Between Shadows

by Chanel Cleeton

  I can believe the Director capable of just about anything.

  “I thought it could be.”

  Fuck.

  “I came back to figure out if they were following me. At first I thought they were Academy grunts, checking up on me. But then after Venice…” He pauses. “Those guys tried to kill me. Why would the Academy want me dead after they spent so much time and money training me?”

  “So you came back here?”

  “I didn’t tell them I was back right away. I just watched the school. I started seeing suspicious activity around the Academy. People lurking outside the gates, that sort of thing.”

  If Luke is right there’s a huge security breach, one that endangers all of us. But why haven’t we heard anything about it? Why haven’t they put out a security alert? They have a school full of trained assets. Why aren’t we utilizing our skills if the Academy is under attack?

  I lean back on the couch, tucking my legs underneath me. “Who do you think those men were?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I don’t buy that. The Luke I know—knew—considered every angle. Sure he’s more impulsive than me, but not enough that he would go into this blind.

  “I’ve never heard of anyone at the Academy almost getting caught like that. They pride themselves on the fact that no one knows of our existence.”

  Without the protection our secrecy affords us, anyone could come after us. The thought of Grace paying for the weight of my sins sends tendrils of fear licking through me. I’ve killed some bad people with some very bad friends.

  “Unless it’s the Academy,” Luke counters.

  “Yeah, but why? Why would they bother? They don’t have to follow us. They own us. Our lives are already theirs.”

  Luke pushes off the couch, the move sudden. He sways for a moment, unsteady on his feet.

  I reach out to brace him. “Do you really think it’s smart for you to walk around? You’re going to make it worse.”

  “I need a drink.” He stumbles over to the kitchen, grabbing a bottle of dark liquid from the counter. He pours some into a glass, pulling ice from the freezer and dropping it into the crystal with a loud clink. “Want one?”

  I shake my head. As he walks closer, the smell of alcohol assails my nostrils. I freeze, a distant memory poking through the periphery. I know that smell.

  “What is that?” My voice is calm, betraying nothing of my inner turmoil.

  Show no weakness.

  “Scotch. You sure you don’t want some?”

  “No.” Something about that smell—I can’t put my finger on it—but something makes me nauseous and afraid. I remember the smell…from before.

  “You okay?”

  I am definitely not okay. “I’m fine.”

  “You don’t look fine.”

  “I’m fine.” I stare at the leather couch, shifting my body toward the end opposite Luke. I struggle for calm, to steady the panic building within me. What is it about that smell?

  “X?”

  I shake off the memory, fighting to bring my mind back to the present before my past drags me down.

  “You never answered my question,” I say instead. “What would the Academy want with you? There’s more. Something you’re not telling me.”

  Luke hesitates; he’s weighing the pros and cons of trusting me. Unlike me, Luke doesn’t have anyone else. As far as I know, there are no siblings; he came to the Academy alone. He gets along with everyone, but I’ve never seen him be particularly close with anyone either. Besides me.

  “There’s more.”

  “There is.” His gaze meets mine. “I don’t trust you.”

  I don’t trust him either, but the part of me that knows I need help wants to. What if I’d been out with Grace? What would I have done then? Luke’s a powerful ally to have; he’s also a dangerous enemy.

  He stares at me now, his gaze penetrating. I know what he’s going to ask me, some part of me has been waiting for it—dreading it—since he came back.

  “Did you regret it at all? Or did you just chalk it up to a job well done?”

  I can’t meet his gaze. This is the question, the point that can alter the trajectory between us. I could lie and then he’d tell me what I need to hear. I could lie…

  I don’t answer him. The truth is both too much and not enough.

  “Is it any wonder I don’t trust you?” His eyes judge me as his voice condemns me.

  “They told me you were a traitor.” My words sound hollow, the explanation poor, and yet it’s all I have, all I can afford to give before he picks at the scab that’s formed over a wound that never healed.

  “You knew me.”

  That voice. I’ve never known anyone to speak with such power. It’s as though he’s struck me without lifting a finger.

  “Better than anyone,” he continues, adding a kick to his verbal punch. “Did you really think I would sell you out? After everything we’d been through? You were the only person I trusted at the Academy. And you stuck a knife in my back and ripped my throat out.”

  I splinter with each accusation. “Do you think I was in any position to question the Director?” I whisper, each word painful to release. “Do you think it was ever a choice? Have you ever heard of an asset turning down an assignment?”

  “You could have warned me.”

  My laugh is sharp and full of bite. “No. I couldn’t have. Not with Grace. Not with what they would have done to her. They would have known immediately and they would have killed her for my disobedience. I would have been the traitor.

  “It’s been drilled into us since we got to the Academy. Can you blame me for doing what I was trained to do? Did I want to kill you? No. Did I take pleasure in it? No.”

  It sliced me in half.

  “I did what I had to for myself and for my sister. You know better than anyone—you don’t tell the Academy ‘no.’” My voice builds with each word, filling with anger, fear, and regret until I’m overflowing with the weight of my sins.

  He knows there’s no escaping who we are. It’s inside of us like a cancer eating its way through our bodies. There is no such thing as retirement or escape for people like us. Our lives are death—causing it, mastering it, and then succumbing to it when our utility is gone. There’s nothing else. I hate myself for what I did, but I would have hated myself more if my little sister had been killed because of me.

  It doesn’t make what I did right, not even a little bit, but right or wrong, it’s why I did it.

  “What would you have done in my place?” I ask, wanting him to admit it, wanting to hear those words fall from his lips. Needing to believe that I’m not entirely the monster he thinks I am. Just a shade less, perhaps.

  Luke raises the glass to his lips, taking a long swig of the liquid. It’s a minute before he answers me. He won’t meet my gaze. “I don’t know. Two weeks ago, maybe I would have believed them, would have done what they told me to. I don’t know anymore.”

  His words hang between us, tension filling the air. “What happened two weeks ago?”

  “Promise. On your sister’s life. Promise you won’t tell anyone.”

  “Leave Grace out of it.”

  “Promise.”

  “I won’t tell anyone. What happened two weeks ago?”

  His gaze shutters; his hands clench. “Life’s very different outside of the Academy. You begin to realize just how big the organization is. There are other academies in other cities around the world. It’s more connected than you could ever imagine, but you’ve never felt as alone as you do on the outside.”

  I figured there were other academies, but it’s not something that has ever been openly discussed. The secrecy that clouds our lives surrounds the Academy as well. I’m its best asset, but I know practically nothing about the operational side of things, about life on the outside.

  “This past year I had twelve assignments.” His mouth tightens in a harsh line. “Twelve kills.”

  In a given year, the bes
t assets at the Academy have half that.

  “Where were you?”

  Luke laughs, the sound nothing like I remember. Luke’s laugh used to fill me with warmth. Now it’s a shell of what it once was.

  “Paris, Marrakech, Venice. The list goes on.”

  I’d forgotten how good Luke is with languages. It makes sense they would send him to different countries—he could blend anywhere.

  For the first time since he’s been back, I look at him. Really look at him. He looks tired. His brown eyes that used to be so warm are now haunted. His lips are slashed in a tight line. He looks harder, so much of his spark gone, replaced by something cold and lethal. I’ve been playing at being an asset; he’s been living it.

  And it’s been killing him.

  “You’ve changed.”

  “Yeah, I have.”

  I beat down the tiny flare of sympathy. This is Luke; he’s dangerous and deadly. Except he doesn’t seem dangerous right now. He looks exhausted.

  I have to know what put that haunted look in his eyes.

  “What happened two weeks ago?” I repeat.

  Chapter Seven

  Luke takes another sip from his glass. My gaze is focused on the point where his Adam’s apple bobs up and down, to that smooth expanse of skin, as I attempt to discern his tell.

  We didn’t have a relationship before. Not even close. We had one night. One night when I gave him my virginity and the heart I didn’t even know I had. My knowledge of his body was confined to a few hours of exploration, and still, the sight of him sends a hum of recognition through me and a sharp pulse between my thighs. There are flashes when I think I can read him, and then he rips those away, the wall slamming between us.

  I look away for a beat, concentrating on his voice instead, on the answers I desperately need.

  “I was on assignment. It was supposed to be a standard job. A government official they needed taken out.” He takes a final swig of the liquid, draining the glass dry. It hits the wood table with a clunk, but I doubt he even notices. He’s somewhere else as he continues his story with a battered voice and tired eyes. “They wanted me to take him out in his office. I went in like I was a cleaner. That was the plan, at least. They wanted him shot.”

  It likely wasn’t in the U.K., then. In a country that banned guns, a shooting death would have made the news.

  “When I pulled the gun on him, there was this moment before I pulled the trigger.” Luke’s voice is ragged now. “I don’t know why I hesitated, but for an instant I looked away from his face and I saw a picture on his desk. He had his arm around a woman. Two kids sat next to them, a Christmas tree in the background.”

  Never get close to targets. This is why they drill it into us. It’s a lot easier to kill a stranger—especially a stranger who has committed prior evil deeds—than to kill someone who becomes more than a name on a file. It’s a rookie mistake. I’m surprised Luke fell for it.

  The Academy does the best they can to train our humanity out of us.

  “In the moment I hesitated, he talked to me. He knew who I was. Not my name, of course, but he knew who sent me.”

  “That’s impossible.” We don’t exist. “What did he say? Exactly.”

  “He didn’t call them the Academy. He called them Ares.”

  “Ares?”

  “Greek god of war.”

  My knowledge of mythology is a few steps below my history knowledge.

  “Ever since I heard that name, I started investigating. I think Ares is the organization behind the Academy, pulling the strings.”

  For a moment I can’t speak, the words trapped in my throat. A secret organization behind the Academy? It had occurred to me that there was likely some infrastructure in place, some authority beyond the Director. But what purpose do they serve? And how has word of their existence gotten out? And why am I learning about this from Luke?

  “I think he was one of us,” Luke adds. “I think he was an asset.”

  No way.

  “What did he say about this organization?”

  “That they’d been lying to us all along. That we’re basically mercenaries, our missions farmed out to the highest bidder. That all the bullshit they’ve told us about writing wrongs and dispensing justice is crap. That we’re killers. Killing the innocent and guilty alike for their agenda.”

  Anger bleeds through his words. Luke was never the type to be happy as a pawn, and his disgust is even clearer now that he’s older and had a taste of life out on his own.

  I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I’ve had my doubts about the Academy. It’s why I go to the church in Knightsbridge; it’s that voice that lingers in the back of my mind. This isn’t a good life, but it’s the only one I have. The only one I’ve ever known. I can look myself in the mirror everyday because despite the things I’ve done, I’ve always thought I was doing good—acting for a cause greater than myself.

  What if I was wrong?

  “Did you kill him?” I ask.

  “No. I wanted answers and I wasn’t going to kill him until he told me what I needed to hear.”

  “Did he?”

  “No.” Another dark look flashes across Luke’s face, and the pain there nearly steals the breath from my body. “He swallowed a pill and took his own life. It happened so fast—hell, it was so unexpected—I didn’t get a chance to stop him.”

  “Why wouldn’t he try to bargain with you? Why wouldn’t he want you to spare his life?”

  “I don’t know.” Luke leans forward, lacing his fingers together, his shoulders hunched. “I think he was more afraid of something else. Something worse than me. And maybe he thought this way he could keep his family safe.”

  “Have you checked on them?”

  “They’re gone. All of them. Like they never existed.” He sighs, meeting my gaze. “I’m not lying to you.”

  It’s not that I don’t believe him. Not exactly. But if he’s right, everything I’ve believed about my life up until this point is a lie. I trusted them with the most important thing I have; I gave up everything to keep my sister safe. And now with a few words, Luke has shattered the only security we’ve ever known.

  “What information did you find on Ares?”

  “Hardly anything, which tells me enough. I started trolling the Internet—anonymously, of course—for anyone who’d heard of them. I got a few hits from assets all over the world. They said they’d heard of Ares, but no one was willing to talk beyond that.”

  “That’s not proof. For all you know, Ares is a completely separate entity from the Academy. You don’t know that they’re even connected. What you’re doing right now is enough to get you killed. And for what? You could be wrong about all of this.”

  “I’m not wrong. You know I’m not. Haven’t you felt it?”

  “We kill people, Luke, so whatever the reason, yeah I pretty much figured that wasn’t standard behavior. We’re not normal. We’re pawns to them; I’ve always known that. I’m not stupid.”

  “I never said you were.” The look in his eyes changes to something speculative that sends a wave of fear through me. “Is that why you changed your name? Because you aren’t a person anymore?”

  I freeze, whatever compassion I had for him quickly evaporating. He always was a calculating boy. Now he’s a dangerous man.

  “I don’t want to talk about my name,” I bite out.

  His voice is silk, curling through my insides, leaving a shudder in its wake.

  “Why not, Alexandra?”

  ###

  I had a different life once. I may only remember pieces, but I remember enough. I remember Sunday mornings with animal-shaped pancakes. I remember lying in bed with my sister, telling stories and making funny faces with a flashlight. Pieces—stray images that hit me at random times. Sometimes it’s as though those pieces belong to someone else, as if I am watching a movie of my own life. I suppose in some ways they do. I can never be Alexandra again. Because I also remember other things—

  D
arkness. Pain. Fear.

  I was already broken before I came to the Academy. I just don’t remember it. Correction—I don’t remember most of it.

  Everyone knows better than to call me that. Even my sister has taken to calling me X. Though to be fair, she was too young to remember me as anything else. As bad as my life may be as X, life as Alexandra, what I remember of it, at least—was far worse.

  “How do you know that name?”

  He just stares at me.

  My heart pounds, anger building. “Did you look at my file? Is that what this is about? You trying to take me down?”

  I was such an idiot for letting my guard down with him. For helping him. He’s used my two biggest weaknesses against me—my past and my sister. I only hope he doesn’t realize my third weakness.

  I stand, fury coursing through my body. I grab my bag and Luke tugs on my elbow, pulling me down against him, my hip brushing against his.

  “Let me go.”

  “Not yet.” It’s as if he’s immune to the rage radiating off of me, his voice perfectly calm. “You still don’t remember, do you?”

  “Leave it alone.” I struggle, trying to pull my arm away from him. He doesn’t even budge. He’s like a rock—hard, unmovable.

  “You’re scared.” This time there’s no taunt, no challenge, just an almost gentle curiosity that takes me back.

  “I’m not the one babbling about conspiracy theories,” I snap.

  “It’s not a conspiracy theory.”

  “Prove it.”

  “I’m trying to. That’s why I came back. If there really is something going on at the Academy, if information on this Ares organization exists, the best place for me to find it is inside the school. It’ll give me a chance to get a look at the Director’s files. I came back because I’m sick of living my life with a noose around my neck. I need answers, and if they won’t give them to me, I’m going to take them.”

  This isn’t just risky—it’s suicide.

  “You’re using this assignment to get dirt on the Academy. I was just a way to get close to the Director.”

  He doesn’t even bother looking guilty. “You owe me.”