Redemption (Enigma Black Trilogy Book #3)

by Furlong-Burr, Sara

  Jeremiah released another cough from the core of his throat, further intensifying the dryness, like a breeze blowing across a desert. “Screw,” he said, coughing once more, “you.”

  “Very well. You’ve made your choice, and come execution day you can rest assured that your convictions carried you far in life, as you die next to and forever become associated with the face of terrorism in this country. I will find Mr. Leitner without your help, and you will die together as the faces of the rebellion.”

  “At least I still have convictions. I’d rather die fighting for a cause I believe in than serving a lie.”

  “If you say so,” Carver Brooks replied with a sneer. “Have it your way then, brother.” He turned to back up and leave the room, when a thought occurred to him and he paused in his tracks. Brooks reached into his coat pocket, where he took out a bottle of water and left it by the doorway, just out of reach of the maximum slack allotted by the shackles. “Here you go. If you can reach it with those bonds locked tightly around your body, then it’s all yours,” he said, a laugh escaping from within. The door shut behind him, leaving Jeremiah alone in the dark.

  “Where are we on finding Marshall Leitner?” he asked the younger guardsman.

  “Our sources have located a couple of potential hideouts within downtown Washington, D.C. It’s believed he is in one of them with another group of rebels and former soldiers, sir,” the guardsman answered.

  “Good. Dispatch soldiers to both locations. I want him found and captured as soon as possible. We have our first televised execution to plan in which both he and Delaney are going to be the stars. If that doesn’t help deter the rest of the rebels, I don’t know what will.”

  “Yes, sir. I will dispatch men to both locations immediately and make sure you have a status update within the hour.”

  *****

  I dug the backpack I brought with me when I came to The Epicenter out of my dresser drawer. In it, I would again pack only the essentials and those items I refused to leave behind: my photographs, Chase’s necklace, a change of clothing, toiletries, and whatever food and water I could sneak out of the kitchen undetected.

  At this point, most people would have formed a clear plan, meticulously pouring over every last finite detail of it before daring to embark on what I readied myself to do in the next couple of hours, but I wasn’t most people. And there simply wasn’t enough time for such careful preparation. All I knew for sure was that I was leaving alone, and as soon as word of my defection got to Brooks, I would be wanted. Hunted down like an animal. I wouldn’t subject Ian to that kind of life or the danger my decision would put us in.

  After packing everything I needed from my room in my bag, I put a windbreaker on over my suit. I’d leave wearing the suit, with my helmet on, and with my gun in the holster on my belt. Despite my disdain for Victor and everything The Epicenter stood for anymore, the suit would come in handy, especially in battle, and I figured it was the least I was owed for the price I’d paid to come here.

  When the door to my room slid open, I peeked out into the hallway, looking for any signs of life. It was late, too late for any of the normal Epicenter staff to be lurking around the building, too late even for most of the stragglers and inhabitants of this place to be working still or up roaming the halls. In other words, it was now or never. Quietly, I walked out into the hallway, making my way to the kitchen to grab whatever food I could find. Just as I suspected, there wasn’t a soul in sight in the hallways, though the television and lights were still on in the sitting room. Strange, but not overly so considering the weird hours we kept here.

  Moments later, I found myself alone outside the dark kitchen. Satisfied that no one would be coming any time soon, I made my way inside, careful not to disturb the pots and pans that hung above the counter. A rather wide, stainless steel refrigeration unit stood toward the back of the room, near the food preparation counter. Inching my way across the room, I used the wall and what little light that came into the room from the hallway to guide me to the refrigeration unit without incident. After what seemed like hours, I finally felt its doors in my hand.

  Light shone into the room when I opened the door to look inside. Right away, I spotted bottles of water on the bottom shelf of the unit, of which I grabbed roughly a half dozen. After I packed the bottles away in my backpack, I scanned the rest of the unit for food that would keep outside of a refrigerator for a small length of time. Not finding any such items, I quietly closed the door and found myself once again bathed in darkness. Near the refrigerator, I noticed a bulky cabinet-like structure that resembled a pantry.

  I guided myself back along the perimeter of the kitchen toward the pantry, opening its doors when I felt the handles in my hands. Inside, a host of canned items and other nonperishable goods stood on a multitude of shelves inside the cabinet, all meticulously labeled and ready for consumption. Greedily, I snatched up everything and anything I could fit in the limited space available in my backpack, until it was stuffed full and became quite heavy.

  When I was satisfied that I had taken enough food to get me started on my journey, I peeked out of the kitchen doorway to look into the hallway, and after seeing no one walking down the hall, I was about to step outside when I heard voices around the corner. With no time to run, even with my enhanced speed, I scoured the kitchen for a place to hide. A steel cabinet under the food preparation counter caught my eye. With any luck, there would enough space free for me to squeeze myself into it. Hurriedly, I ran over to the door and slid it open just as the voices drew closer. Pots and pans lay stacked neatly inside. With my arm, I slid a stack of them over, giving myself enough room to squeeze into the shelf. There was just enough space for me to squeeze in with the upper half of my body lying flat against the shelf and the bottom half bent upward. The backpack rested uncomfortably on my abdomen, its weight making it difficult for me to draw breath into my body.

  With my free hand, I felt around the door for the handle and slid it over until I had closed it as far as I could get it, just as the light to the kitchen came on.

  “Let’s just hurry up and get this stuff put away so I can at least get some sleep before we have to get up at the butt crack of dawn for breakfast service,” Becca’s voice said. I heard the sound of paper bags rustling and then a loud thump right above my head as they were set on the counter. “Man, my feet are killing me already. I can only imagine what it’s going to be like when I’m further along.”

  “Why we can’t just find a food service place to deliver half this stuff, I’ll never know,” Colby moaned.

  “Victor has been making a lot of cuts lately. It’s kind of scary because it’s almost as though he doesn’t expect this place to be around much longer.”

  “It doesn’t help matters when he has his own people turning on him,” Colby said.

  “You’re telling me. I was there when Celaine blew up on him,” Becca acknowledged, opening the refrigerator. I heard the rustling sound of an egg carton. “I almost wish Ian hadn’t stopped her from hitting him. That would have made for an interesting fight.”

  “Oh, come on,” Colby said, laughing. “Who are you kidding? You just wanted to see Celaine get her ass handed to her.”

  “Am I that transparent?” Becca said, laughing. The bags above my head rustled as she dug through them. “Seriously, though, I just don’t get what Ian sees in her. She’s just so, so—”

  “Hot in a crazy kind of way?”

  “Not what I was going for, Colby.”

  “Don’t worry. If she ticks off Victor anymore, I’m sure she’ll end up dead like the rest of them. Then Ian will be all yours.”

  “That ship has sailed, I’m afraid,” Becca responded. A loud slap resounded next to my ear, startling me. Turning my head, I peered through the slit of an opening that remained in the door and noticed that a package of bacon had fallen to the floor. Seconds later, Becca came into view when she bent down to pick it up. Cautiously, I held my breath, trying not to make a
sound. As Becca retrieved the bacon from the floor, she looked up, practically making eye contact with me through the opening in the door. Sure she had seen me, I began to concoct a story in my head to explain why I was hiding in the shelving unit when her hand reached over and slid the door shut all the way, blinding me in darkness.

  “I swear,” she said, “is it so hard to shut a door around here?”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. So far, so good.

  “Anyway,” she began again, “it’s not as though I want to see anything happen to Celaine. After all, as a woman, I should be rooting for her to succeed and all, but she obviously doesn’t know what she wants, and Ian deserves more than that.”

  “So, you’re saying he totally deserves you.”

  “Exactly. Though I’m afraid it doesn’t matter what I think. Even when I was practically throwing myself at him before I found out I was knocked up, all he talked about was her. Oh well, there’s no accounting for taste, I suppose.”

  Classy, Becca. Real classy. A feeling hit my stomach, a strange combination of nausea and the sensation of butterflies, like you get when meeting the one you were meant to be with for the first time. Maybe it was all due to the backpack violently pressing against my innards, or maybe it had something to do with the deep-seated feelings I’d been keeping bottled up inside, too afraid to unleash for fear of what they may do to me.

  I waited for several minutes more, chomping at the bit as I listened to Becca and Colby make small talk while they put the rest of the groceries away. Time. I was losing precious, valuable time. Several minutes later, the noise in the kitchen died down to where I could only hear the sound of my own heart beating in my chest. Then, with my open palm, I gripped the side of the door as best as I could and attempted to slide it open. A small crack opened up between the door and the rest of the steel shelving unit, which enabled me just enough room to push my fingers into it and slide it open the rest of the way.

  It was now or never. There was just one thing left to do.

  Chapter Nine

  The Goodbye

  I stood before the door to Kara’s room, rehearsing what I was going to say to her over and over again in my mind, finally coming to the realization that there were no perfect words to say and no perfect ways to say them. After all, was there ever really a perfect way to tell someone you’re leaving and not coming back? Given my past, I should be an expert on that particular topic; the words should flow easily by now. But they won’t because the truth is that no matter how many times and no matter how many ways you do it, saying goodbye always seems to reopen old wounds and the feelings you kept locked away in the dungeons of your soul.

  As I stood at her door, I began to feel as though I was becoming detached from my body because I don’t remember feeling anything as I lifted my arm, formed a fist with my hand, and knocked on her door. Time passed, seconds most likely, but it all fell in slow motion like grains of sand from an hourglass. A moment later, after getting no response, I knocked again—and then once more, for good measure. Finally, Kara, her hair disheveled from sleep, opened the door just as I was about to bring my arm up to knock again.

  “This had better be an emergency,” she said, rubbing her eyes, clearly irritated. “Honestly, Celaine, don’t you realize what time—” she paused, her eyes adjusting to the sight before her; me, clad in my suit, my backpack secured around my shoulders. “What’s going on? Why do you have that backpack? What’s in that backpack?” She flooded me with a barrage of questions that I did not want to answer in the hallway.

  “May I come in?” I asked, holding my finger up to my mouth to prevent her from saying anything further.

  “Of course,” she answered, her composure switching quickly from irritation to worry. She opened the door wider and allowed me to walk into her room. I’d been in her sleeping quarters—a room she often chose to crash in over her lonely apartment—numerous times before. Each and every time, it never ceased to amaze me how clean and orderly Kara kept things. I often wondered whether she was just really super organized or if she was secretly one of those crazed perfectionists who walked around their homes wearing rubber gloves, searching for the slightest hint of dust. “What is it, Celaine?” she asked, breaking my concentration.

  “You know I can’t stay here,” I said without looking at her. “Especially after the events that transpired at the address and after Victor’s alteration of my statement today. I can’t work for someone I don’t respect, whose morals are so skewed that lying is perfectly acceptable to him just as long as his bottom line isn’t affected.”

  “Then I’m afraid you aren’t going to be able to work anywhere,” Kara said jokingly.

  “Kara,” I said, turning around to face her, “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” She shook her head. “I really can’t say that I’m surprised. Frankly, I’m shocked you held it together for as long as you have.” Kara sulked down on her bed and stared off into space. “You aren’t going to be able to pull this off, you know that, right?” she said after a long pause. “Victor will have you hunted down, he’ll—”

  “Try and have me killed,” I finished her thought. “I know, and I’m prepared to face the consequences brought about by my decision because it’s one that I believe in. My life will be utter hell, but I’ll be happier because of it. If you had seen even an ounce of what Ian and I have witnessed, Kara, you—”

  “And what about Ian?” It was Kara’s turn to interrupt me. “He’s going too, I presume?”

  “No. Absolutely not.”

  “What? You’re kidding. He turned you down?”

  “Not exactly.” I sat down on the bed next to her, trying to avoid the invisible bullets her eyes shot at me.

  “He doesn’t know, does he?” My silence was sufficient to answer her question. “And you aren’t going to tell him, are you?” she pressed on.

  “I can’t ask him to put himself in that kind of danger. Too many people have suffered because of the decisions I made. Blake, Chase, Lucy, Jake, my parents.”

  “How did your brother and parents suffer?”

  “If I hadn’t forgotten my purse in the mall that day, if they could have just driven out of the ramp instead of waiting for me, maybe they would have avoided the blast. Maybe they would still be alive today.”

  “Oh, honey, that’s not your fault,” Kara said, putting her arm around me. “You’ve been beating yourself up all these years because you think their blood is on your hands? How do you know the blast wouldn’t have happened before they had a chance to get out of the ramp? How do you know that you wouldn’t have been killed too?”

  “I don’t.”

  “Exactly. Look, you need to at least give Ian the choice. Put the ball in his court and let him accept the consequences that come his way.”

  “No, that’s not up for discussion. His thoughts are too clouded by his feelings. He’ll—”

  “Be heartbroken if you leave. Celaine, honestly, which do you think will hurt him more, choosing to leave with you and dying because of it, or dying slowly inside because you left him without giving him a choice at all?”

  “Don’t guilt me into this, Kara. You aren’t going to change my mind.” I glanced up at her and noticed that she’d pursed her lips in a disapproving manner.

  “Fine,” she said. “Don’t give him any choice at all, then.”

  “Kara, please, understand why I’m doing this. I’m not cutting off The Epicenter entirely. I know there are good people here, people who truly believe in the cause that Victor presented to them. People who want to find and destroy The Man in Black and restore a sense of peace and order in their lives. You’re one of those people, which is why I’m going to ask a favor of you while I’m gone.”

  She raised an eyebrow, her expression softening ever so slightly. “What kind of favor?”

  “Victor is up to something. I know you know what I’m talking about. I know you’ve seen the changes in him, too.”

  It was barely recogni
zable, but I saw Kara’s head nod as she processed what I had just told her. “I have,” she acknowledged.

  “If we found out what exactly that is, I think we will have all the answers we need. Somewhere in his warped mind is the key to ending all of this. It’s our only hope of reclaiming what’s left of our lives.”

  “And how do you propose I find these answers?”

  “Right now, Cameron is Victor’s right hand man. Victor trusts him with everything. Cameron knows something. I’ve seen it in his demeanor. It’s tearing away at him and soon, very soon, he’s going to explode. You either need to find a way to get in Victor’s good graces or you need to somehow make Cameron trust you enough to betray Victor.”

  “Wow,” Kara said, laughing. “That’s going to be next to impossible.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said matter-of-factly. “Cameron is just like the rest of us. He has the same needs and desires.”

  “Whoa, whoa, I am not sleeping with him!” she exclaimed, nearly falling off the bed.

  “Come on, Kara, take one for the team.” I laughed, but she just glared at me, unmoved. “Look, I’m not asking you to sleep with him,” I said, clarifying my request, “although I’m inclined to believe he’d tell you anything you wanted to know if you did.” Kara relaxed a little and folded her hands in her lap. “Just make him feel like you care about him, like you accept him. Once you gain his trust, find a way to get inside Victor’s office. In there, I’m certain you’ll find some of the pieces to the puzzle. Then gather together everyone here who shares our mindset and take this place down from the inside out.”

  “Okay,” she said, nodding. “I can’t guarantee how successful I’m going to be or whether I’ll accomplish any of the tasks you’ve just given to me, but I’m game to try and do anything that allows us all to finally begin to heal.”

  I smiled as I wrapped my arms around her, holding her tightly one last time. My sister not by blood, but by choice. Tears welled in the corners of my eyes. In my head, I silently considered all the consequences of my decision, and the likelihood of this possibly being the last time I’d ever see her. “No matter what happens, you’ll always be my sister,” I whispered just loud enough for her to hear me.