Dallamore took a seat at the end of the table and angled his chair toward me, reclining against the leather. His right elbow rested on the arm of the chair, his hand propped up, clicking a pen. He scooted the pastry plate closer to me. “Eat, if you’d like.”
I ignored him. I actually wanted to laugh at the nature of it all: the chair, the interrogation room, Dallamore acting all serious. Obviously, he was playing a role he didn’t usually participate in. He was a Vasterias high-up, not someone who threatened nineteen-year-olds.
“I believe you know what we want,” Dallamore said.
I raised my eyebrows. “Do I?”
How long before they sent the person in that would be inflicting the physical pain? It certainly wouldn’t be Dallamore. I’d met people at the top, long ago—men perfectly capable of inflicting pain, and many of them in much better shape than Dallamore. But stuff like this was below them.
“It’s simple,” Dallamore said. “We need to know what you know about Dr. Cunningham. We need the code, Beckett. You’re as aware of that as anyone around here. And you saw what happened to your aunt and uncle when they refused to give information.”
“Does my dad know you killed his brother?”
“I don’t bother myself with the details. They told me to come here, I came. That’s all.”
“But you know they’re dead. You know what happened to them.”
I wondered if my dad knew, if Jack knew. I wondered where they were. Three years ago, the plan was for Dad and Jack to head to Europe and work with Vasterias to start a new lab there, while I headed to Alaska with Peg and Jeff—for “safety” from the Corp. But right after we left, Dad called and assigned us to Kansas. It was what Dad had planned all along—for us to earn the trust of the Sallisaw’s, to extract information from them. He forbade us from contacting Jack or leaving Canta—unless we wanted Jack dead. I hadn’t talked to my father or Jack since.
Dallamore leaned back in the leather chair. “Just tell us what you know, Beckett. And this can all be over.” Yeah. I’ll be dead.
“I’m not telling you anything until you take me to Sage and Finn. Kill me if you want, but I swear to you, I will tell nothing until you take me to them.”
“The Corp’s under pressure, Beckett. We thought the recruits were going to work out. We’ve already alerted select countries that the code is for sale to the top bidder. We’re feeling the pressure. The gala is scheduled for this summer. Heads of countries, corporations who’ve expressed interest, they’re already planning to attend.”
“Do you think I care about the Corporation’s plans to dominate the world? I’m not talking. Not until you give me what I want.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. I’m afraid I’ll have to bring in proper motivation.”
I snorted. Shocker.
“Smalls!” Dallamore called.
The door immediately opened. “Smalls” had obviously been waiting right outside the door, and Smalls was, in fact, very small—short and muscled like a stretch of thin wire. He carried a rope in his hands, but nothing else. I wouldn’t fight them. The more unaffected I remained, the more it proved I didn’t care what they did to me. Eventually, they’d give me what I wanted. My gut twisted a bit at what might come before that, but I kept my expression blank as Smalls approached.
Smalls had deep brown hair with a single wave combed neatly to the side. He tied my hands to the back of the chair using swift efficient knots, then moved to my ankles. He didn’t act surprised by my compliance, and I was only offended by how nonthreatening he obviously found me. Afterward, he stood to the side of my chair, staring at a point on the wall. No eye contact, only orders.
I sighed. Might as well get this party started. I looked at Smalls, then grinned at Dallamore. “So, what’d you do, Dallamore? How’d you get the lowly job of babysitting me? What’d you do to piss off your friends?”
Dallamore didn’t have the guts to come punch me himself, and I knew it. That’s why I smiled at him. Dallamore nodded at Smalls, who turned and hit me squarely on the jawbone, which went numb just before the rush of pounding pain.
Ow. The guy knew how to hit.
Dallamore waddled to the door. “You will tell us what you know, Beckett, whether now or eventually. You know how persuasive the Corp can be. It’ll do you good to remember that.”
Dallamore stepped out of the room, and the door clicked shut behind him.
13
SAGE
The lunchroom hummed with conversation. My eyes searched for Finn at the long wooden tables, seats already filled with recruits. I didn’t spot him there or in the dinner line. Only when Jack’s fingertips pressed to my lower back and moved me toward the line did I realize I’d stopped walking. He nodded his head, a silent order to get in line, and then turned in the opposite direction before I could ask why I didn’t see Finn yet. Jack had said Finn should be at dinner for sure.
A few guards stood near the exits, and Jack sidled up next to them, clasping his hands behind his back and glaring at me. I glared back but stepped in line behind two girls who were deep in conversation about choke holds.
Windows ran floor to ceiling on the east wall, letting in a full panorama of the ocean. The beauty of the view felt wrong, meant for a different time and place, for families taking weeklong trips, or beachgoers seeking restoration and the luxurious feel of the sand between their toes. Instead, the waterline served as a barrier. The waves mocked me as they rolled off the beach, free to escape, leaving me and Finn trapped on this island.
The food line moved forward, and a tall, thin man wearing a hairnet but without much hair handed me a glass. “Fresh squeezed. You’ll like it.” He held out a glass to the recruit behind me, effectively moving me on. The liquid in the glass was the color of the green oak leaves back home. I hesitated at first, but when the liquid reached my throat, it cooled the raw ache from the day of screaming and salt-water. I emptied the glass before I even took a food tray.
Finn still hadn’t come, so I made my way down the center aisle toward a spot by the windows, far from anyone else. A few recruits at the next table made eye contact, one guy even smiled, but otherwise, I was left alone. Steam wafted off the tray of food in front of me—chicken, rice, vegetables.
I tried to take a bite, but found myself only staring at the cafeteria doors, willing Finn to walk through them. Then, a body appeared behind the chair directly across the table from me.
“Can I sit?”
It was the girl from training, with curly, deep red hair. She had a distinctly Irish accent. She didn’t wait for me to answer before pulling out the wooden chair across from me and sitting down. She held out her hand.
“Imogen,” she said. Her face looked innocent—porcelain skin, a light flush to her cheeks, a round child-like face—but she held a hardness in the set of her jaw.
Reluctantly, I extended my own hand. “Sage.”
“I know who you are. And I know why they brought you here.” She leaned in. “Caesar told me.” She stabbed a bite of chicken. “Not all the recruits are on the side of the Corp, you know.”
No, I didn’t know.
“I’m with Jack,” she said, chicken still in her mouth.
I glanced at Jack, but if he knew what she was saying to me, he didn’t act like he cared. My eyes flickered to the door again. “Have you heard about my brother by chance?” I asked her. If she knew so much, maybe she had the answer to this.
“Brother? No, Jack didn’t mention anything about you having a brother here. He just asked me to come sit by you.” My chest tightened, and I looked at Jack again. This time, he stared with zero expression on his face. I tried to speak to him with my gaze. Where is Finn?
“Do you have other siblings? A mother that goes along with the scientist father you have?”
“No other siblings. Just me and Finn and my mom.”
The last image of my mom in the car with blood on her face flashed through my head, and I set down my fork.
“My
mom was a surrogate,” Imogen said, shoving another bite of food in her mouth as if nothing was wrong. If she noticed I was upset, she didn’t acknowledge the fact. “We all had surrogate mothers who signed contracts to carry and raise us.” She nodded her head across the lunch room full of recruits. “The agreement included child support and a substantial payout once the Corp took us.”
Imogen nodded at my raised eyebrows, as if to confirm the truth in her statement.
“They had just one problem,” she said. “When the time came, most of our families didn’t want to give us up.” Imogen stabbed a piece of food on her plate. “Usually it’s a car accident. Sometimes other things, a mom drowns, food is poisoned. It works in the Corp’s favor. They invite us to training school, the whole thing framed as an honor. We think one of the reasons we’re “chosen” is because we’re orphaned, and so we feel indebted to them. We’re grateful to get taken on. No one knows this, of course. I only know it because Jack told me when I got here.”
I struggled for something to reply with.
“I’ll get them back for what they did to her. Someday, I will.” Imogen stared out the window, her mind in another place, her chin set in that sharp, defiant line.
I wasn’t sure who the “her” was that Imogen talked about. Her mother? A sister? A friend?
I glanced around at the recruits, wondering the story each of them had. At one table, a guy tossed his fork in the air in some sort of trick move that made it land perfectly stabbed into his piece of meat. The recruit next to him tried to mimic the same. At another table, a girl with bleach blonde hair stood and did a little dance move, talking loudly, describing her gestures in detail before sitting in her chair again as the recruits around her laughed.
Imogen’s face looked sad—or was it lonely?—as she stared at them, too. “Now that the Corp knows we’re sterile, they’ll use us as private security for their ambassadors. They told us this morning. I don’t think anyone really even cares.”
My eyebrows rose. Jack hadn’t mentioned any of this to me. “Ambassadors?”
“The Corp has a presence in nearly half the world’s countries, each with an ambassador,” Imogen said. “They intend to be within all of them within ten years. They buy prominent businesses to establish themselves within the local government and then slowly purchase land for their crops.”
Imogen shook her head, as if shaking off a bad thought along with it. “Not me though,” Imogen said. “I’m going with you guys.” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “So. You said your brother was brought here with you?”
At the mention of Finn, again I looked at Jack, willing him to feed me answers. He wouldn’t make eye contact with me, and I’d had quite enough of the waiting around. The line had emptied, everyone was at their tables eating dinner. So where was Finn? I was about to stand up and go over to Jack, to demand he take me to my brother, even if his dad would torture me for it—even if Jack himself tortured me for it. But before I could, Jack rolled away from the wall and pushed through the cafeteria doors.
14
JACK
I slammed my fist into the wall just outside the cafeteria and headed for the break room. Finn wasn’t at dinner. I’d waited long enough to watch Imogen sit down next to Sage at the table in the corner. Sage had stared at the door for a long time, waiting for her brother. After that, she kept glancing at me until I left. Every single thing that went wrong chipped away at the very little trust she had in me. I could see it in her eyes. But that was secondary right now.
Where was Finn? He should be in the cafeteria by now.
I shoved open the break room door, just down the hall and around the corner from the cafeteria. My eyes scanned for Caesar. Most of the three tables were filled. Other guards lounged against the counters or walls. A few guards offered me a nod, and I responded with the same.
Caesar sat in the far corner with a few others. He saw me immediately but pretended not to care. Slowly, I made my way to the vending machines, faking the purpose of a soda while I talked to Caesar with my eyes. I pulled on my ear to signal that I was earbud-less. Caesar tipped his chin, understanding that I would grab one from my room, and that I needed him on-screen ASAP.
In the hall, I turned west instead of south back toward the cafeteria. I knew it was a risk to head all the way to my room at this time in the evening—that it could raise suspicions, but tension was building up inside me. If there was general news about Finn, Caesar would have signaled as much in the break room, or found me in the cafeteria. No news at all meant my dad was hiding something.
Which meant I needed another earbud.
Now.
15
SAGE
Jack still wasn’t back. He’d been gone for thirteen minutes. I couldn’t take my eyes off the doors where he left, hoping that either Finn would walk through, or Jack would return with some sort of reassurance. Imogen had stopped trying to talk with me once she realized I was distracted.
I was still pushing around the rice on my plate when someone reached over my shoulder and placed a napkin next to my tray.
Jack’s voice came directly by my left ear. How had I missed his entrance? I’d only looked away from the doors for a few seconds.
“I’ve heard from C. Finn’s okay for now, but it’s not good. Eat as fast as you can without drawing attention to yourself. I need to get you to your dorm room.”
I started to stand, my heart beating hard in my chest. Jack put his hand on my shoulder and lowered me back into my seat.
“Do not make a scene. Eat your dinner.”
I jerked away and took a bite of my rice. Imogen’s ivory skin went pale. Jack walked away, stopping by the exit doors and turning to wait, hands clasped behind his back. He started chatting with the guard next to him, then laughed at something the guard said. Jack sure knew how to turn it off and on.
My fork froze halfway to my mouth. Wait a second. What if he wasn’t turning it “on” for the guards? What if he was turning it “on” for me? Was this real, or just a ruse? How did I know that everything Jack just said to me was even the truth?
Imogen stared at me, then, as if reading my mind, said, “You can trust him, you know.”
I forced five more bites of food into my mouth before standing.
“See you,” I managed to get out to Imogen.
She lifted a finger away from the glass of water at her mouth to say farewell—or maybe to say wait for her.
Whatever. She could do what she wanted. I dropped off my half-eaten tray at the counter. Imogen moved in that direction, too—but too slow for me to wait on her.
Jack rolled away from the wall when he saw me coming.
“What’s going on?” I hissed as we stepped out of the cafeteria.
“Not here.” Jack started off down the hall. The intensity of his answer combined with his fast pace kept me quiet. The hallways were darkening as nightfall neared, and wall sconces flickered on, interspersed every fifteen feet or so down the hallways. To distract myself, I counted fifty-five wall sconces before we stopped in front of a door marked in black metal with the number forty-four. He pressed the handle down and motioned for me to enter.
From the hall, I could see the concrete room had just enough space for a metal bunk bed and a small wooden desk. A basic reading lamp sat on top. The bottom mattress had been covered with a white sheet and topped with a thin pillow. The top mattress held a pile of black clothes—more tights and shirts.
“I’m not going inside of here until you tell me what they’re doing with Finn.”
“Get in the room.”
“No. I’m not going—”
Jack placed his hand on my back and half-ushered, half-shoved me into the room. From the hall, he glanced right, then left, then stepped inside and shut the door behind him. The intensity of him and me in such a small space competed with my terror about Finn. It was that pull to him again, and I wondered how other girls, those he’d met outside of life threatening situations, were ever be a
ble to resist him at all. Maybe they weren’t.
He spoke before I could ask questions. “If I’m going to help him, I’ve got to go now.”
I didn’t know what Jack meant by that, but it sent me into a tailspin, my body felt like it would explode and crumble to the ground in a million pieces. I felt more desperate than I had in my entire life.
“But I thought your dad didn’t want to kill us yet.”
“There are worse things,” Jack replied. My body froze in place, unable to ask just what those things might be. “Here. Take this.” Jack pressed a tiny piece of plastic into my hand. “It’s an earbud. Yours won’t be turned to talk, but you will be able to hear what’s going on.”
My voice rose, even though I tried to keep it contained. “Did you plan this? Did you know it was going to happen?”
“Did I plan this? Sage, who do you think I am? Really? Do you not trust me at all?” Jack cursed and pounded the wall once with his fist. “You think I wanted this to happen?”
“What is happening, Jack? What?”
My hand gripped the back of the chair, my knuckles turned from red to white. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to hear the answer, so I didn’t wait for him to reply. “I’m coming with you,” I said.
Jack shook his head. “You can’t come. Trust me. I’ll get to him.”
“Trust you? That’s my brother!” I shoved the chair into my desk.
Jack turned to go.
“What will you do once you get to him?” I said.
“I’m buying us time. That’s all. From there, we improvise.” He tapped at his ear. “Listen to the bud. You’ll know everything when I do.” With a single, concise movement, Jack disappeared into the hall. There was nothing for me to do but listen and wait.
The Mod Code Page 7
