I giggle. “Good thing Adam is at the lab so often. I don’t think he could handle you. But really, I don’t know what Cole and I are. We had a . . . moment. But things were so crazy and stressful, and then Sadie had to go, and we came here.” I’ve thought about our kiss. So many times. Constantly. But I don’t know how to bring it up.
“Rooming with me is cramping your style.”
I smack her shoulder. “No, rooming with you is awesome. But it’s like, how do you even start dating in a situation like this? Is it possible?”
Her phone chimes with a text. “Rafael. Sadie is in Europe, on her way to the Swiss Alps. Dang, girl, why couldn’t you have seen Fia murdering me? Sadie gets the Swiss Alps, we get North Dakota. This is really not fair.”
“It’s not funny.” The image of Fia doing that to Sadie, and then . . . I shudder.
“I’m sorry. You’re right. You know what you need? An actual date. You and Cole should go out to dinner.”
“I don’t want to leave you and Adam out.”
“Adam’s not back from the lab until late tonight, anyway, and I make a mean microwave meal.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “But Cole and I have pretty much been living together for months now. What do I say? ‘Hey, remember that time a week ago we totally made out in a hotel? That was nice. I’d like to do it again. Let’s go to dinner.’”
Cole’s voice comes from right behind me. “Um, okay.”
My cheeks burst into flames. I pick up the popcorn bowl and dump it on Eden. She shrieks, laughing hysterically. “The look on your face . . . oh, that was worth it, I’m sorry, I’m the worst friend ever, but I will never regret this.”
I turn to Cole, who must be behind the couch. “I was—you weren’t—she was just—”
Laughter pulls the edge of his voice, stretching it into a shape that turns my embarrassment into something giddy. “Actually, I was coming in here to say the exact same thing to you. What a coincidence.”
“Oh, really.”
He walks around the couch. “Yes. Shall we?”
I hold out my hand and he takes it in his.
And—
Holy crap.
Holy crap, holy crap, holy crap.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
It’s his hand.
“I think she’s having a vision,” Eden says.
“I—I—no. I’m not.” I shake my head and he lets go of my hand but . . . I’d know that hand anywhere. It’s his.
It was his all along. All this time, he’s taken my elbow or my arm or my shoulder, but I’ve never actually held his hand.
“You okay?” Eden asks. “You look like you’re going to pass out.”
“I, uh, I’ll go get my jacket.” I rush past them, banging into the doorframe, then stumble around the tiny bedroom until I hit a low bed. I collapse onto it, unsure whether to laugh or cry, the things I’m feeling too much.
Cole.
I shove my fist into my mouth, laughing. I’m going to fall in love with Cole.
Actually, I’m pretty sure I already have. I pull the pillow over my face and laugh into it. And I didn’t fall in love with him because his hand was right. I wanted him before I knew it was him. That makes it feel even truer somehow.
And then my stomach turns with a sick twist, because I can see. And it’s not what I want to see, I don’t want to, but I can’t stop it.
A beautiful man sits on a leather couch, leaning back with his legs crossed. His skin reminds me of the way coconut oil smells. His suit shines beneath the overhead lights, perfectly contoured to his every line. His hair is black and curly.
Next to him is Sadie, brown hair back in a ponytail. Baggy clothes—long sleeves pulled down over her hands, long pants, wide-set eyes darting around the room like they can’t settle on any one focal point. She’s curled into the corner of the couch, legs tucked protectively in front of her chest.
A heavy door opens and two people enter the room. One, carefully handsome James, something tight and frightened around his eyes but not showing in his broad smile.
The other is the owner of the voice that still haunts my nightmares. Blandly handsome, not quite as tall as James but almost, the family resemblance in the jaw and the set of the shoulders. Phillip Keane.
And then a third person comes in (please no not again, not this) and my heart twists to see Fia, my Fia, but she doesn’t move with her dancer’s grace. James and the coconut oil man both look at her at the same time, each trying to convey something with sharp, expectant expressions.
She giggles, a high, nervous sound, and the line of her eyes shifts them into a shape I don’t recognize.
She reaches behind herself
and pulls out a knife
and throws it, the knife sinking deep into Sadie’s chest.
The beautiful man shouts, his hands fluttering over the knife and the blood as he tries desperately to help Sadie, who looks sad and resigned.
No one is watching Fia, who drifts to the balcony and jumps.
Eden’s voice shatters the light, plunging me back into darkness. “Annie? Annie, what’s wrong? What’s going on?”
I gasp as though coming up for air from the depths of an icy lake. “Cole. I need Cole.”
She runs into the hall and I’m alone with the things I saw. It changed, but not in the way it was supposed to. Why did it change that way? What was different?
Oh, no.
Oh no.
“What?” Cole asks, out of breath. I can hear Eden panting behind him.
“What does Rafael look like?”
I know before Cole speaks what he will say. “Curly black hair. Olive skin.”
“He betrayed us,” I whisper. “He’s taking Sadie. He’s taking her to Keane.”
FIA
Nine Hours Before
I SIT ON A BRANCH, HIDDEN BY THE NIGHT AND THE clinging leaves, my back against the tree trunk. The lake stretches out in front of me, a black slick, but if I only look up, all I see are branches and leaves and sky. No lake, no park, no city. No buildings.
No people.
Rafael’s plan is simple, and very similar to James’s. He has guaranteed me Phillip Keane at an exact time in an exact place. He does not care what method I use, as long as Phillip Keane never leaves the meeting. And as long as Phillip Keane ceases to be, Annie is safe.
In Rafael’s plan.
In James’s plan, as long as Sadie ceases to be, Annie is safe.
If Phillip Keane were supposed to die, if that were right, if I knew what right was, then I would have let that woman kill him. I wouldn’t have to decide to do it myself. It would already be done.
If Sadie were supposed to die, if that were right, if I knew what right was, then I wouldn’t have wanted to protect her, wouldn’t have wanted to save her. When I looked at her I saw myself.
But if she is me, I can’t save her anyway. No one can.
I can’t decide to kill either of them, so I take them out as variables. I make them not-people. They are not-people. They are elements of the wrong stretching out before me, and my goal is to choose the least-wrong possible.
This is easy. Rafael is wrong that makes me want to throw up. I should never have called him. I do what James asks. Rafael is implicated in the fake attempt on Phillip Keane’s life. Annie remains secret and safe. Rafael is no longer playing any game at all.
Ever.
I get two taps for the price of one. A Sadie tap and a Rafael tap. I tap tap tap tap tap tap experimentally on the side of my leg, and I want to sink into the rough bark of the tree, be folded into its green heart, cease to exist think feel be.
I’ll make myself a not-person, too. If Sadie is a not-person, and I am a not-person, then it doesn’t matter what we do to each other, what I do to her. What I do after.
I pull out the stolen phone. The picture on the sleeping screen is a smiling, chubby baby. It is amazing to me that such a thing can exist. How does it survive? How does it live in this world?
<
br /> I dial another phone number I know by heart.
“Hello?” my sister says, and I let out a breath of gratitude and relief, because she is alive, no matter how many times I forced myself to make her dead in my thoughts and feelings and heart. She’s still alive.
“Heya, Annahell,” I say.
“Fia. Oh, Fia. I have to tell you—”
“Are you safe?”
“I am.”
She’s not. She’s never safe. It’s my fault, always my fault. But I’ll make this safe permanent if it’s the last thing I do. “Stay safe, okay?”
“Fia, listen to me. Don’t do it. Please don’t do it.”
I tap tap tap tap the back of my head against the tree trunk. She knows. She always knows. She’s already seen what I’ll do. She only sees the terrible things about me.
There are only terrible things to see when it comes to me.
“There’s no right choice,” I say.
“There is a right choice. Walk away. Right now. Just walk away.”
I sigh, the breeze carrying away my breath my life my future my self. “I love him. Why would I love him if I wasn’t supposed to?”
“Oh, baby sister. We all want things we shouldn’t have. Even you. Just because you love him doesn’t mean you should. Love is a choice, like anything else.”
She’s wrong. I had no other choice from the moment I met James. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Listen to me. If you do whatever course you’re set on right now, you . . . Just don’t do it. Promise me you won’t do it. Don’t hurt Sadie.”
I was right, then, to pick James’s plan. I already did in Annie’s future. “I’m broken. I don’t know anything anymore. I can’t feel it like I used to.”
She sounds desperate, sounds like before when she thought we could get out of this mess together. “Let me feel it for you, then. Let me make this choice.”
We breathe together for a while. I wish I could see her. No. I don’t. Not with what she’s already seen me do. I hope I never have to see her again. “I’ll figure it out,” I say, taking my eyes off the sky and looking toward the city, toward where James has probably been waiting for me for hours now, frantic. “I always do.”
“Not this time. Please, Fia.”
“Don’t worry about me. It’s my job to take care of you, remember? Stay out of this. Stay safe. That’s all I want.”
“I’m coming—”
“No.” I sit up straight. “No. You stay far away. Stay far away where you’re safe. I’ll be fine. I’m always fine.”
“Fia—”
“I love you, Annie. Go live. I won’t call again.”
I hang up. I won’t. I will never call her again.
I wander back to the hotel. I don’t know what time it is until James opens the door and yells it at me as though it has any meaning whatsoever. And then he takes me and holds me, but I don’t lose myself in his arms.
There is nothing left to lose.
I am already gone.
ANNIE
Fourteen Hours Before
I SIT ON THE FLOOR AGAINST THE BED, NUMB WITH horror and shock. “Do you have Rafael’s number?”
“Yes,” Cole says.
I hold out my hand. “Call him. Let me talk to him.”
“I don’t think—”
“Call him!”
His voice is soft to balance my scream. “Okay.”
“What can I do?” Eden asks, her hand on my shoulder.
“We need to know where Fia is. Is there anyone you can call, anyone with Keane you trust?”
“I know where Keane headquarters is,” she says. “I’ll get tickets on the next flight to New York and text Adam what’s up.”
I nod.
“Here.” Cole puts a phone in my hand and I listen as it rings.
“Who is this?” Rafael answers, his voice lacking all the musical play it had when talking to me. I was such an idiot to ignore that his voice changed when talking to women.
“You lied.”
“Annie? Bella, how are you?”
“You didn’t keep Sadie out of it.”
“Ah.” He sighs. “Has something ever been so important to you that you’d do anything? Anything at all?”
“Yes,” I hiss. “My sister. My sister is that important to me.”
“I’m sorry, Annie. I really am. But we all have the same goal, and now I have a way to make it happen. I finally have a meeting with Phillip Keane, and he won’t survive. You remember Casey?”
“Don’t change the subject.”
“She’s dead. Keane had her pumped full of heroin until her heart stopped and then dumped her body in an alley in Harlem.”
“You’re a liar,” I whisper.
“I am not lying about this. I wouldn’t do that to Casey’s memory. I’m sorry for using you, but I can help look out for Fia. Tell me what happens in your vision now.”
“You die.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“You die.” I drop the phone.
“What did he say?” Eden asks.
I shudder, thinking of Casey. I don’t have Fia’s talent for spotting lies, but what Rafael said felt true. Too much. This is all too much. I think I’m going to be sick. “I need to go to New York myself.”
“You can’t go,” Cole says. “If they knew you were alive . . .”
“I don’t care. We get Fia out. Whether she wants to leave or not. And we save Sadie. Tell Adam to pack up his research and leave. We can’t let Rafael have it.”
“He’s not answering his phone,” Eden says. “I’ll leave a message and a text to call us ASAP. There’s a flight leaving in two hours. We can make it, but there’s a layover in Minneapolis. We’ll hit New York in the morning.”
“Let’s go,” Cole says.
We’ve been in the Minneapolis airport for an hour when my phone rings. Breathless, I answer.
“Heya, Annahell.”
Her voice is like a physical blow, punching through all the hollow spaces inside me where she used to live.
“Fia. Oh, Fia. I have to tell you—”
“Are you safe?”
“I am.”
“Stay safe, okay?”
“Fia, listen to me. Don’t do it. Please don’t do it.”
I hear a ghost of a tap-tap-tap-tap on the other end of the line and it buries me in a wave of grief. I’m mourning her like she’s already dead, but she’s not, she won’t be.
“There’s no right choice,” she says.
“There is a right choice. Walk away. Right now. Just walk away.”
The whisper of her sigh against the phone makes me ache to hold her close, the way I used to when we were little.
“I love him,” she says. “Why would I love him if I wasn’t supposed to?”
“Oh, baby sister. We all want things we shouldn’t have. Even you. Just because you love him doesn’t mean you should. Love is a choice, like anything else.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“Listen to me. If you do whatever course you’re set on right now, you . . . Just don’t do it. Promise me you won’t do it. Don’t hurt Sadie.”
“I’m broken. I don’t know anything anymore. I can’t feel it like I used to.”
“Let me feel it for you, then. Let me make this choice.”
She’s quiet, and I strain against the phone, listening to her breathe, counting on each breath, needing to hear them.
“I’ll figure it out,” she says, and now she sounds distracted and far away. “I always do.”
“Not this time. Please, Fia.”
“Don’t worry about me. It’s my job to take care of you, remember? Stay out of this. Stay safe. That’s all I want.”
“I’m coming—”
“No. No. You stay far away. Stay far away where you’re safe. I’ll be fine. I’m always fine.”
“Fia—”
“I love you, Annie. Go live. I won’t call again.”
The line goes dead.
“No no no no no,” I moan, letting my head drop. “No.”
And then—oh please not another one I can’t see this again—light.
I watch my sister die.
In the vision, the beautiful traitor sits on a leather couch, leaning back with his legs crossed.
Next to him is Sadie. Dark circles under her eyes making her look older than sixteen.
The only door opens and two people enter the room. This is hell, watching this happen over and over again, not being able to change it. There is James. There is Phillip Keane.
And then there’s Fia, my Fia, who looks from Sadie to Phillip Keane and back again, slides along the wall next to the door, shoves her fist into her mouth as though suppressing a scream. James and Rafael both look at her at the same time, expectant and demanding.
She giggles, a high, nervous sound, and she looks less than human, somehow.
There’s a loud noise from the hall, a shout, and then something slams against the wall. The door flies open again and a man, ferocity in his blunt, young face, bursts into the room, fighting with another man in a suit. They fall to the ground, a tangle of vicious pounding limbs.
And then
And then
And then
I walk into the room, sightless eyes wide with terror, a gun that looks too heavy clutched in my wildly shaking hands.
Phillip Keane raises an eyebrow as though seeing someone he thought was dead happens every day. Fia’s shoulders collapse and I can see the life draining from her even though nothing has happened yet.
“No,” she says.
I hold the gun out, but I’m pointing at nothing, and everyone knows I won’t shoot, can’t shoot, can’t even see what needs to be shot. Phillip Keane is to my right, James Keane is to my left, Fia is sliding along the wall to get behind me.
The two men still beat at each other on the floor and I think—I know—help will come too late. It’s too late. I’m useless.
Fia puts a hand on my shoulder, reaches from behind me, takes the gun from my hand. “Good-bye, Annie,” she says, and she doesn’t sound sad. She sounds . . . gone.
Perfect Lies Page 14
