“I figured it out,” he said, between breaths. “I didn’t forget.”
Rylee failed to hide the relief his words brought, a smile forming on her lips. She stepped out of the doorway, wordlessly inviting him inside.
As he stepped inside, he immediately held one finger up to his lips. “We can’t…” he said, still panting as his eyes searched her room. “We can’t talk here.”
His face was so serious, not at all what she expected him to be like when they were finally together again outside of the gates. She felt her smile faltering. He hardly even looked at her—what was he looking for?
She grimaced when his eyes fell on the dresser. The pills were still emptied beside the unopened bottle. She flushed and hesitated as he picked up the bottle and read the label. She could see the fear forming in his expression.
“I didn’t,” Rylee managed to say.
He closed his eyes, his entire body seeming to relax as he finally started to catch his breath. “I was…” he said. “Afraid I wouldn’t get here in time.”
She watched as he carefully scooped the pills back into the container. She hadn’t thought about it, not until she’d seen the relief come over him. Now, she knew what moment had been shared with him, what he’d seen inside of her.
Jonathan placed the pills in the trash, pausing afterward, seeming unsure of what came next. Finally, he spoke: “You aren’t alone.”
There was no point in a strong face. There was nothing she could hide. More importantly, nothing she’d felt in the last day really made sense to her anymore. She believed him—she didn’t feel alone. A moment passed, the silence expanding such that when she swallowed, the sound felt louder than it could have possibly been.
“Jonathan, why can’t I rem—”
He closed the distance between them quickly, bring his finger to his lips again. Leaning in close, he whispered in her ear. “Not here. We need to get your things. I need to move you.”
Rylee tilted her head, blinking at him in surprise. She wondered if she should put up some resistance, even though she knew she wanted to go wherever he took her. He had an intensity in his eyes that left no doubt that he had good reason. That intensity lit a spark of excitement in her. She felt… intrigued. She actually wanted to know what came next. Something she hadn’t felt in longer than she could remember.
She raised two fingers to her forehead, and one of her eyebrows, in a playful salute. “Yes, sir,” she joked.
Jonathan, oddly, seemed to flinch at the gesture.
Leah stood beside Olivia and a man who had been introduced to her as Agent Rivers.
She was aching for information, but only allowed her face to show a businesslike interest. They had something—The Cell didn’t bring Leah in unscheduled unless she needed to be brought up to speed on something immediately. They stood in front of two monitors: one showed Rylee Silva’s motel room; the other, Leah’s living room.
“Watch the time stamps,” Agent Rivers said, pointing to the clock reading in the corner of each monitor.
Leah watched her and Jonathan, together in her living room. She had to compartmentalize a few emotions, seeing herself standing at the open door, alone, as Jonathan walked away from her.
“Here,” Rivers said, rewinding a bit and pausing the footage.
On the monitor, Jonathan had crumpled against the wall, falling into the strange trance he’d been in before he’d left without explanation
“Leah, we need to know—is there anything happening here that the camera isn’t seeing?” Olivia asked. “Do you have any idea what caused him to behave as such?”
“No,” Leah replied. “It was completely unanticipated.”
“Good, we don’t want to jump to conclusions,” Olivia said. “Rivers, show her the other feed.”
On the second monitor, she saw Rylee sitting in a chair, staring distantly into a prescription bottle.
For a moment, Leah feared she was about to witness Rylee overdosing. The secondary protocol—Leah’s protocol—required The Cell never interact with the subjects unless approval came from a higher up. The protocol was designed to keep any member from making a snap decision and interceding.
Suddenly, Rylee jolted. She looked about the room, shock turning to a growing sense of scared confusion and anger. Yet, nothing had occurred inside the room to explain the woman’s sudden shift in behavior.
“Look at the time,” Rivers said.
They didn’t match, not perfectly. There was a minute and a half delay between Rylee’s unexplained behavior and Jonathan’s. Leah frowned curiously at the screen. “They both reacted to something. Sensed something,” Leah said.
“It would appear,” Olivia said. “Unfortunately, we’ve yet to come up with any theory as to what. If they are, in fact, both reacting to the same stimulus, why was Mr. Tibbs’ physical response so much more intense?”
Leah shook her head, her mind already grappling with the questions.
“We’ve checked the news networks. There have been no noteworthy events reported,” Rivers said. “The teams watching the other subjects didn’t report any similar behavior. What is interesting is that no other subjects are anywhere near as close to one another in physical proximity.”
Leah nodded. “I need print-outs. Detailed files with everything we have on Rylee Silva,” she said.
“I’ve prepared a full report, and intended to give it to you at the next scheduled meeti—”
“Ma’am!” One of the analysts interrupted them, his voice clearly excited. “He’s there. Jonathan Tibbs—he just arrived at her motel room.”
Olivia, Rivers, and Leah were quick to join the analyst at his monitor.
Leah watched Jonathan, panting, desperately trying to catch his breath. Whatever The Mark did to The Cell’s audio devices, the distortion was not in affect yet in Rylee’s motel room, and the analyst pulled his headphone jack to let the audio come though over the speakers.
“I figured it out,” Jonathan said to Rylee. “I didn’t forget.”
Leah’s eyes narrowed on the video feed as she began to get a hunch. “He knew,” she said. “He knew her life was in danger.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
SATURDAY | OCTOBER 8, 2005 | 10:45 PM | SEATTLE
JONATHAN GOT OFF his bike and pulled the garage door down behind them. He started removing his gear, while Rylee did the same behind him. Setting his helmet down on the cupboard beneath the garage’s one window, he saw that the lights in Leah’s house were now all off. She must have gone to sleep after he’d left her.
He’d hoped to speak to her, make some attempt at explaining himself before the night was over. Sadly, he had to wonder if it wasn’t for the best that he had missed the chance. What would he say? There was no excuse in the world to explain Rylee’s presence. He’d convinced her he’d never met the woman. For that matter, what was he going to tell Collin?
“So,” Rylee said from behind him. “Am I allowed to speak now?”
Jonathan had been staring out the window at Leah’s darkened house, unintentionally ignoring Rylee as she stood behind him, waiting. “Sorry.” He nodded. “We can talk, but we have to be vague.”
“Why did you bring me here?” she asked.
“It’s the only place I know with any protection from eavesdropping,” he said.
A moment of pause followed his statement.
“Can you try and be a little less vague? Because I’m not following,” Rylee said.
He turned to look at her. “What has our mutual acquaintance told you?”
Her face paled at mention of the alien. “As little as possible,” she replied. “He never said anything about where I should or shouldn’t speak. Well, unless ‘never speak of this to anyone’ counts.”
Sounds about right, Jonathan thought. “He must have known you weren’t under surveillance,” he said. “Doesn’t matter. The moment you showed up here, they became aware of you. If you left your motel room at all today, they likely used the opportunity to insta
ll bugs in your room.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What are you on about?”
Jonathan pondered the woman in front of him. Obviously, Heyer hadn’t wanted Jonathan knowing about her. There was no way that Mr. Clean didn’t know exactly who and what she was when he had brought her up during their conversation that morning—which meant the computer had been trying to keep him in the dark. The question was what Heyer or the A.I. would do now that he knew? He had to think that, given the state of mind Jonathan had known Rylee was in, he’d done the right thing in keeping her close.
“Rylee….” He trailed off and sighed. He realized he had no idea what he should or shouldn’t say. After months of being angry at the alien for keeping him in the dark, he loathed himself for guarding his own words. “Does he know you are here?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t really care,” she said. “I didn’t ask for his permission.”
Jonathan was given pause by the tone of her answer. Rylee’s relationship with the alien was clearly not ideal. “I’m asking because if he didn’t know your location, he couldn’t protect you,” Jonathan said. “They heard every word you’ve said.”
“Jonathan,” Rylee said, and he could tell she was getting irritated. “Who is ‘they?’”
He studied her for a moment. He was worrying about everything he said, not knowing if Heyer had kept this information from her for good reason. Still, he had to do what he thought was best. Circumstances were changing and he had no idea what would happen if he waited for the alien to show up and advise him.
“He calls them The Cell. They are connected with the U.S. government, unofficially, or at least it appears that way. I don’t know much, but I’ve seen some of what they’re capable of,” Jonathan said. “Truth is that they haven’t been a problem for a while, but that was because there wasn’t anything for them to see or hear. No one I could have talked to.”
“This Cell,” Rylee said curiously. “How did they know about you?”
“They seem to investigate anyone he has contact with. I’ve been under surveillance since the night I met him. Circumstances made our first meeting—” Jonathan paused. “Difficult to miss.”
He let this sink in for a moment, as he could see from her expression that she needed time to process it. In the meantime, Jonathan tried to think of what his next move should be. He rubbed his forehead as he started feeling the strain of juggling all the things he didn’t yet have a plan for. At least at this hour, he might not have to explain his houseguest to his roommates until tomorrow. He had to work early in the morning. That gave him a sleepless night and half a day to think of what to say to them. Given he’d already denied knowing Rylee to Collin, he figured he didn’t have a choice but to blatantly contradict himself—unless he pretended he’d lied in the first place.
So, I’ll lie, saying I lied when I was actually telling the truth, in order to undo telling the truth, so I can tell a lie that I haven’t actually come up with yet. He pinched his eyes shut. I’m sure nothing can go wrong with that plan.
“What do they want?” Rylee asked finally, disrupting his concerned thoughts.
“I only have theories,” Jonathan said. “Not tonight, though. I have to work tomorrow, and I’ve got a lot to think about.”
She looked at him as if he were joking. “That’s it? You brought me all the way here and now you want me to come back later?”
“Later,” Jonathan said. “No, you’re staying here.”
She looked surprised. Her face seemed to soften as though she were pleased, but a moment later, she hesitated, and her face hardened suspiciously. “You expect that I’m going to stay here because you order me to?” she asked.
Jonathan was immediately confused. Her tone seemed duplicitous—he couldn’t tell if she was deadly serious or seriously playing. He let out a long breath as he frowned at her. “No,” Jonathan said. “I’m not ordering you, I am asking you.”
“Didn’t feel that way,” she said.
Jonathan’s shoulders slumped. He wanted to have a straight conversation but understood that he couldn’t expect to get one if he was going to be so secretive, himself. “If you don’t stay, I’ll worry about you. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow, but tonight, this is the only safe place I can offer you. Anywhere else, you have to watch what you say. You won’t be able to trust anyone who tries to interact with you. Even here, you can’t talk about this with anyone. My roommates don’t know—all I can do to protect them is make sure that they never find out.”
She pondered him, and her suspicion wavered but didn’t disappear. “What is so special about here?”
“Our acquaintance blocks any audio signals around the house. Still, I don’t think he ever planned for two of us to be in the same place at once like this. At least not…” He stopped again.
“At least not what?” she asked.
He looked at her and she didn’t flinch as she waited for him to answer. He put his head down, placed his fingers on his forehead.
Talking to his roommates, who remained completely in the dark to his real situation, had always been challenging enough. Talking to someone who knew the reality, while still trying to keep secrets, was mental gymnastics. He knew that if he tried to hide anything from her, whatever suspicions she seemed to have suddenly manifested would only grow stronger.
So, he decided, he was done. He would just be straight about why he was hesitating.
“Rylee, he only tells me what I need to know. I don’t know if he wants you to be aware of the things he has told me. Still, it’s safe to assume that if he did, you already would. I don’t want to keep things from you. I’ve wanted nothing more than someone I could talk to. But I can’t ignore his wishes. So, while part of me wants to ask you about everything the man’s ever said to you, another part of me is afraid of the danger it could put us in.”
She studied him for a minute, her eyes narrowed in indecision. “I don’t know if I’ve ever been so convincingly told the truth about why I wasn’t being told the truth,” she said.
Jonathan smiled. “Please, will you stay?”
Rylee tilted her head and drew one shoulder into a half shrug. “I wasn’t really ever going to leave, Tibbs. I’m glad you’re asking, though. If it had been an order, I don’t think I would have believed it came from you.” Her eyes fell to the floor for a moment, and he could see she was troubled. “You call him a man—did it a few times, actually—and you don’t ever sound like you’re saying it ironically. You talk about him… differently than I would.” Rylee bit her lip and seemed to carefully consider her words before replying. “You sound… almost like… you’re protecting him.”
He heard her swallow.
“It is… troubling… to me that you talk about him as though you see… ” Rylee hesitated. “Like I’m missing something. You trust him?” she asked, her face still disturbed at the notion. “You think he is….” She grappled to find the right word, and once she had it, didn’t seem to want to say it. “Good?”
Jonathan ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know that ‘good’ is the word. He wouldn’t use it,” he said. “He is doing the best he can with what he has to work with. Trying to live with the decisions he has to make. I would never want to be in his position.”
She listened, but only seemed more troubled, hardly convinced. “I do not trust him, Jonathan.” She paused. “He’s always felt … evil … to me.” Rylee looked away. “But I know you aren’t evil. I think it’s the only thing I know for sure. So, I’m going to trust you.”
Seeing that she meant it, Jonathan suddenly felt the burden of her words. Too conflicted to trust herself, Rylee was putting her trust in him. It was too much for a person she hardly knew. Though, that didn’t feel true to him as he looked at her. She had seen inside his head as he had seen into hers. There were such terrible things in his mind—she must know what he was holding at bay beneath the surface. Yet, whatever Rylee had seen within him, she didn’t seem afraid of it.
Jonathan had once told Heyer that he’d given the man his faith. Not long after, that faith had been put to the test. The alien must have felt as he did now: scared to guide someone who might close their eyes and accept that he would choose the right path for them.
And Heyer was responsible for an entire world, Jonathan thought. Everyone, whether they knew it or not, had placed their trust on the man’s shoulders.
At a loss for how to respond, Jonathan remembered what the alien had said to him. “We’ll trust each other,” he said.
There was a lull as neither knew what should follow. Jonathan’s other concerns resurfaced.
“Let’s get some sleep. If anyone is still awake, follow my lead,” he said, failing to hide his uncertainty.
Rylee smiled at him, as though she knew he overestimated the obstacle. “Don’t be so serious,” she said. “How much explanation do roommates need anyway?”
“Unfortunately,” Jonathan said, “I swore to Collin that I’d never met you before. I think I was a bit too convincing, seeing as how it had been the truth at the time. I’m going to have to give him some explanation.”
Rylee shook her head and smiled at him, seeming to know something he did not. “I have a feeling he’ll not need much convincing,” she said, turning toward the stairs.
“Wait, one other thing,” he said. “The baton in your jacket. I know you wouldn’t leave it laying around, but it’s still best not to take chances. You’ll want to hide it.” He pulled open the cupboard, removing the facade.
She hesitated only a moment before she nodded and pulled the weapon free. “Not a baton,” she said. “He used my rattan as a template.”
“Rattan,” Jonathan said, trying the word out as she handed the weapon to him. “Never heard the term. Is it Portuguese?”
She smiled as though she found him adorable, but didn’t explain her amusement.
He sighed. “I’ve asked this before, haven’t I?” Jonathan noticed that the weapon had an inscription, written in the same manner as Excali-Bar. “Themyscira,” he read aloud, figuring he butchered the pronunciation. “What does it mean?”
The Never Paradox (Chronicles Of Jonathan Tibbs Book 2) Page 15