Except Priyanka shifted, turning so her back was fully to me. Even without the seat belt strapped across my chest, there was no way of reaching the phone without climbing over Roman.
“Shit,” I breathed out, turning my full attention back to the road. My hands gripped the wheel so tightly, I felt the old leather crack beneath my palms.
Priyanka and I had walked for hours, carrying Roman’s unconscious form between us. Wild grass turned to cornfields, which had led us to an abandoned farm and a junker truck left to be buried by a collapsing barn. All I’d had to do was use the last bit of power in the house’s generator to jump the engine.
The truck was an old model, with its best years in the rearview mirror and a broken fuel gauge, the latter of which added some unwelcome mystery about how much gas we actually had. Liam would have loved it, though. He’d call it a “classic beauty,” and name it after some old rock song.
Maybe…he could be my second call, after I let Chubs know where I was and that I was okay. If I still had the right number.
I rolled down the window’s hand crank, hoping some fresh summer night air might keep the fog of fatigue from creeping too deeply into my thoughts. We had to hit some kind of home or motel or even gas station eventually. The trick was just staying awake.
I hadn’t had anything to eat or drink in what felt like days. No rest outside of the drug-induced stupor they’d put us in. Maybe that’s why Priyanka hadn’t fought me to drive—she really thought it would only be minutes before I pulled off the road and tucked into sleep, too.
I glanced over at her again. The gun was in her lap, her hand resting on it. The phone I’d stolen from the soldier hadn’t had a signal at all—either there were no cell towers out here, or someone had figured out what had happened and immediately discontinued service to it. In the end, it didn’t matter. I’d probed what was left of its battery with my power as we’d climbed into the truck, but it had already died.
Awake, I thought. Just stay awake.
What my mind wanted was coffee. What I had was a radio.
The signal had started out dodgy, sputtering between songs and silence. It got stronger with each mile we gained, which made me hopeful that we were on the verge of finding civilization again. And even if we only got that one throwback station, it at least gave me something to do—Liam’s favorite trick to stay awake: singing.
I whispered the words to the REO Speedwagon song, but my head felt like it was a thousand pounds, and I couldn’t seem to grasp the melody.
“I’ve never heard this song before.”
The truck swerved into the other lane. My heart just about rocketed out of my chest, shredding itself against my rib cage. “Jesus!”
“Sorry!” he rasped out. “I should have—”
“No,” I interrupted, pressing a hand against my chest as I steered us back to the right lane. “It’s all right.” Adrenaline had dialed my nerves up to a hundred, and the way he was looking at me now, so concerned, filled me with this angry confusion. “You’re awake.”
Don’t be nice to me, I thought, forcing my gaze back onto the road. Don’t pretend.
“Where are we?” he asked, rubbing his forehead. He leaned forward, turning to get a better look at Priyanka, assessing her with those bright, worried eyes of his. She didn’t stir.
“No clue,” I said curtly, sitting up a little straighter. “I’m just driving until we find someplace that’ll let me make a phone call.”
“How long have I been out?” he asked, sounding like he might not want to know the answer.
“A few hours,” I said. “Long enough that I was starting to seriously doubt you’d ever wake up.”
He swore quietly. “Hours?”
“Hours. Priyanka explained about your migraines,” I told him. “How they’re triggered by stress. Is that true?”
“They hit me like a hammer and take me out, but it’s usually only for an hour at most.” Roman ran his scarred hand over his face again. “What else did Priyanka tell you?”
It sounded like he didn’t want to hear the answer. Of course. Maybe he’d be the easier one to drill for answers in the end.
“About your past with the Psion Ring,” I said, watching his face for his reaction. “How you were at the school for a ‘fresh start.’”
“The Psion Ring?” He leaned his head back against the seat, his mouth stretched into a tight grimace. I didn’t miss the glance he slid her way. “Then she told you too much.”
“Why?” I began, trying for playful. “Is it an I’d-tell-you-more-but-I’d-have-to-kill-you kind of operation?”
“Yes,” he said flatly. “The more you know, the more dangerous they become to you. There are…added risks to you since you work in the government.”
I ignored the cold prickle on the back of my neck, keeping that same joking tone. “Because they have spies in our ranks?”
“No, because you can report our involvement, and then we’d be taken in for questioning.”
I glanced at him, stunned. “I won’t do that.”
“Why wouldn’t you?” he asked, staring through the windshield. “It doesn’t matter what you’d want to do personally—it would be your duty. Your responsibility.”
I don’t know why that rankled me. “I’m capable of working for the government and doing a little bit of off-the-books help if I have to. If it’s true you want a fresh start and you left that life behind, then I have no reason to say anything.”
But that wasn’t exactly true, was it? The government had been searching for any leads on the Psion Ring for years. Knowing I had something potentially helpful would gnaw at me. Maybe I would feel like I had to say something.
That only mattered, though, if there was an ounce of truth to this story. And every interaction I’d had with the two of them pointed to it being a convenient cover, including Roman’s reluctance to say more now.
“I’m sorry,” he said in that quiet voice of his, the one that didn’t disturb the silence so much as give it depth. “God, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what else to say, other than thank you.”
“Don’t thank me,” I said, ignoring the pull of those eyes. Pain had its own gravity, and his words were heavy with it, threatening to pull me in. “I really didn’t do much.”
“You stayed with Priyanka,” he insisted. “You helped her.”
Helped would have implied I had a choice. But even if nothing else he said was true, those words, at least, felt genuine to me.
“I’m going to make it up to you,” he said, his low voice rumbling. “I won’t forget this, and I won’t ever let you down like that again.”
At that, the words blistering with sincerity, I finally looked. Roman was watching me intently, his face a kaleidoscope of barely restrained emotions.
“You couldn’t help it,” I said, feeling my skin heat up again. The way he looked at me was like…
Like nothing.
Like a liar.
I turned back to the road. “It’s fine. Really. Don’t make a big deal out of it.”
“It is a big deal,” he said quietly. “It’s my only deal. At least the only one that matters to me.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. I didn’t understand why I wanted to say something to that. In that moment I felt as soft as a petal, when all I’d ever wanted was to grow a few thorns.
“Priyanka and I…We…” Roman struggled to put the thought together.
“You only have each other,” I finished. “She told me that, too.”
He shook his head, running a rough hand back through his dark, thick hair.
“What? Is that not true?” I pressed.
“It’s true enough,” Roman said, rubbing at the back of his scarred hand. “I had…I lost my sister. I lost her, just like we’d lost our mother years before. As hard as I tried to take care of her, it all fell apart in the end. The man raising us had the heart of a snake, and I couldn’t save my sister from him. I couldn’t keep my family together.”
/> I tried to swallow whatever was lodged in my throat. “I’m sorry.”
“Even if it doesn’t make sense to you…when I say that what you did in helping Priyanka means everything to me, it’s the truth. It’s my absolute truth.”
“I understand,” I said before I could stop myself. “Probably better than you think.”
I hadn’t been able to keep my family together, either.
Maybe this was all a play, part of whatever their bigger plan was—get me on their side by working some quality emotional manipulation. Even as the thought crossed my mind, I wanted to brush it away. The only times I felt like they were being real were the ones where their control over the situation slipped and they spoke or acted from a place of deep feeling. These little glimpses of who they were beneath the deception, two kids who fought like hell for each other, made me think the endgame wasn’t to hurt or kill me. Or at least I hoped.
It was a good ten minutes before I realized Roman and I had been sitting in silence. I stole a look at him out of the corner of my eye, but he seemed as unbothered by quiet as I was.
For the first time in a long while, I didn’t feel like I had to say anything. There was no one to comfort or convince. There was no one to charm or encourage. I disappeared into myself as I drove on, trying to find my center. I could breathe. Be still.
What I hadn’t expected was how much Roman seemed to need it, too.
Some people feared silence. They did anything to fill it, talking about things that didn’t matter, asking questions just to hear some kind of response. It seemed to me that a lot of people saw it as a kind of failure. Evidence that they weren’t interesting enough, or that a bond wasn’t strong enough. Or maybe they were just nervous about what it would reveal about themselves.
“Do you want a break?” he asked quietly, catching me looking.
“No, I’m fine,” I said. I wasn’t turning this wheel over to either of them. As long as I had it, I had some control over our destination.
I was so sure he’d fight me, make all the right arguments about how he’d rested and I was exhausted, but he simply nodded. Believing me.
“Why did you stop singing?” he asked.
“I was only doing it to keep myself…to keep my mind off other things,” I said. “And I haven’t recognized any of these last few songs.”
Roman looked almost relieved. “Me neither.”
All right. I’d bite. This was at least keeping me awake and alert. “What do you normally listen to? Or do you just not really listen to music?”
He pressed a fist to his mouth, considering. “It’s…Priyanka tells me I have the taste of an old man. I like the classics. Older music. There’s a word for it I can’t think of?”
“Classics like orchestra music, or standards?”
“Standards!” he said, his expression brightening. “Sinatra, Billie Holiday, Nina Simone…Listening to them helped me learn English. They were the only records in the house where we grew up. I like them, too, because they’re simple.”
My brow creased. “In what way?”
“The voices, they’re deep and complex, right?” he said slowly. “But the songs are usually uncomplicated in what they’re saying—that they love someone, that they miss someone, that they don’t want to have to say good-bye. It makes me wish all of life could be that way.”
Roman suddenly sat up straighter, taking in a sharp breath. I turned back toward the road, searching for whatever he’d seen move in the darkness beyond the headlights.
“What?” I asked. “What is it?”
“I know this one!” he said, turning up the volume on the radio.
It took me a moment.
“You do not,” I said in disbelief.
He held up his finger, waiting for the chorus, wholly focused on the dashboard. Then he opened his mouth to sing.
Even with the rasp of his dry throat, it was a beautiful, rich voice—the sound was as pure and bold as a bell, and completely at odds with his usual quiet way of speaking. For a moment I was so stunned by it, I missed what he was actually singing.
“Come on, Eileen, I swear what it means,” he sang, trying to keep his voice down so as not to wake Priyanka. “In this moment you need everything / You are the best / Oh, I swear you’re the best / Stop your hurting / Come on, Eileen—see?”
I let out a shocked laugh. He was so pleased with himself, I almost couldn’t say it. “Those are not the lyrics. What do you think the song is about?”
Roman’s expression turned serious. “She’s discouraged and he’s trying to cheer her up. Bolster her courage.”
“He’s trying to convince her to hook up with him,” I explained. “He’s basically badgering her.”
“No.” He looked almost scandalized. “Really?”
“Really,” I confirmed.
Roman angled his head toward the radio, listening to the next verse. Then he leaned forward and turned the radio off.
After a minute, he explained, “I like my version better.”
“You know,” I said, “I think I like your version better, too.”
Roman shrugged and turned back to the road, and I did the same. Silence settled between us again, but as the miles faded in the rearview mirror, so did the easiness of that moment. A cold, creeping realization spread over me.
Dammit.
I’d just…slipped. The conversation had felt genuine, and I was so tired I’d lowered my defenses. I wanted to believe that I’d opened up as a way to convince him that I’d fallen for their game, but that would have been lying to myself.
There was only one thing I needed to remember.
All of this was impossible, and none of it would ever be real.
A FEW HOURS SHY OF morning, we spotted a motel sign in the distance, its VACANCY light on. For dozens of miles it had been nothing more than a faraway spark, and now the sign turned the sky violet with its glow. The sight of it tangled my thoughts, knotting them with unwelcome memories of other motels, in other empty places.
“Phone lines,” I said, pointing them out. A feeling of triumph bloomed in me as I added, “At least I’ll finally be able to make my call.”
The only questions were what they’d try to do to stop me, and what they’d do when they realized they couldn’t.
As if on cue, Roman asked, “Can you pull over here a second?”
I slowed the truck, but didn’t pull off onto the rough shoulder.
Roman stared out at the motel, brows lowering in thought. “I was just thinking…maybe we should approach on foot. And not check in with the employees.”
I translated that into the crime it was. “You mean break into a room and use it?”
“The hotel manager or staff would be able to identify us to anyone who came looking,” he explained. “The kidnappers could have beaten us here and bribed the workers to call in a sighting of us.”
“That terrifying thought aside,” Priyanka said, “we also look like we escaped a murder scene, so maybe it is best to approach with some caution, especially since a hotel manager out here is likely to have some kind of gun.”
I glanced down at my shirt, my stomach turning at the sight of the blood on it.
“That too,” Roman agreed.
“Let me go ahead, then,” Priyanka said. “I’ll scope the place out, see which rooms are open, avoid rushing any horses.”
“Why don’t you both go?” I suggested innocently. “Or I can go, and the two of you can stay here.”
“Or Roman could go,” Priyanka said. “Or you and Roman could go. Thank you for helpfully laying out all the possible solutions.”
“That’s not all of them,” Roman said absently. “None of us could go, or all three of us could go together.” Seeing the look Priyanka sent his way, he said, “What? That wasn’t all of them.”
“I should go,” I said, fighting my frustration. I needed to get into one of those rooms myself, not give them time to find an excuse for why we should move on. “I could go in, make the
call, and get out before anyone notices.”
“You’re the most recognizable one of us,” Priyanka said. “Someone is going to notice.”
“No one is going to notice,” I shot back, and that was the truth. I was used to moving unseen, even if I was slightly out of practice. “I have more experience with this kind of thing than you do.”
“Somehow,” Priyanka said, “I really doubt that.”
I slammed my foot down on the brake in anger, and it was the only opening she needed. Before I could get the truck moving again, she unbuckled her seat belt and jumped out, calling, “You two can enjoy coming up with all the possibilities of what could happen to me together.”
Priyanka took off at a limping run, her legs losing their stiffness as she wove through the tall grass and stray clusters of trees, making a wide arc across the field to approach the hotel from behind. Gritting my teeth, I guided the truck onto the shoulder and threw it into park.
I was shaking with frustration, and no matter how hard I gripped the wheel, I couldn’t stop.
“Tell me what that look means,” Roman said. “Are you all right?”
“No,” I said, and left it there for him to figure out.
Priyanka’s distant form reappeared at the edge of the motel’s lot twenty minutes later. As she neared, it quickly became apparent that the blood on the shoulder of her jean jacket and dress was bright, meaning fresh, and that she was holding a palm against the skin above her left eyebrow for a reason.
Roman let out a sigh and reached over to turn the engine off, taking the keys from the ignition. He slid across the seat to open the door for her. Priyanka didn’t bother climbing back in.
“Good news, bad news,” she said, way too brightly for someone with a gushing head wound. As she leaned in, I saw that her pupils were dilated again, and she had that look of almost feverish excitement. Her words seemed to chase one another out of her mouth.
Roman’s whole body tensed as he took in the sight of her. “Start with the bad.”
“Welllll, you see,” she began, “I happened to be trying to look into a room’s window to make sure it wasn’t occupied, and the manager—this little white dude—he just pops out of nowhere at me like a damn weasel. I didn’t really want to wake anyone sleeping nearby, so I followed him back to his office, playing the innocent, desperate ingenue. And, well, it turns out he’s got a little side business, this one of the narcotics variety. I basically had to knock him out, use his belt to chain him to the office’s toilet, and blockade the bathroom door.”
The Darkest Legacy Page 10
