The car slows to a stop. I stretch my legs as the surrogate takes my phone. I almost try to grab it back before I realize what she’s doing. Her nails tap the surface deftly to enter a ten-digit number. The car door opens. Handing me my phone, she pushes me outside and I flail my arms as I fall to land on both of my feet.
“Phoenix!”
“Phoenix!”
“Phoenix, did you kiss her?”
My heart is racing. I stare at my phone. Her number. I got Hazel Smith’s phone number. I’m not surprised, but actually getting it feels so much better than I thought it would. I laugh out loud. All the pressure of the night that was still inside me comes out again, making my cheeks flush and my breathing pick up. I’m excited as I stride with long steps across the carpet and smile to every last one of the photographers. I wave like a madman, and they eat it up. They click their cameras at lightning speed, and I twirl once for the crowd.
Goddammit, I’m going to win.
*
I push against the door to my suite. It won’t open, and I remember it’s barricaded. I try to press through it, leaning my whole body weight against the elaborately carved white door, but still it won’t budge. Just hours ago, a little hiccup like this could’ve sent me through the roof, but I’m not frustrated at all. I’m still riding the high of my first date. I knock twice, feeling looser than usual with a bit of success in my system.
“Who is it?” Tinder yells.
“It’s Flora,” I reply in a falsetto.
“Shut up, Phoenix,” he says. Furniture slides against the floor as he clears a path. Tinder opens the door a crack and sticks his head in between. In a rush of energy, I shove the door with both of my palms, and it swings open until it bangs against the wall. Tinder shuts it immediately, locks it, and starts to move the barricade back.
“Did you get it?” he asks, not meeting my eyes.
“Yeah,” I say. “Did you?”
“Not exactly,” he says.
“What do you mean, ‘not exactly’?” I ask.
Three more knocks tap against the door.
“Who is it?” Tinder yells.
“It’s Flora,” Elektra jokes.
She giggles, and I laugh out loud, a real raucous laugh. Tinder looks at me like he wants me to stop laughing, but I can’t help it. Tinder starts pulling the chairs away, and I unlock the door. Elektra swings it open with a single finger. She stands beside surrogate Wesley, and suddenly, I’m not laughing anymore. He’s smiling.
I know the whole thing with Star and him was a misunderstanding, but I size him up anyway. See the threat he might have been. We look each other in the eye, and I stare him down. At least he’s not taller than I am. He wears a light-pink collared shirt buttoned up to his neck. His neck is a little bit too long, and his torso is, too. There’s a lanky quality to him that makes him look just a smidge too nice. Guys like this don’t end up in the Underground—but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t fight him.
Elektra is smiling too, more innocently and sweetly than I have ever seen her. Her lips are paler than usual, just a very modest pink now. She rests her hands gently in the small of her back and looks up at him, batting her long black lashes.
“Here we are,” she says, biting her lower lip. “Would you like to see my room?”
“That would be wonderful,” surrogate Wesley answers politely.
Clearly, she’s getting a phone number.
Tinder sighs and shakes his head as they walk past us toward her room. We shut the door and push the furniture back. One yellow armchair at a time.
Star wasn’t interested in Wesley, I remind myself. She doesn’t think he has a “nice smile,” or a nice anything else. I’m just being paranoid. The farther away surrogate Wesley gets now, the more I settle back into my good mood. I exhale a long breath and let the tension melt off my shoulders.
Tinder and I are quiet during the high-pitched screeches of wooden legs sliding against tile. I still want to know how he did on his date, but I can’t ask him with all of this noise. When we’re finished, we stand and take a moment to appreciate our work. He’s panting slightly, and I wait for him to catch his breath.
“What were you saying?” I ask him. “You said, ‘Not exactly’?”
“The surrogate gave me the first three digits,” Tinder says in a low tone, sounding embarrassed. He lets his head droop. “It means I did kind of well, but she wasn’t sure I’d be a good fit for Flora.”
“That’s harsh,” I say. I reach out and grab Tinder’s bony shoulder to comfort him, but he shakes it off. We hear Elektra giggling all the way from her bedroom, and then the low voice of her surrogate.
“I’m gonna call it a night,” I tell Tinder. He nods, but something is wrong. I realize that he doesn’t want to go back to his room. It’s closer to Elektra’s, and he’ll probably hear them all night. “Hey, do you want to sleep in the extra room tonight? The one right next to mine? You’ll rest easier, I think.”
“That room is bad luck.” Tinder shakes his head firmly no.
“Well, how about mine then?” I ask. “We can switch for the night.”
He pauses. “Okay,” he agrees. “Thanks.”
“Get some sleep,” I say, pointing my finger at him. He smiles a little bit, and we part for the night. As I walk away, I think again about texting Hazel and decide to wait. The player version of me wouldn’t be eager to text her. The surrogate only started to like me when I was arguing with her. No, the real Hazel won’t fall for someone nice and considerate. I’ll ignore her for now. Tomorrow, I’ll bait my next trap.
I enter Tinder’s room and smile to myself. A row of open books lies on the blue carpet in front of his messy bed. He must have pulled them off the bookshelves along his wall. Funny, the only thing I thought when I saw those books was how fast they would burn. Elektra giggles in the room next door. I sigh and turn out the light, too tired to undress before falling into bed. My body relaxes on top of the deliciously soft comforter. The stress of the evening slowly melts off my shoulders. My phone buzzes with a new message. Half-asleep, I check it.
Elektra: surrogate is leaving soon, can u fix the barricade behind him?
Elektra: thanks cutie
I roll over and plan to respond. Sure, I can fix the barricade, Elektra. I close my eyes and focus for a moment on the pillow cradling my head. With every exhale, I sink deeper into the feathers, and before I can do anything else, I fall asleep. In my dreams, I hear my phone buzz twice once more.
18
Footsteps wake me. Without opening my eyes, I listen. The slow sounds approach from the hallway as someone walks heel-toe, heel-toe. I roll over half-asleep and try to figure out if it’s Elektra or if it’s Tinder.
I used to do something like this in Dark DC. At night, without light to see my parents, I’d identify them by sound. Burn moved with heavy, creaking steps. He never liked to be alone, so whenever he was, he muttered to himself. He’d mumble things he had to do, part of a song, or just nonsense to clog the silence. Aura moved with a slight shuffle. She dragged the balls of her feet when she walked. It used to bother me when I was younger because I always worried she was going to trip.
The footsteps outside now are too slow to be Elektra’s, but far too heavy to be Tinder’s. My eyes flutter open. The footsteps can’t belong to surrogate Wesley either. He wouldn’t be coming toward us. He would be leaving. Whoever’s walking toward me is a large person trying to make the least amount of noise possible. I gulp, and fear chills my spine. There’s a stranger in my suite. As quietly as possible, I turn over in my bed and reach for Magic between my mattress and nightstand. It’s gone.
But of course it’s not here. I’m in Tinder’s room.
I sit straight up, and my heart drums faster in a growing panic. I went to bed in far too good a mood last night, and I didn’t consider nighttime threats. Goddammit, I didn’t consider anything. I didn’t bring a weapon, and I didn’t fix the goddamn barricade. I wipe my face with one hand to wake up.<
br />
The footsteps outside draw steadily nearer. They’re getting louder as they approach. I bolt toward my door and slow down to twist the knob a hair’s width at a time. When it’s fully turned, I pull slowly and peer through the crack. Light shines distantly in the foyer, shrouding a lone man in shadow. His profile looks entirely dark. I can’t see a single feature—no eyes, no mouth, nothing—just blackness. The shape of a shotgun hangs from his hand, and I gasp. He jerks his head in my direction, and now I recognize the wide shoulders and thick arms. Blaze. Blaze is in my suite.
I slam the door. Lock it now. Squaring my shoulders against the base of my bed, I shove it toward the door as fast as I can. My whole body strains, heaving, until I hear the reassuring thud of wood hitting wood. A new barricade. I stand as the door start to rattle, and I sense my rapid-fire breaths coming even quicker now. A bullet sails suddenly through the door and headboard to shatter the window behind me. Instinctively, I drop to my knees. A shard of glass cuts me across the back.
Blaze peers through the round hole with one eye. I stare back at him for a moment and sense his determination. He is not about to give up. When he steps back, I jump up in a panic and leap onto the narrow ledge outside the broken window. The ledge continues for a short foot on either side of the window frame. I teeter on one of the sides, and my heart pounds so hard that I worry it might rock me off into the street.
Yellow headlights pass thirty-three floors below me. I try to steady myself. Breathe. I feel impossibly small staring at the hundreds of beaming towers, and no one in any of those windows is looking back at me. I’m invisible to them. Ignored. The way I’ve lived my whole life is now the way I’m going to die. I hear Blaze battering the door to splinters, and Star’s face flashes through my mind. Star. I pull out my phone and thumb to PROFILES. She needs to know how much I love her, that I am thinking of her now. Shakily, I update:
PHOENIX
Just now: I love you, Star. I am always and forever yours.
Mattress springs compress and release, and I can tell Blaze has made it into my room. I listen as he steps off my bed and stalks the rest of my room, flipping over a chair. It’s only a matter of time before he finds me. A lone tear runs down my cheek, and in the howling icy winds, it freezes to my face. Star, I miss you. Coming here was supposed to bring us together. I am so sorry, Starlight, all I wanted was you. All I ever wanted was you. It’s more clear than it’s ever been, I never really wanted anyone or anything else. Not even power. When I craved electricity, what I really desired was the ability to make you happy. So I could keep her safe. Keep her warm. Help her little brother.
“Star…” I whisper into the night.
Two gunshots startle me. I jolt violently in surprise and nearly fall off the ledge. Bending backward, I steady myself as Blaze cries out in agony. A thump hits the carpet floor. A second softer thump follows.
Silence settles. Awful waiting ensues. I’m helpless in the uncertainty, stuck waiting with pricked ears for some sign of what just happened. Slowly, carefully, I sidestep to look back inside. The lights are on now. Two DZs lie on the ground in widening dark stains, Blaze and another player who was going for Hazel. Elektra stands behind them in the hallway, her face stony. Tinder jogs to a stop next to her carrying Magic. When he sees the bodies, he gasps and turns away like he’s about to heave.
I look back at the unmoving DZs. They face each other, guns in hand, and it’s clear they shot one another to death. I wonder why the second DZ was here until the cold realization overwhelms me. I shiver as it runs through my mind, but there’s only one explanation that fits. They both came to my room to kill me.
The front door to our suite slams, and Tinder yelps. He might be crying—I can’t quite tell—and he looks deeply shaken. A crew of Easies in white bodysuits lumber toward us. They wear clear shields as masks over their faces. We step aside as they start to clean the carpet and lift the bodies onto stretchers. One member of the crew removes Blaze’s golden ring, then the other boy’s. He scans each ring with a pocket-size metal device. I suspect those rings had a role in summoning this crew in the first place.
“I told you to check the barricade,” Elektra rebukes.
“I fell asleep,” I say.
“What happened to the barricade?” Tinder asks, his voice cracking.
“Surrogate Wesley had to move it to leave,” Elektra says, pulling her phone out of the front pocket of her silk robe. After a moment, her eyes widen slightly and her lips part. I do a double take; her expression is subtle, but it’s an extremely unusual one for Elektra to wear. She’s anticipated almost everything since we got here, but now, she is surprised.
“What is it?” Tinder asks nervously.
Elektra raises her stare to glare at me. The edge of her jaw looks especially sharp. She holds the screen of her phone up for both of us to see my profile. It shows the update I made about Star. I check it on my own phone to delete it, but it already has 4,050 Adds. Regret seizes my chest as I read:
PHOENIX
5 mins ago: I love you, Star. I am always and forever yours.
See Earlier Adds.
USER 21099: OMG WHAT
USER 00821: Ya right
USER 72109: Attaboy Phoenix. Be true to you
“You know Star?” Tinder asks, confused.
“We’re both from Dark DC, of course I know her,” I say, thinking quickly. I clear my throat and try to look earnest. “Love her? I don’t know. Someone just tried to shoot me. I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
The cleaning crew files around us to leave. We three fall silent and, for the moment, I’m free from interrogation. I try to breathe. Tinder will believe anything, I tell myself, and Elektra doesn’t want to hurt me. We’re on each other’s team. They won’t try to get Star and me disqualified, they need me—but I’m not sure.
Looking over my shoulder, I see the crew has removed every sign of the murders except for two eerie stains in the rug. As the last crew member leaves, I turn slowly back to face Elektra and Tinder in uneasy silence. Elektra’s eyes fixate on me like two dark spotlights, severe and unblinking. Tinder just looks confused. He scratches his head, further messing up his hair still unkempt from sleep. I swallow painfully and find it even harder to breathe. My lungs feel an inch deep.
“You don’t know if you love her or not?” Tinder asks.
“No—I mean, I don’t love her,” I say.
“Are you sure?” Tinder asks.
“I’m positive.”
Tinder nods faintly like he believes my lie. The more he nods, the more convinced he appears to be. For the first time, I’m grateful he’s so goddamn naïve. I sigh with relief and look at him the way I would look at a brother. Thank you, Tinder. He pulls on the soft navy tie wrapped around the middle of his long robe, cinching it tight in a gesture that signals he has reached a conclusion. To him, I am telling the truth.
Elektra is different. She continues to glare at me with a stare so intense she might be looking right through me. Unlike Tinder, her hair is still perfectly coiffed and stick straight. As if she never went to bed at all, and she is as awake and alert as ever. My relief fades as we gaze at each other. Her harshness tells me that she doesn’t believe me, and I swallow hard from nervousness. Then, before I even see her reaching, she snatches my phone with lightning quickness out of my hand.
“Hey!” I cry.
She ignores me and types furiously on my phone. I try to grab the device back—twice—but each time she pulls it effortlessly out of reach. She doesn’t stop typing for one second. When she’s finished, she throws the phone back toward me, and I catch it spastically. A new update displays on screen.
PHOENIX
Just now: jealous yet, hazel?
Sweet release washes over me. So Elektra isn’t going to use this secret against me after all—at least, not yet. This update covers my tracks. Hell, it even makes me look good. I want to hug Elektra to thank her, but she isn’t wearing enough to get that close. Her pink robe is too thi
n and the front hangs open just a little too low.
“Now come with me, Phoenix,” Elektra commands.
“Sure, where to?” I ask.
“My room,” Elektra says. “You’re going to spend the rest of the night with me.”
“What?” I demand.
She waves her hand to shut me up. “If anyone else comes for you, you’ll need my help to fight them off,” she says, grabbing my arm with one hand and Magic from Tinder’s grasp with the other. She pulls me toward her room, leaving Tinder standing awkwardly by himself. This doesn’t feel right, but I can’t find a logical reason to resist. And she did just save my ass by typing that update. I gulp. It’s just one night, after all.
Her lavender room is neat as a pin. Everything is stacked or lined in perfect rows: books, tomorrow’s clothes, paper notes. Elektra shuts the door noiselessly and then sinks slowly into her bed. She beckons me to lie on the other side of the purple sheets. I sigh. I don’t want to be here. She slips under her covers and closes her eyes. I sit down reluctantly and decide that I’ll leave as soon as she falls asleep. Just like I would slip away from Star’s side without waking Mrs. Windsong or Wick. I won’t be able to stay here all night.
“If you try to leave,” she says, “I’ll wake up.”
I grimace.
“And then we’ll try sleeping again with my arms around you,” she says.
“Jesus, Elektra.”
It’s hot in here. I pull my sweatshirt over my head and throw it against the wall. It falls to lie crumpled on the floor, the only sign of human life in the whole room. Before Elektra can see my bare chest and get the wrong idea, I lie down on the bed as far away from her as I can. I’m so close to the edge that I almost fall off. Elektra breathes so softly that when I close my eyes, it sounds as if I’m completely alone.
“Should we barricade your door?” I whisper.
“Don’t worry,” she says sleepily.
Blackout (Darkness Trilogy) Page 15