Sam and I went to the kitchen. My stack of schoolbooks sat in the middle of the kitchen table. My unread Artist’s magazine lay near the bread box. Dad’s empty coffee cup remained in the sink, unwashed. It all felt surreal.
Planting his hands on the edge of the counter, Sam lithely hoisted himself up. He shoved aside the flour canister and a box of tea, slinking closer to the window above the sink. “Open the back door and call out. Say you need help.”
“But—” He silenced me with a look. And the gun in his hands ended any thought of further protest. I moved to the sliding door, flipped up the latch, and hauled it open. “Help! Please! Someone!”
The man in the garden straightened, placing his eyes firmly on me. The window slid open, the gun slid out, and Sam pulled the trigger. The man’s head bounced back from the impact of the bullet and a new heat spread through me.
Two more shots followed Sam’s. A few seconds later, the boys regrouped in the kitchen. “Clear,” Trev said, and my stomach seesawed. More dead. All of them dead. And I’d helped.
“Where are the files?”
Someone shook me.
“What?”
“Where are the files?” Sam said. “Where did Arthur keep them?”
“Down the hall.” I pointed. “In the study.” I rattled off the code to the filing cabinet, and the boys left me.
I leaned against the sliding door. The man from the Branch lay facedown in the grass. Not breathing. Not moving. What if he had kids? A wife? He must have crawled out of bed that morning thinking he’d return home that night to the life he lived. But he wouldn’t. Not now. Because of me.
I felt the guilt of that decision right down to my core.
“Anna,” Sam said from behind me.
“Yeah?”
“We’re leaving.”
I turned to face him. “Did you get the files?”
“They’re gone. Riley must have taken them.”
Numbly, I followed Sam into the hallway. Nick scowled as he pushed past me. Trev and Cas hurried after him, their excitement so thick I could almost feel it. They bounded outside. Sam and I watched them through the screen door of the mudroom.
Cas ran three circles around the garage before dropping to his knees and fake-kissing the cement. Trev looked out over the yard, the woods, the field, taking it in, his hands on his hips.
I stayed where I was, wondering if I could get back downstairs to Dad before Sam could stop me. Would he stop me? Would Dad be angry?
“We need to go,” Sam said.
I looked toward the basement door.
“Anna,” he repeated, the command stronger the second time.
I put on a jacket and went outside. Trev rummaged around inside one of the Suburbans and came out with a wrapped package for each boy. “Looks like there’s some clothes and a pair of shoes in there.”
Cas tore into his package and the shoes spilled out. “Sweet Jesus, I have real shoes! No more prison loafers!”
Nick snorted, a look of disdain hardening his eyes. “Just throw them on so we can go. Is no one else worried that we’ve been here too long?”
“Calm down,” Trev said. “We’re fine on time.”
“And you know that how?” Nick countered.
Cas donned a white long-sleeved shirt, then shoved his feet into the tennis shoes. The others followed suit, though Sam had found one of my dad’s old flannel shirts hanging in the mudroom and slipped into it without my noticing. It was navy blue with red and white stripes and pearl snaps. It hid the gun at his back.
I hovered between the house and the garage, trying to stay small and inconspicuous, because I wasn’t sure what the plan was or if my having been witness to this escape would become a liability. If it came to that, would Trev stick up for me? Would Cas?
Trev gestured to Dad’s car. “Is that what we’re taking?”
“Who’s driving?” Nick said.
“I’m driving.” Sam pulled the keys from his pocket. He slung a glance my way. “Anna?”
I swallowed. “Who are you? How did you know how to use a gun like that? How…” What else had he hidden from me? “Do you really have amnesia?”
The keys clanged together as he let his arm drop to his side. “Yes, but I am not having this discussion with you right now. We need to go.”
Nick grumbled. “Leave her.”
“Hey now,” Cas said. “Disarm the torpedoes, soldier.”
Nick narrowed his eyes.
“I’m coming,” I said. “Just… give me a second. Please?”
Sam sighed. “One minute.”
In my bedroom, I grabbed my mother’s journal from my dresser. I didn’t know where I was going, or even why I was going, but if I was leaving with a promise to Dad that I would never return, I wanted to take this book with me. It was the only thing I cherished more than my sketches, and I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving it behind. If anything, it would serve as a link to home.
Back outside, Sam already had the car turned around and facing the road. Never mind the fact that I wasn’t sure if he even had a license. I climbed into the empty front seat and dutifully clipped my seat belt in place, tucking the journal safely in my lap.
Sam eyed it before ripping into drive and stepping on the gas. When we reached the end of our long gravel driveway, he slammed on the brake. “Which way to town?”
“Right.”
He turned and stomped on the gas again, kicking up dust. I clutched the book, the feel of the worn cover a comfort in my hands. There was a reason the boys had remained in those rooms all those years, but I no longer knew what it was. I’d thought the Branch wanted to make the perfect soldier. If that was the case, then we’d failed. Perfect soldiers don’t kill their commanders.
An ache bloomed behind my eyes as I tried to make sense of it all. If Sam’s treatment had somehow backfired, then why had Dad pushed me to leave? And why had he insisted I get as far away from Connor as possible?
Dad knew something I didn’t. And Sam… a part of me wanted to trust him. He hadn’t killed me. He hadn’t killed Dad, even though he had shot him.
“So what’s the master plan?” Cas said, drawing me from my thoughts.
Sam eyed Cas in the rearview mirror. “Ditch the car. Find something new.”
“Are we splitting up?” Trev asked.
“Do you want to split up?”
Trev shrugged and scratched at the back of his head. “It’s harder to track down parts of a whole. But mostly, I’m just glad to be free. So whatever we decide, I’m okay with it.”
“We need to stay together,” Nick muttered.
“Dude.” Cas put his hands on the back of my seat and leaned forward. “When I saw Connor show up with all his lackeys, I thought for sure your plan was toast.”
I swiveled around. “You were planning to escape?”
Sam didn’t say anything. Didn’t even look at me. I stared at him, mouth agape. I’d told him about Connor’s visit. I’d prepared him for the escape. What if I hadn’t said anything? If I could, would I change it?
Only a foot of space separated Sam and me. Being with him in the outside world was what I’d always wanted, but not like this. A flash of the lab, the blood, and the dead agents came back to me and my stomach clenched.
“When were you planning to escape?”
“Next week,” Cas said. “During Sam’s blood draw.”
My eyes widened. Would I have been the one on the wrong side of a bullet? “What about the gas?”
“Straws,” Cas said.
I frowned.
“He taped several together,” Cas explained. “Ran them through the vents between the room and the bathroom. You might have noticed his bathroom door was shut? That’s because he sealed it off. Gas goes on, Sammy goes down and pretends to be out, but really he’s using the straws like a snorkel.”
“You really did that?” He didn’t answer, but it didn’t matter. It all made sense now. It was why he’d been asking for straws, and why he�
��d asked for a roll of tape last night. I hadn’t bothered to get it back from him.
I’d supplied him with the tools for escape and intervened when Connor tried to stop him. I was as much a fugitive now as they were. Maybe that’s why Dad sent me away—to escape certain punishment.
God. I was such an idiot. I’d thrown everything away for Sam. For a boy. I’d thought I was on his side. And hadn’t I considered breaking him out a few nights ago, during our chess match? Somehow it didn’t feel as good as I thought it would. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.
“Brilliant, huh?” Cas said and patted Sam’s shoulder. “I knew there was a reason I kept you around.”
“As if you had other options?” Sam asked.
Cas shrugged a shoulder before dropping back into his seat. “I’m just saying.”
Nick snorted. “Would you quit blowing smoke up his ass? He’ll get a big head.”
The drive into town seemed to take twice as long as it normally did. Sam ditched Dad’s car in the back lot behind Emery’s Pizzeria. Trev was ordered to stay with me on Main Street while Sam and the others scouted for another vehicle.
The chill October air stole through the thin material of my jacket. I cast a glance at Trev. He still looked like the same friend I had shared secrets with, the one who loved reading biographies and who had a vast memorized cache of famous quotes. But something about him seemed off now. Maybe it was the gun I knew was hidden at his back.
“Anna,” he started. “I’m sorry you had—”
“Do I have time to use the bathroom?” I cut him off and motioned to the drugstore across the street.
He looked crestfallen, but he nodded. “Yeah. I think that’d be okay.”
Inside, with the door locked behind me, I took a huge, gulping breath and tried to cool the burning in my eyes. I washed my hands, scanned my reflection in the mirror. I hadn’t showered that morning, and my blond hair looked dull, like dried, cracked wheat. My eyes were heavy. I looked tired but, shockingly, not disturbed, like I hadn’t just watched Sam kill all those people. I still looked like Anna.
But I didn’t feel like her at all.
I met Trev in the pet food aisle. We started for the front of the store.
“You know, you don’t have to be afraid of me,” he said. “I’m still the same guy.”
I frowned. “I’m not afraid of you.”
He tipped his head my way. “The distance between us says maybe you are.”
Mentally I calculated the feet separating us. Five. Maybe six.
“It wasn’t anything on purpose.”
Overgrown black hair hung in Trev’s face, hiding a clear view of his soft, amber eyes. I’d always trusted him. In another life, he could have easily been the boy every girl had a crush on because he was clever and good-looking and kind.
I still trusted him. Didn’t I?
Outside, Sam met us at the corner. “Go find Cas and Nick in the parking lot out back,” he told Trev. Trev glanced my way before heading off at a jog.
The tangy smell of rising yeast in the bakery next door made my stomach growl—a reminder that I hadn’t had a chance to eat my toast before Connor showed up. A reminder that nothing was as it should be.
“Are you really going to steal a car?” I asked as I followed Sam in the opposite direction from Trev.
“Yes. Unless you have one we can take.”
“No,” I said. “I just… I don’t know if I’m comfortable with all this.”
He gave me a look. “Now is not the time for your morality to make an appearance.”
I stopped walking. “What’s that supposed to mean? My morality was never gone.” When he didn’t respond, I plowed on. “You know, I’m starting to wonder if you were ever the guy I knew. Because I don’t see the morality on your face. I can’t see you at all. What happened to the Sam who was my friend?”
He got in close, lowered his voice. “We were never friends, Anna. I was a prisoner in your basement for five years. Before that, I suspect I was with the Branch for several more.” A vein in the middle of his forehead swelled. “I wanted out, so I did what I needed to do to win your trust. If you had been in my position, you would have done the same thing.”
His words stung. “No, I wouldn’t have. You could have asked me.” I spread my arms out. “All you had to do was ask for help.”
He started to say something and then clamped his mouth shut. The surprised look on his face told me that it had never crossed his mind to come to me. My chest felt hollow, like all the good things I’d experienced with Sam in the last few years had been carved out and mashed to pulp. My life in that lab was a lie.
Tears blurred my vision. I was an idiot to ever think he cared. An idiot to think there was anything special about me. Because there wasn’t. I was just another tool he’d used to break free of that lab.
“We should go,” he said, his jaw tight as he looked everywhere but at me.
I considered running back to the drugstore and begging for help. Dad needed me. Dad would want me around. To Sam, I was nothing more than a burden.
I could escape this, whatever it was. I would leave Sam for good.
“Anna?” He cocked his head to the side, narrowed his eyes. I wondered if he saw the indecision freezing me in place. He didn’t push, didn’t pull. He gave me the opportunity to escape right then and there.
But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
And what did that make me? Pathetic. Sad. Desperate. Dad had made me promise not to come back to the farmhouse. I really had nowhere else to go.
“Lead the way,” I said.
So he did.
8
SAM HAD SEVERAL CRITERIA A VEHICLE had to meet before he’d steal it. The vehicle had to be large enough for all of us, it had to have a big engine, and it had to be discreet. Cas was the one who picked the navy blue SUV.
I sat in the passenger seat, slumped down, wondering if anyone would notice us stealing this big vehicle, if someone would call the cops. But we made it to the highway without incident and Treger Creek faded in the rearview mirror.
There really was no going back now. The farther we pulled away from home, the tighter the knot in my chest grew. I ran my fingers down the cracked spine of my mother’s journal, glad I’d grabbed it.
“What is that?” Sam asked, gesturing at the book.
I tugged it closer. “It was my mother’s.”
“Sura,” Sam said, and I nodded. It was odd, hearing someone else speak her name. Dad hardly ever did.
Sam headed south, driving at an even sixty miles an hour. The surroundings flashed by in a blur of color. To keep my mind on something other than what was happening, I tried to think of the colored pencils I’d use if I were drawing the landscape. Burnt umber. Cadmium green. Scarlet for the leaves that were starting to change.
“So,” Cas said, “any idea where Arthur sent us?”
I felt the weight of Sam’s gaze. “Did that address sound familiar to you?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know anyone in Pennsylvania. And there was no mention of it in your files.”
“It’s probably a trap,” Nick said. “Arthur is part of the program. I don’t know why we’re trusting him.”
Irritation flooded me and I turned to face Nick. “My dad never wanted to hurt any of you.”
The dark scowl returned. “Doesn’t mean it isn’t a trap.”
“Would you rather stay here?” Sam looked up at the rearview mirror, making eye contact with Nick. “I can stop the vehicle so you can bail.”
“Yeah,” Cas added, “you can hitchhike your way across the country. Just flash your abs. I bet someone would stop.”
Nick snorted. “Shut the hell up.”
“Damn,” Cas said. “You’re cranky. We’re free! You should be doing the Hokey-frickin’-Pokey!”
“I would rather light myself on fire.”
“Awesome.” Cas rubbed his hands together. “Anyone have some marshmallows?”
> Sam ignored them and punched the address my dad had given him into the portable navigation system on the dashboard. A cool female voice told us where to go. It took us nearly three hours to reach the Pennsylvania border. While Cas and Trev discussed all the things they wanted to eat now that they were free, Sam focused on the road. Nick slept in the back.
I leaned closer to the passenger-side window. I’d never been to Pennsylvania before, but it looked exactly like I thought it would, the land undulating like the sea. I marked pencil strokes in my head to keep myself busy.
No one said it, but I think we all felt like we were being watched. Like Connor was waiting for us to screw up to make his next move. I just wanted to find the safe house Dad had told Sam about.
A freeway sign overhead read EXIT 28. We drove past it and continued southwest for another half hour before the navigation system steered us to an on-ramp. Sam exited, veering sharply to the right, the force of the turn pushing me in his direction. I swept a gaze over his arm, draped on the center compartment, the sleeve of his shirt rolled back to the elbow. Less than forty-eight hours earlier I’d been in the lab, studying him through the glass, studying his scar.
“What are the letters? The scars,” I clarified. The others went quiet in the back.
“Uh-uh,” Nick muttered. Apparently, he wasn’t sleeping after all.
“She read some of our files,” Sam said. “Something might stand out if she knew what the letters were.”
Cas tapped his fingers on the back of Sam’s seat. “Yeah. What’ll it hurt if she knows?”
“We’re forgetting that she spent the last five years on the other side of the wall,” Nick said. “You want my opinion? Tell her nothing and ditch her at the next town.”
“I didn’t ask for your opinion,” Sam warned.
“I’m sitting right here, you know.”
“No one’s ditching you,” Trev said. “He doesn’t make the decisions.”
Nick draped an arm over the back bench seat. “Oh? And you do?”
“Stop.” Sam’s voice cut through the argument and the boys went silent. “You’ve seen the R on my chest,” he said to me, keeping his attention on the road. “There are more. Another R, an O, and a D.”
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