Mr. Justin: “I don’t think the machine will fit through the doors.”
Man: “How the hell did they get it in there?”
Mr. Justin: “It’s quite simple, Orson. They built the medical ward around it.”
Summer’s voice cut through Jacey’s concentration. “His name is Orson!”
“Shush. You’ll make me lose the rest.”
Orson: “That’s going to slow us down.”
Mr. Justin: “I’ll think of something. Now, I need to get going. I’ve got to prepare my puppet to speak with Captain Wilcox. That bastard is pressing hard to post men here.”
Orson: “Don’t let that happen.”
Mr. Justin: “I won’t.”
Orson: “See you tomorrow.”
And that was it.
Jacey opened her eyes and discovered she was trembling.
Summer moved closer to her. “I’m not sure I understood all that. Who was Mr. Justin talking to?”
Jacey had no idea. But it didn’t matter. All that did was what the man had said. “We’ll move the little ones first, then bring the bus up for the rest.”
“We have to warn Mother Tyeesha and Humphrey,” Jacey said. “Mr. Justin is planning to steal the Scions. And it sounds like he and this man Orson have been planning it for a long time.”
“Why?”
“We’re valuable. You’re the Scion of a very powerful person in North America. We have to assume that the others must also have important, powerful Progenitors. Once Mr. Justin controls us, he can go to those individuals and demand . . . anything. And once he’s hidden us away, the Progenitors will have no choice but to give him whatever he wants.”
She clenched her fists, berating herself for not heeding her suspicions about the butler. She desperately needed to sleep, but her thoughts kept spinning in useless circles. “Orson said he’s arriving tomorrow and that he’s going to Children’s Villa first. We have to warn Mother Tyeesha. Maybe she knows where to hide the little ones. After that . . .”
She had no idea. Once the search for Summer started, even going to Mother Tyeesha’s was a huge risk. But maybe the search would work in their favor. Mr. Justin hadn’t known the senator was coming when he had his conversation with Orson. It did explain his insistence that they allow the transfer, though. He wanted the senator in and out before his boat arrived.
“Get some rest, Summer. We’ll figure out what to do next in the morning.”
Summer rustled on the tarp as she settled in. She lay much closer to Jacey than she had before.
Jacey took some satisfaction in the current situation. Mr. Justin had believed there was no way off campus for Jacey and Summer, so he hadn’t tried to restrain their movements. He hadn’t counted on Belle running off with Dr. Carlhagen. He hadn’t counted on the gate being open for Jacey and Summer to slip through.
“Mr. Justin must be worried,” Jacey said to herself.
“What?” Summer mumbled.
“Let’s try to sleep. I think we’re going to need it.”
22
A Cloak of Frozen Stillness
Belle rose early, not that she had slept much on the loveseat tucked along one wall of Mother Tyeesha’s tiny front room. The east-facing window in the little kitchen showed just the barest glimmer of blue horizon beyond the trees.
She crept to Vaughan’s room and peered in. He lay bare-chested among the twisted sheets, arms out to either side. Fear carried her in a rush to his bedside. With a rush of breath, she relaxed. It had been too dark to see clearly, and she’d thought for a moment he wasn’t breathing. She wrinkled her nose at the smell of sickness in the air.
She glanced at the window, thinking to open it and let in some fresh breeze, but the hurricane shutters were still in place. If they were like the ones at the Scion School, they locked from the outside.
Vaughan moaned and shifted his position but didn’t wake. His forehead burned to the touch. Belle wiped the clamminess from her hands and quietly retreated from the room.
Vaughan’s withdrawal from the pills was worsening.
Belle felt her way down the hall and to the kitchen. She went to the refrigerator, intent on pulling together some food to fuel her continued search for Summer. She stopped mid-step, startled by the tiny figure sitting at the kitchen table.
Mother Tyeesha held her hands folded in her lap, eyes closed. Belle thought the woman was asleep, but her eyes popped opened and locked on Belle. “Going back out to capture Summer.”
It wasn’t a question.
Belle opened the refrigerator and began assembling the fixings for a few sandwiches. “Do you have a container I can take water in?”
“Summer is your sister,” Mother Tyeesha said. “Maybe not by blood, but by any measure that means anything. You’ve grown up together. You’ve lived together. You’ve endured the same experiences.”
“Yes,” Belle said. “And should we both be overwritten?”
“You think that’s the only choice, don’t you?” Mother Tyeesha said. “That it’s her or you. You’ve always thought that way, Belle. That life is win or lose.”
“Yes, yes,” Belle said, opening a package of sliced meats. “Life is a zero-sum game. I’m quite familiar with the concept.”
She assembled a few sandwiches, barely paying attention to how much meat and cheese she mashed between slices of bread. As long as it sustained her in her search, it would do.
“Do you have a container or not?” she asked. “Preferably something with a cap.”
Mother Tyeesha pointed vaguely to one of the lower cabinets in the tiny kitchen. Belle swung open a door and found a plastic jug with a screw cap. She began filling it from the tap.
“I can accept that you disapprove of my plan,” Belle said over the hiss and gurgle of the filling jug. “But you haven’t offered an alternative.”
“Haven’t you considered the obvious one?” Mother Tyeesha asked. “How about you find Summer so that you can help her?”
Belle turned off the water and screwed on the lid. “I don’t want to help her.” She dug through the cabinets until she found plastic bags to stuff her sandwiches in.
“That boy in there is not Vaughan,” Mother Tyeesha said quietly.
“How could you possibly know? You haven’t seen him for nine years. None of us are the same as we were when we left here.”
“You’re the same, Belle. Exactly the same.” The words were so laden with disappointment that they hit Belle like a slap in the face.
She spun on the old woman. “You don’t have the right to judge me. It’s easy for you to give in to sentimentality and emotion, easy to let weakness guide your choices. But any time I do something out of emotion, it ends up a disaster. Reason is the only sane path to follow in this world, and reason demands hard choices. Reason demands that I survive.”
If Belle’s outburst had any effect on the woman, she hid it completely. Her face was a wrinkled mask of equanimity, and she met Belle’s cold, hard stare as if studying a curious shell she’d found on the beach.
“And so you survive,” Mother Tyeesha said. “What happens then? What do you do? What gives your life meaning, if not emotion? You’re in love with that boy,” she said, waving her arm toward the hallway. “Does reason guide you in defending him? Does reason blind you to the fact that he is not Vaughan, but is, in fact, entirely Dr. Carlhagen? Does reason reveal to you that he is using you to get what he wants? That he has no intention of leaving the island with you? That all he wants, aside from regaining control of the Scion School, is a bottle of painkillers, and that he will trade you, Summer, or even me, to get what he wants?”
Belle pulled a cloak of frozen stillness around herself. Forced the heat in her blood to cool. It was always about Vaughan. Everyone wanted Vaughan, and if they couldn’t have him, they painted him as some sort of monster.
She flung open the front door and left, carrying her sandwiches in one hand and the jug of water in the other. She drew in deep breaths of heavy, humid
air, trying to hold onto the ice in her mind. But the inferno inside raged, breaking through her will.
She climbed into the Jeep and fired up its engine, stomped the accelerator to make the engine roar. And as she drove away from the school, she gave vent to her anger by pounding a fist on the steering wheel and screaming.
After a moment, her fury passed, leaving behind a core of cold determination, the same thing she had clung to since she had come to the Scion School all those years ago.
Mother Tyeesha’s ploy was obvious. She was trying to plant a seed of doubt about Vaughan in Belle’s mind.
Belle knew that Dr. Carlhagen had attempted to overwrite Vaughan. She knew that at one point, the old man had been in control of Vaughan. She knew that Vaughan appeared to have regained some control. She knew that Dr. Carlhagen’s addiction was making it harder for Vaughan to stay in control.
And so, she had a question to answer. Could all of those kind things that Vaughan had said, the smiles that he had given to her and to Mother Tyeesha, the kiss he had granted her the day before, could all of those things have been fake? Was Dr. Carlhagen that good of an actor?
She didn’t think so.
The source of Vaughan’s worst behavior was the andleprixen withdrawal. A double-edged sword for sure, but one she needed if she was going to cut him free of his addiction.
If she had Summer, she’d be in the power position in any bargaining. She could get an endless supply of the drug, then. The problem was that there was no guarantee she could find Summer. And even if she could, was there enough time? Vaughan worsened by the minute.
If he dies . . .
Belle wouldn’t let herself finish the thought. The only things she needed to focus on were finding Summer and getting some pills for Vaughan.
23
You Mean the Jeep?
Pain flared across Humphrey’s scalp, and he let out a high-pitched shriek. His arms flailed, coming free of the blankets. His hands went to his head and found a fist there, grasping his hair. His fingers followed it to a thick arm and beat against it.
“Let me go!”
“Where is she?” Alice’s grating voice cut through Humphrey’s panic.
He blinked the sleep out of his eyes and looked up at the huge woman. An animalistic snarl contorted her face. Just behind her, the senator’s nurse Miss Dayspring wrung her hands. She glared at Humphrey, dark eyebrows forming a V of worry.
Mr. Justin’s voice floated from near the door. “I’m so sorry, Dr. Carlhagen, but these women would not listen to me. They just barged right in.”
Alice shook Humphrey’s head. “Where is she?”
It had been bound to happen. Alice had figured out Summer had run away.
“She’s . . . I think she’s . . . I don’t really know.”
“I’m right here.” The voice, soft and calm, startled Humphrey.
Alice released his hair, and he fell back onto the bed. Alice’s face had shifted to wide-eyed surprise. Just beyond her, Mr. Justin looked utterly shocked. Humphrey turned to find Senator Bentilius standing at the doorway of his bathroom, her red hair flattened on one side from sleep, a shockingly short robe draped over her shoulders and gaping to expose far more bosom than Humphrey wanted to see.
He sat up, pulling the covers up to his chin. “What? Wait, no. This isn’t what it looks like.”
“Oh, let them gape, Christof,” Senator Bentilius said as she approached the bed. Humphrey noticed then that the blankets on the other side of his bed were wrinkled, the pillow indented. He put a hand to his head and wondered how much wine he’d drunk. But no, he’d been very careful. The senator must have slipped into bed next to him in the night.
“Are you insane?” he asked the old woman.
Alice had backed up a few steps and was looking at the floor. “I’m sorry to have intruded, Madam Senator,” she said, full of contrition. “I know how you value your privacy.”
“She didn’t value mine,” Humphrey said, voice rising in pitch.
“Shall I prepare breakfast, Dr. Carlhagen?” Mr. Justin asked, emphasizing the name.
Humphrey quickly slipped back into his Dr. Carlhagen impression. He took a deep breath and put on an ingratiating smile. “If you would be so kind.”
“It shall be waiting in the dining room.” The butler departed.
Humphrey smoothed the blankets over his stomach. “Madame Senator, I really must protest. This isn’t seemly conduct for the Scion School.”
Senator Bentilius wavered were she stood, suddenly putting her hands on the bed to stay upright. Alice started forward, but the senator urged her away. She turned her most lascivious smile on Humphrey. “Oh hush. The Scions are all tucked in their dormitories. Who’s going to know? Besides,” she slipped under the covers and sidled up next to him, “I was cold.”
Humphrey cleared his throat and squirmed out of bed.
Senator Bentilius’s hungry expression disappeared in a flash and she put a hand to her face. “Perhaps I don’t feel well, after all.”
Alice was at her side in a second, hands going to the senator’s wrist to feel the pulse there.
Seizing on the senator’s momentary dizzy spell, Humphrey leaned across the bed and placed a hand on her forehead. “You see, all the wine and excitement is getting to you. This is not good for you in your condition.”
Senator Bentilius closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Do you have my medicine, Alice?”
“No, I left it in your room.”
“You should take her back there,” Humphrey said. “Make sure she takes her medicine and let her rest for a while longer.”
Despite the senator’s weak protests, Alice scooped her from the bed and carried her away. Miss Dayspring trailed after.
Humphrey slumped back onto his pillows. He didn’t feel at all rested, having spent the small hours of the morning rifling through all of Dr. Carlhagen’s papers. He’d found nothing of true interest. Nothing about the new Scion School he was building with Senator Bentilius.
“The senator is very fragile,” Alice said, pushing her way in. “We must get on with the transfer. Now if you’ll tell me where the senator’s Scion is, I’ll go fetch her.”
“She’ll be in Girls’ Hall now. I’ll summon her to the medical ward. Please move the senator down there.”
Alice glared at him, clearly not happy with him issuing an order. But since it was sensible, she gave a curt nod, spun, and stormed away.
Humphrey took this rare bit of privacy to pull one of Dr. Carlhagen’s white suits from the closet. He drew on the white trousers, cinching the belt to its tightest hole. Dr. Carlhagen had really gotten a bit big around the waist toward the end. Humphrey clicked his tongue, wondering if he’d share the same fate since he was genetically identical to the old man.
Once dressed, Humphrey went to Dr. Carlhagen’s office, closed the door, locked it, and summoned Vaughan. His old friend’s image materialized above the desk. In a few sentences, Humphrey summarized the situation: Alice demanding an immediate transfer. Summer, Jacey, Dr. Carlhagen, and Belle missing and presumed off-campus.
“I’m sorry you have to face this alone,” Vaughan said. “What are you going to do?”
“I was hoping you’d have some ideas.”
“She can’t transfer if she doesn’t have Summer. It seems to me all you need to do is wait. Let Alice search the campus and then she’ll move on to searching the island. The bigger concern is what might happen after that. I don’t have any information from the outside to know what the implications would be if something happened to the senator.”
Humphrey knuckled the table, and let out a grim sigh. “All right. I guess I’d better go down to the medical ward.”
Vaughan held up his hands. “Wait. I wanted to tell you that Mr. Justin went down to that door you found in the wine cellar last night. I think he was suspicious that you might have touched it when you went down there with the senator.”
Humphrey grunted and jabbed a thumb into his che
st. “I was the only thing that got touched down there.”
Vaughan let out a distracted laugh, and said, “That door puzzles me.”
With all his other worries, Humphrey had forgotten about the door. And he had no time to think about it now. “Just keep watching it. I’d better get down to the medical ward and continue this farce. The game is to see how long I can delay the truth coming out.” He straightened and gave himself a little shake. “And I guess I do have Plan B.”
“Oh really?” Vaughan said. “And what is it?”
“Never mind. You don’t want to know.”
“Humphrey—”
“Goodbye, Vaughan.”
Humphrey didn’t wait for Vaughan’s holovid to disappear before striding to the door and leaving. He checked down the corridor, stopping to listen to see if he could tell where Mr. Justin was, but he heard no sounds of activity nearby. With slow steps, he forced himself to the front door and started down the bougainvillea-lined pathway.
It had always seemed like a long walk before. This time it seemed too short. All he really wanted was to turn away from the medical ward, head toward one of the paths and just keep walking. Maybe go out to Isaacs’ Beach or Jacque’s Point. Anything to avoid the inevitable confrontation awaiting him in the medical ward.
He found Alice and Miss Dayspring in the main ward. The bodyguard stood like an iron statue in the middle of the room. The nurse sat on the edge of one of the cots next to Senator Bentilius.
“Please,” he said, motioning to the back of the room. “The transfer room is this way.
“Where is the Scion?” Alice demanded
“She isn’t here?” Humphrey asked, looking around as if she might be sitting in a corner somewhere. He turned his gaze to the senator. “She’s looking terribly unwell. I think perhaps we should delay. She had way too much wine last night, despite my protestations.”
“It’s not the wine,” Miss Dayspring said. “It’s the illness. She’s been having more and more of these episodes.”
Child of Lies Page 14