by Ellery Kane
Next to me, Elana exhaled, and we exchanged thin smiles of relief about Millie. But my mind was a million other places. I couldn’t stop seeing the Paramount—whatever secrets it held—disappear behind a wall of flame. Uncomfortable, I shifted in my seat. The soldier flanking Judge Blacksher was watching me, his gaze unflinching, stalking me. It didn’t help that when Max and I arrived at the courtroom that morning, Quin’s jacket was hanging over the back of his chair, the seat next to him most definitely occupied. It seemed deliberate. Even the way Emma swept her hair back—its golden ends brushing against Quin’s shoulder—seemed rife with intention. I chided myself. What do you want from him, Lex?
Willing my eyes away from Quin and the soldier’s laser sight, I looked at Mr. Van Sant instead. “Mr. O’Malley, how long have you worked as a parole agent?”
As Mr. O’Malley leaned toward the microphone, I could see his cheeks were dotted with freckles to match his auburn hair. “Three years with long-term offenders, guys who have been incarcerated for over ten years. Before that, I worked five years with the short-timers.”
“I see. And Mr. McAllister was a long-term offender, correct?”
“That’s right. He served thirteen years.”
“I imagine after thirteen years, some men have difficulty readjusting to life on the outside. How would you describe Mr. McAllister’s adjustment on parole?”
“Pretty typical, I’d say. Most of the older guys, they’ve settled down a lot. They’re trying to do things right, you know? George was a little nervous at first. Like you said, it’s a big change. But he got a job right away, made some friends. He had a stable home life with his wife and his son. He was one of my easy cases.” Mr. O’Malley exchanged a grin with Quin’s father.
A stern look from Mr. Van Sant dampened Mr. O’Malley’s smile. “To your knowledge, was Mr. McAllister ever violent toward his wife, Shelly?”
“Not to my knowledge. He seemed like a pretty level-headed guy.” “Level-headed,” Mr. Van Sant repeated, letting the words resonate before he steered his questions in another direction.
“Did you know about Mr. McAllister’s speaking engagements?”
“I did. Almost right away, he was invited to talk about his experiences with Crim-X. I guess he’s pretty famous … or infamous.” Mr. O’Malley chuckled to himself. “He was proud of his speeches. He wanted to try to give back, make some amends. I even attended a couple of the rallies.”
“Did you ever caution Mr. McAllister about what he was doing?”
“Yes. When George started talking to the New Resistance about EAMs, like Emovere and Eupho, I got a little concerned. In one of the speeches I heard, he mentioned Zenigenic, sort of insinuating they might be manufacturing those drugs for sale on the street. After that, he got a few threats. Nothing credible. Still, I told him, with a family, he might want to rethink it.” I inched forward in my seat, shocked. I wondered if Quin had known.
“Were you aware of any of the specific threats Mr. McAllister received?”
“One.” He paused, his eyes darting about the room. “I was with him, when he got it. It was after one of the rallies. This guy found a note taped on the door outside. It was a poem of sorts, pretty unnerving. I asked George to turn it over to me, and he did.”
Mr. Van Sant removed a plastic bag from his pocket and held it up for the jury. Inside was a small scrap of paper. He handed it to Mr. O’Malley. “Is this the paper Mr. McAllister gave to you?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. O’Malley, please tell the jury, what it says on this paper.”
“You murdered your wife and you got life. You got out, but couldn’t shut your mouth. We’re watching you. Shelly too. Stop it now 243. Or we’ll make you wish you were never free.”
Elana took in a sharp breath, clutching her hands together in her lap. Max and I sat dumbfounded. The jurors shared our expression, most of them still staring at Mr. O’Malley.
“No further questions, Your Honor.”
Dream Killer’s heels clicked in the silence. “Good morning, Mr. O’Malley,” she began, just as my cell phone buzzed in my pocket. “I have to go to the bathroom,” I whispered to Elana, scooting past her into the aisle. I felt the soldier’s eyes on me, still. But, it was 9:05 a.m.—time to go.
CHAPTER EIGHTY - FIVE
DÉJÀ VU
OUTSIDE, IT WAS GRAY—a thick, dark cloud blocking the sun—and bitterly cold. Most of the protestors wore coats, their breath visible, emerging in forceful puffs as they chanted. As in the courtroom, the steps were thick with military personnel, guarding the crowd with distrust. I hurried past them across the street, not looking up until I was standing at the edge of Lake Merritt, the water reflecting my face back to me. Once bordered by restaurants and shops, the lakefront was deserted and littered with debris. From inside a nearby garbage can, I pulled out my backpack, shaking it off in the grass. I had hidden it there that morning, after sending Max to the courthouse ahead of me. There was only one thing inside. I probably wouldn’t need it, but with what happened to Grimley, I preferred to be prepared.
9:15 a.m. Dr. Donnelly was late. I pulled my jacket tighter around me, the gun shifting uncomfortably against my back. I could hear the courthouse crowd from here—“Free Inmate 243, victim of con-spir-acy!” After Mr. O’Malley’s testimony, their voices sounded different, less foreign somehow, more like my own.
9:17 a.m. I watched a gull land on the dilapidated pier in front of me. Considering me with one black, unblinking eye, he glided into the water and floated by me. I was alone again.
9:20 a.m. I sat down in the grass, plucking it blade by blade. A discarded plastic bottle bobbed in the water. Maybe he wasn’t coming.
9:21 a.m. “Can you spare some change?” A homeless woman wandered toward me, her gnarled hand extended. Her fingernails were long and caked with dirt. “I’m sorry,” I offered, turning her away. She lay down a few feet from me. For some reason, I felt relieved she stayed close.
9:23 a.m. I stood up, brushing off my jeans. Removing the gun from my waistband, I reached for my backpack, discarded on the ground. I couldn’t wait any longer.
“Prompt as always, Ms. Knightley.”
“Augustus,” I pronounced, with equal parts dread and disgust. I pointed the gun at him.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Were you expecting someone else?” He aimed his back at me.
“Where is Professor Donnelly?” I saw the homeless woman stir, blinking at us, as if doubting her own eyes. She struggled to her feet.
“Hard to say, really. In a better place, perhaps.”
“What was he going to tell me?” I demanded. “That Zenigenic is manufacturing Onyx? Selling it?”
The shrug of his shoulders, his doubtful expression—all contrived. “I guess you’ll never know.”
“Augustus, I don’t want to shoot you.” That was a lie. I wanted to shoot him, to watch him writhe in the searing pain of surprise, knowing I had pulled the trigger. My undeniable desire to hurt him unnerved me, even more than the barrel of Augustus’ gun. I wondered if Emovere had changed me somehow, set free some other part of me capable of darkness.
He cackled, turning his head to the sky. “When you aim a weapon in my direction, Ms. Knightley, you most certainly should be prepared to use it. But we both know, you’re not going to shoot me.”
“Really?” I asked. “Don’t you know by now? I’m not the same girl you met in San Francisco.”
“Hey, what are you doing?” the homeless woman screeched, her shrill voice cut through the air like the scream of a bird.
“This girl is under arrest by order of the drug czar.” Augustus flashed an official-looking badge. “She’s coming with me.”
As the woman considered us with a grimace of confusion and fear, I squeezed the trigger. Augustus’ hand went to his shoulder, where a red spot of blood was growing. The woman yelled, waving her hands wildly. She began to run.
I fired once more. Then, I plunged into the lake. When I opened my eyes
, I could see Augustus’ face swirling through the ripples above me. He took one shot, the bullet coursing through the water near my leg. I swam down, down, down, under the pier. It was cold. So cold.
I pushed my head up, sucking in air and weedy water. Something slithered past my leg, and I gasped. I reached my feet for the bottom. There was none—only more cold. Have I been here before? I could barely hear Augustus, his words chopped, as the water rushed in my ears and stung my eyes. “Get … here … now … else…”
I grabbed onto the rotted wood. Hold on, I told myself, willing my fingers to comply. I held my face just above the murk. From here, Augustus was a shadow, and he wasn’t alone anymore.
“Please, I need more time.” Gunshots! I went under again, swallowing a gulp of icy water. I held my breath as long as I could—one thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three … one thousand eleven … one thousand twenty—then fought for the surface. But I went nowhere. My leg was stuck. Panic seized my lungs, and I opened my eyes into the cold. A garbage bag floated beside me like a jellyfish. Then the world started to go dark, tiny pinpricks of light starring the blackness. Wriggling my foot, I felt the leg of my pants tear, and I catapulted upward.
Air! Glorious air! I sucked it in with desperate gasps until the pinpricks vanished. There was only silence.
Ducking back from under the pier, I pulled myself toward the shore, carrying my body—now almost completely numb—like a bag of sand. Just ahead of me, a gull landed on the grass, watching my struggle with disinterest.
“Help!” I managed to yell, before I collapsed, sending him, wings outstretched, into the wide-open sky.
CHAPTER EIGHTY - SIX
I NEED YOU
“WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?” My father admonished me from Mr. Van Sant’s couch, where I spent the afternoon wrapped in a blanket with Artos sitting on my feet. It was a welcome change after my brief visit to the hospital. Official diagnosis—a mild case of hypothermia.
“You could’ve been killed!”
“But I wasn’t.”
“That’s not the point, and you know it.”
“You’re right, Dad. The point is Augustus killed Professor Donnelly. And somebody who wanted Onyx shot at Augustus.” Since mid-afternoon, SFTV reported the drug czar as missing, following his shootout with an unidentified suspect. But in the last hour—after the discovery of a trail of blood near the lake—Barbara Blake added feared dead to her description of Augustus’ fate.
“You’re sure no one saw you?”
“Positive,” I lied. I couldn’t be certain, but I didn’t want my dad to worry. I told the police I jumped into the lake to escape the gunfire and saw nothing.
String shook his head in amazement. “I can’t believe you stole my gun and didn’t say anything. You might have a little more con artist in you than I thought.” He winked at me, but it seemed forced, intended to hide his discomfort. I remembered the item—a photograph?—secreted inside his bag.
My father glanced at his cell phone. “Elana just texted me. They should be back any minute now.” More upsetting than dodging another near-death experience by Augustus and almost freezing to death in Lake Merritt, I missed nearly the entire day of the trial.
“What did I miss?” I demanded, as soon as Elana and Max burst through the door.
“Are you crazy?” Max asked, frowning at me. “Why didn’t you tell anybody where you were going? You could’ve been killed!”
“My dad’s already covered that.”
My father nodded. “It’s true. She’s as stubborn as her mother.” I knew he was only teasing, but it made me wonder. Maybe there was a piece of me—more than a sliver—that was reckless, impetuous. Like her. Maybe that wasn’t a bad thing.
Elana pushed Artos from the sofa, taking his place and wrapping her arms around me. “Quin wanted to leave to check on you,” she whispered. “But we told him you were okay. He’ll be here soon.”
“So what happened?” I repeated. “Did Millie testify?”
“Yeah,” Elana answered. “She had a cast on her arm, but she managed to survive Dream Killer.”
“Which is more than some can say,” Max added, laughing.
“Anything else?” I asked, as Mr. Van Sant opened the door, Edison and Quin behind him.
“You mean aside from the reports of gunfire by Lake Merritt?” Edison smirked at me, giving my leg a pat.
“I must say, Alexandra, you do have impeccable timing.” Mr. Van Sant grinned. “This little drama was exactly what we needed to advance our conspiracy theory.” My father’s mouth dropped opened, aghast. “I’m glad you’re okay, of course,” Mr. Van Sant added.
Edison shook his head. “Nice one, Dad.” He looked from me to my father. “Ignore my dad, please. He gets tunnel vision during a trial.”
“What about the Guardians—I mean, soldiers?” I corrected myself, unnerved by my own error.
Max shrugged. “Just a lot of staring and looking tough. So far, they seem pretty harmless.”
“Creepy, but harmless,” Elana amended, gesturing to her own forearm.
Quin cleared his throat, not looking at me. “Can I talk to Lex? Alone?”
No one answered him, but within a few moments, the room cleared. Even Mr. Van Sant snuck away without another word. Quin sat down alongside me. Finally, his eyes met mine. “You should’ve told me that you were meeting someone. I would’ve gone with you.”
I shook my head. “Quin, Emma was right.”
He laughed out loud. “Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked, putting his hand to my head. It was so warm.
“You can’t always be there to protect me, and you don’t have to.”
“I know.” He sounded wounded. “But I want to.” He ran his fingers through my hair, gently untangling the ends.
“I can take care of myself.”
“Of course you can.” Quin sighed. “Lex … about us … getting back together … you said you’d think about it.”
“I have.” I’ve thought of nothing else.
“And what did you think exactly?” His voice was playful, his smile flirtatious.
“I don’t know.” It was so hard to explain, especially to those brown eyes. “I want to be with you…”
“But … “ Quin prompted, already disappointed.
“All I know is I can’t be with someone who keeps things from me, and maybe that’s just a part of who you are.”
“I knew it.” He exhaled in frustration. “This is about Prophecy—who I am. That’s why I want to have—”
“It’s not about that, Quin.” I stopped him with my hand against his chest. Beneath it, I could feel the faraway beating of his heart. I formed the words in my mind, turning them over and over like a stone, before I said them aloud. They were cold and hard. “I don’t trust you.”
Quin winced. “I know I’ve been like a closed book. It’s not easy for me to let anybody in.”
“I’m not just anybody.”
Quin grazed my cheek with his thumb. “No, you’re most definitely not.”
“What about Emma?” I asked. It hurt to say her name to him. “Are you—have you? Were you with her?”
“I never even kissed Emma.”
“Really?” Half of me believed him. The other half saw Emma’s red lips leaving their mark on his.
“You don’t believe me?”
“I want to. So much.” I turned my face away from him.
Quin lay down next to me and buried his face in my neck. I felt everything hidden and heavy inside him collapse in my arms. His hot tears joined with mine. “I need you.”
“I know,” I answered.
CHAPTER EIGHTY - SEVEN
INNOCENT MAN
“BEFORE WE BEGIN our proceedings today, I’d like to take a moment of silence for our missing drug czar, Augustus Porter. We’re all hoping he’ll be found safely.” Judge Blacksher lowered his head, quelling the shuffling of chairs and bodies with his gesture. Only the soldiers—and me, of course—kept o
ur eyes lifted. Augustus would relish this, I thought to myself.
“Alright, Mr. Van Sant, please call your next witness.” The courtroom jolted back to life.
“Thank you, Your Honor. The defense calls George McAllister.” A few of the jurors gasped, others were wide-eyed. That morning, before the first strike of the gavel, Mr. Van Sant had turned to Quin. “Fortune favors the bold,” he’d hinted. And it certainly was a bold strategy, even for Nicholas Van Sant.
At the defense table, I watched Mr. McAllister take a deep breath, his shoulders rising and falling again. He rose to his feet—sneaking a glance back at Quin—and began walking. Next to me, Quin’s apprehension buzzed like a live wire.
Shelly’s mother huffed, as she stomped down the aisle. “Whatever he says, he’s a liar!” she yelled, before she slammed the door behind her, its impact reverberating in the dead silence. As I watched her go, I noticed Xander Steele standing at the back of the courtroom, leaning against the wall, as if he just wandered in. What was he doing here? After his public meltdown—food poisoning or not—his reappearance was unexpected.
Taking a seat in the witness stand, Mr. McAllister cleared his throat and took a sip of water. His eyes were tired, but he was freshly shaven, his thinning hair neatly combed. I thought of the last time we were all together—George, Shelly, Quin, and me. Even my dad was invited. Quin had arranged a dinner to celebrate his father’s fourth month out on parole.
Halfway through dinner, Quin stood. “Dad,” he began, “A little over a year ago, I never thought I’d be having dinner with you. I probably would’ve punched somebody if they’d even tried to tell me that I would sitting here tonight.” Quin met my eyes and smiled. “But I want to tell you how proud I am of you. You’re not the person I thought you were, not anymore. And…” Quin paused, then expelled the words all in one breath. “I love you.”