at her follow-up appointment.
She had spent the previous day in bed and stayed in that night as Nick had requested. Her fever had broken, but she felt queasy every time she recalled the truth about Ava and the lie that she could help Nick find her.
“If it wasn’t, there would be something wrong with me. Between this engagement party, getting the supplies we need to leave this place, and Nick . . .” She couldn’t tell Aaron about Ava without telling him about the pendant.
Aaron sat down on the exam table next to her. “What can I do to help?”
She slumped forward, elbows into thighs, face into hands. “Tell me Nick is going to be okay and we’ll escape without getting caught.”
“Nick is going to be fine and we’ll escape without getting caught.” Aaron believed it and she didn’t. The part about Nick, at least. She knew the escape plan so well she could execute it in her sleep. But what if Nick wasn’t okay? She wanted the hours to rush by so she could get to the barracks and check on him, but at the same time she wanted the clock to freeze because she was afraid he wouldn’t come to the window when she whispered his name. How could she have left him alone last night?
Lifting her eyes back to the light, she turned to Aaron. The paralyzing mixture of apprehension, fear, and dread she’d battled every day at Oak Creek puzzled her. She’d been afraid most of her life, but usually it felt more like a tremble of excitement and only lasted until she swiped the food she needed or outran the authorities. Then came the calm, the clarity of thought, the plan for a new risk. At Oak Creek, anxiety frosted fear until her focus became slush.
“Aaron, I’m so scared all the time. I don’t want Nick to die.”
“He won’t.” Aaron’s eyes traced his shoelaces. He couldn’t make such a promise and he knew it.
“What if I can’t get all three of us out? What if Nick is too sick to help? What if we have to . . .” The words died before they landed on her tongue. “I’ve never been so worried in my life.”
“That’s what it feels like to have a family.” His gentle smile lit the room in a glow of comfort.
She always imagined a family would feel more like warmth, safety, stability.
Aaron tilted his head and his eyes smiled as he read the confusion on her face. “I was always worried that my family didn’t have enough money for food. That’s why I left—to make money, to make everything better for them.”
Her thoughts collapsed and twisted. She jumped off a moving train in the dark. Aaron let his family believe him to be dead. She crossed Oak Creek every night in the cold and the rain even when Nick didn’t want to see her. Why?
“Do you wish you would have stayed?”
“I miss them, if that’s what you mean. But the next place we settle, I’m going to get a job and send them some money and a long letter.”
“We,” she repeated. “Are we going to the same place?”
He laughed. “Do we have a choice? Last time you tried to lose us, we all ended up here.”
Her smile held up for exactly five seconds before it drooped and vanished. Some family we are, she thought. Galloway knew more about her than Nick or Aaron, starting with her name. A squeaking whoosh passed by in the hallway. The blindingly white walls made her head ache. “There’s no telling how long the riot at the barracks will last as a distraction. We have to move quickly, so you have to be in the tree line by the barracks before midnight.” Lareina closed her eyes and pictured the train schedule Louise’s friend had stolen from the factory loading dock. The schedule she had studied every night by flashlight until she knew it by memory. “We’ll slip out through the main gate and sneak onto the twelve-thirty train. Got it?”
“Try not to worry,” Aaron told her. “I won’t be late.”
Everything will be fine. She let it repeat over and over, a silent reassurance only she could hear. Everyone knew their part in the plan and Louise had helped her to meticulously plan every detail. With Aaron’s guarantee that she was recovering as quickly as could be expected, she returned to her room to rest until night returned to camouflage her visit to Nick.
Just before midnight, she buried the two backpacks of supplies from Louise beneath leaves and pine needles inside the tree line, then snuck over to the barracks for what she hoped would be the last time. As long as I don’t end up locked in there, she thought, then shoved the thought away.
It took longer than usual for Nick to appear at the window, but when h
e did, his head lolled to the side and expressionless eyes barely noticed Lareina’s presence.
She took a breath, let it out, hoped her face didn’t reveal disappointment. “Hey, feeling any better?”
His forehead pressed against the bars as he watched streams of water carve mini trenches through the dirt. “I can’t do this, Rochelle,” he whimpered. “I’m too sick.”
A low, wailing whistle echoed off in the distance. Two sets of eyes snapped to the nearest tree, but not one twig stirred. She smiled and wiped a smudge of dirt from Nick’s searing forehead with her thumb.
“Do you hear that?”
“Mmmmhmmm,” Nick agreed with his eyes closed.
“This time tomorrow night, you, Aaron, and I will be on that train, getting far away from here. Just hold on for twenty-four hours.”
“I’ll try,” he promised.
She pulled the key out of her pocket and folded it into Nick’s hand. The feeling of cool metal against his skin revived him a bit and he opened his eyes.
“Tomorrow night at midnight, I’ll meet you over there in the evergreen trees. Find a way to get all of the doors open. We’re all counting on you.”
He smiled weakly for the first time in days. “I won’t let you down.”
Returning to her room, she sank into her bed, and closed her eyes against the throbbing headache that hadn’t eased since she’d been sick. Sleep, however, escaped any attempt she made to catch it. Instead, she watched shadows crawl across the ceiling, clutched the pendant in her hand, and visualized each detail of her escape second by second.
“Wake up, Rochelle. You have to see this.” Louise was shaking her shoulder.
She sat up, rubbing one hand across her eyes, the pendant still clutched in the other. She slid her pendant hand beneath the blanket and blinked at her roommate, who held a sparkling blue dress up in front of her.
“This came for you with lunch today. There’s shoes too,” Louise exclaimed.
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