“Is that really the only reason you are here?” I wasn’t sure why I was pressing him. Maybe it was the exhaustion, or maybe it was the realization that we’d likely be forced apart in a few hours. The guilt was setting in.
“I care about you. Whether you like it or not.”
“I care about you too.” I did. I cared about him in a deep and intense way, but my heart belonged to Mason. It always would.
“Do you ever wonder what would have happened had we stuck to my plan?”
“To the peach orchard plan?” I closed my eyes and imagined the trees heavy with ripe fruit. The paths winding between them. The small white farmhouse off in the distance. It all looked pretty, yet I knew that life was never meant for me.
“Yes.”
I opened my eyes to find him watching me. Something in his expression made me think he could read my mind. He could see me imagining it all.
Those thoughts were ridiculous. Bolton was an ordinary man. He hadn’t been worked on by Central. If he had any sort of gifts they were naturally born. And if he could read minds he’d be somewhere very far from here. “There wouldn’t be Faith so I can’t think about that.”
He nodded. “I understand. I have edited her into my visions. Of course.”
“I hope you find happiness one day.” I did. Even if the selfish side of me was so glad to have him around. That side knew I needed him, and that wasn’t fair. Nothing about my relationship with him was fair.
“I’ve already found more happiness than I ever thought I would.”
I considered his words. They were moving yet horribly sad.
He continued. “Our friendship means more to me than you will ever know. And getting to help with Faith—she may not be my daughter, but that doesn’t change the fact that I love her as if she were.”
He wasn’t lying. I knew it. I knew it from the way he interacted with her. The way he cared for her. I’d taken it for granted. I’d taken so much about him for granted. “Thank you.”
He shrugged. “It comes naturally.”
“Do you ever wonder what happened to Ethan?” He was a friend—the one that I always thought would have been more, but he was also Bolton’s cousin. They had a relationship that went far beyond me.
“Yes, but then again I wondered what happened to make him leave in the first place.”
“He went looking for more. Is that really all that surprising?” I’d accepted Ethan’s decision right away even though it hurt. I imagined that being rejected always hurt, but being rejected for the mere possibility of someone else sounded far worse.
“When the alternative was to stay with you, yes.” Bolton yawned.
I knew he wasn’t bored with the conversation, he was tired. He had every reason to be. “In the end, he would have ended up in a worse spot.”
“Not necessarily, and even if he did, what would that matter? He’d have had the chance to be with you. To really truly be with you.”
“Quinn,” Maverick mumbled.
I looked over as he rolled back over. He was talking in his sleep. I smiled. I was glad Quinn had someone who cared about her so much.
“Think she’s ever going to give him a chance?” Bolton nodded in Maverick’s direction.
“It’s not as if we have time for that now.” We’d had the time before, but she hadn’t been ready, and even though on the outside she’d acted calm and settled, maybe she never had been.
“If you keep using that excuse there will never be time.” Bolton rubbed the stubble on his chin.
“My point exactly.”
“Eventually we will all have to start living.”
“But not now. Not in this mess.” I spread my hands up toward the ceiling.
“We’ll get out of this mess.” He put his foot against the wall. “I know we will.”
“We have to. I can’t let anything happen to Faith or Bailey.”
He nodded. “The girls always come first. We know that.”
“Does Maverick know that?” I lowered my voice to a whisper. “I know he’s dedicated… but he’d put Quinn first, wouldn’t he?”
Bolton shook his head. “He knows what Quinn would do if anything happened to either of the girls. He wouldn’t risk them.”
I nodded, but I couldn’t help wondering if Bolton was right. Maverick treated the girls well, but his intense feelings for Quinn seemed stronger than anything else. Love could do crazy things to a person.
“You do need to get some sleep.”
“So do you.” I’d caught the yawn even if he thought I’d missed it.
“Are you planning on holding Faith all day?”
“Of course.” She was too young and our location too dangerous to allow her to get down and explore.
“Then you need the sleep more.”
“If you say so.” I stretched out beside Faith. Maybe I should have argued more, but I would have had to have had the energy for that.
“I do.”
“Thanks, Bolton.” I closed my eyes.
“You already thanked me.”
“I’m thanking you again.”
“You’re welcome. And thank you.”
“What are you thanking me for?” I opened my eyes and turned toward him.
“For giving me more than I expected out of life.”
“You’ll be happy one day.”
“And so will you.”
I drifted off to sleep with his words echoing through my head.
Mason
I tried to make sense of what I was seeing. A lab in the middle of the desert? A lab clearly run by Central—or something very similar to it. This was a government-run facility. I had no doubts about that.
“Is this what you looked for?” The first boy asked. He needed a name. But was I the right one to name him? Would that be presumptuous of me? It wasn’t like me to question things so much, but I could no longer go headlong into anything anymore. I debated every move even when I knew that was dangerous. I could blame Kayla for that. She’d changed me in ways I was only now beginning to see.
“Uh, not exactly, but I’m glad we get to see it. Thank you.” I tried to push away my surprise and stay focused.
“This is crazy.” Addison examined a set of computers off to the side of the room. Like the rest of the equipment, they were stark white. “Do you think this is Central?”
“If it’s not Central it’s the government’s crazy cousin.” Benji hopped up to sit on a table—the kind of table that was likely used as a bed for a patient when running tests. “How close to the intelligence were you, Mason?”
“Not close. I was pushed out before I could get further along.” My thoughts went back to those last days in the System. To packing up and leaving. To my character being too strong for what they wanted me to do. I’d thought those were dark days, but they were all worth it since it ultimately brought me to Kayla. Now I needed to find my way back to her. How much time had passed? I could no longer count the days. They were all blurring together into a dark mass of time.
“Mason?” Benji snapped. “Are you listening?”
“Yes. Sorry.” I pushed those thoughts away. Now wasn’t the time to get sucked into the past.
“What does any of this mean? How does it help?” Addison watched several of the kids running around the room. They were playing some sort of game, but I couldn’t identify which one it was. There seemed to be several kids doing the chasing, and they only tagged certain others.
“I don’t know that it helps,” I admitted. “We were hoping to find a cure. This suggests something else entirely.” Had our entire mission been a waste? I never should have left Kayla.
“But it gives us some information.” Benji got off the table. “And all information is potentially useful.”
Benji’s optimism was surprisingly contagious. I snapped out of my thoughts and set to work exploring the lab. I recognized a lot of the machines, but not all of them. This was the time when we needed Denver. He knew how everything ran. How everything
connected. My gut was they were cloning in here, which meant the kids were what I’d originally thought they were. That didn’t make them any less of kids—they still deserved protection.
“The first thing we need to determine is whether they abandoned this lab, or merely left for a short while.” Thomas pressed on the screen of one of the computers. Nothing happened. He ran his hands over the back, along the sides. I assumed he was looking for some sort of switch or button.
“Or if they never left and are watching us.” That possibility kept circling my head. If this was a Central operation, they’d have eyes everywhere.
“What would they be watching for?” Addison looked all around us. “We’ve been sitting ducks for a while now.”
“Who knows.” I shrugged. “Does there have to be a reason for the madness?”
“Don’t lose it on us, Mason.” Thomas patted my shoulder. “Something here is triggering you. You can’t let it do that.”
“I’m here. I’m focused.” I would be. I had to be.
“Where do you come from?” The boy asked. So far the rest of the children hadn’t talked. I wondered if they were shy or if they couldn’t. Had something gone wrong in the cloning process?
Addison bent down to match his height. “From the other side of the wall.”
“The wall?” The boy frowned.
“There’s a big wall a few hours from here.”
“We’ve never left home.”
Home. This cropping of run-down buildings and a lab in the middle of the desert were the only home these kids had ever had. There was no way we could leave them here.
“Okay. All you need to know is we are here to help you,” Addison explained. “We want to make sure you are safe and cared for.”
“And what makes you think you are qualified to do that?” A male voice called from behind us.
We all spun around as Denver walked into the door. He was dressed head to toe in white with the tell-tale insignia of Central.
“Denver?” Addison gasped.
He frowned. “No. You have me confused with someone else.”
“That’s impossible.” Addison shook her head. “Denver, it’s me. Addison.” She put her hands to her chest. “Did you hit your head or… did someone do something to you?”
He shook his head. “Your name means nothing to me. Why are you here?”
“Denver?” Addison narrowed her eyes.
“Are you hard of hearing?” Denver asked.
“Oh.” Realization sunk in. “You’re not Denver, are you?”
“Were you listening to a word I said?” He rubbed his forehead.
The door opened again. “Addison?” Denver—dressed in the clothes he’d been wearing when he left us walked in.
“Wait.” Benji’s eyes widened as he took in the two identical looking men. “More clones?”
“Which one is the clone?” Benji looked between Denver and his exact duplicate.
“We both are,” Denver answered. His eyes locked on Addison, something unspoken was being communicated between the two.
“How many of you are there?” Thomas looked back and forth between them. “And are there more kids? What kind of numbers are we talking about?”
The Denver duplicate waved his hands. “No need to get worked up. Being a clone doesn’t make someone inherently dangerous. But there are many of us. There are many of all the top leadership.”
“That’s one way to solve the reproductive problem,” Thomas mumbled.
“Not a long-term one.” Denver crossed the room and took Addison’s hand in his. “Not a real one.”
Addison looked at their joined hands for a moment then ran straight into his chest. He appeared startled for a moment before he wrapped his arms around her.
“Where are the others you came over the wall with?” I didn’t want to know they were gone, but I had to. No matter how used to death we got, everyone needed to be counted.
Denver wrinkled his brow. “I sent the survivors back. We were ambushed. I would have come back myself, but I wasn’t sure if we’d ever have a chance to make it this far again. I needed to search for answers.”
“No one came back.” Addison lifted her head from Denver’s chest. She was barely talking. Not Addison like at all. At least not the new Addison. The free Addison. I’d only done what I’d thought I’d had to at the club, but I’d never get over the guilt.
Denver ran his fingers up and down her back in an absent-minded sort of way. As if it was a habit he wasn’t fully aware of. “Hopefully they found a new home then.”
“You know they’re dead.” Addison stepped away from Denver. “No use pretending.”
“No use deciding something if you don’t know all the answers.” Denver studied her face as if trying to figure out a puzzle. “I’ve seen horrible things, Addison. Ones I will not even burden you with, but that doesn’t mean all hope is lost.”
“What have you been doing here?” I asked the other clone before Addison and Denver could break into a fight over the best way to view the world.
“Making and raising clones. Hoping they might be the answer. So far no clones have been able to reproduce, but that might change.”
“You can’t repopulate through clones. Surely one day they will accept that.” Denver sighed. “It is getting tiresome explaining it over and over again.”
“If it’s the only choice we will…” Denver’s look-a-like scowled.
“Do you know anything about what’s making Central’s militia drop dead?” Addison changed the subject again. It was beginning to feel like we were part of a verbal pin-ball match—the conversation changing at any moment. I’d only played pin-ball once, on a refurbished machine someone had dug up, but the memory had stayed with me. Memories were so strange that way.
“Drop dead?” Denver rubbed his forehead.
“Yes. All at once,” Thomas explained. “The best way we’ve come up with to describe it is that it’s as though someone pushed a button that ended them all.”
“Very convenient.” Denver nodded.
“Too convenient,” I muttered.
“What about all those rumors we heard? Of the cure? Were they lies?” Addison’s face was pale. Any excitement at seeing Denver alive and well had been overshadowed with the rest of the news.
“There was one,” the other clone began.
“What happened?” There had to be more than what we were seeing.
“Central happened.” He shrugged.
“Wait, what?” Addison took a step back.
“They don’t want a cure. If everything goes back to normal…” Denver trailed off.
“There is no need for clones. There is no need for them.” It all made sense.
“Exactly.” Denver pointed at me. “Exactly. Exactly.”
“But who pressed the button so to speak? Who was powerful enough to take power from Central?”
“Whoever that is, it’s who we need to find.” Denver smiled. “Anyone up for the challenge?”
“Another challenge? Another journey? Another unknown destination?” Addison wrung her hands at her sides.
“Do you have any better ideas?” There was nothing condescending in Denver’s words. He was legitimately asking.
“No.” She shook her head. “And my guess is no one else does either.”
Quinn
His lips slowly moved up and down my neck, settling on a sensitive spot. He sucked in and then bit down gently. His hand slid up and down my body, while his other hand cradled my head. I pushed up against him, needing the feel of him against me. Needing the comfort and security only he could bring.
His lips left my neck as his hand slid between my legs. “I love you, Quinn.”
I gasped and woke up in a sweat. Maverick? Had I really just dreamt about Maverick in that way?
I felt around me. Cool sheets. I hadn’t gone to sleep under the sheets. Bailey. Where was Bailey? I sat up shivering. It wasn’t from the cold. It was from fear. Real and terrifying fea
r. I didn’t even remember leaving the room. They’d somehow drugged us—I was brought back to Central in my head. The room was dark, but I got up and stumbled around. I had to find Bailey.
I hit something hard. A wall. I fumbled around and a small sliver of light entered the room. I must have found some sort of window. I glanced around, my heart rate decreasing as I caught sight of Bailey and Faith curled up on a cot.
“Where are we?” Kayla rubbed the back of her head. She sat up. “What happened?”
“I don’t know where we are exactly.” I pushed the blind back more, letting in even more light. “But my head is killing me.”
“Mine too.” Kayla rubbed her head again. “They drugged us. I know it.”
“That would explain the headache. Hold this so I can check on the girls.”
“There has to be a way to open it more.” Kayla stood and joined me by the wall. She took the blind, tugged down and it sprung all the way up, mostly disappearing.
“Thanks.” I hurried over to where the girls slept. Their breathing was even. “Do you think they drugged the girls too?” I was terrified of the answer. I knew Bailey had been through worse at Central, but she was older now. She might remember this. My stomach sunk. She might remember all of this. The older she got, the harder it was to shield her from everything.
“Probably. I wouldn’t put anything past these people. Maverick and Bolton. Where are they?” Kayla looked around.
“I don’t know. I haven’t been up much longer than you have.” My focus had been on finding the girls.
“I can’t believe this happened…” Kayla trailed off.
“You mean you can’t believe Bolton let this happen.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to say anything.” And I understood. Whether we wanted to or not we’d all started relying on each other. The last I remembered Bolton had been keeping watch. That meant in one way or another he’d failed even if it wasn’t explicitly his fault.
The Corded Saga Page 42