“Patrick?” I call out.
Nothing.
I inhale sharply and pull back my tense shoulders as I make my way down the hall. When I approach the sliding door, it slowly recedes. The bedroom is dim, but I can still make out Patrick’s silhouette. He’s lying on a king-size mattress with his legs planted on the floor, dressed in a pair of soccer shorts and a loose fitting T-shirt. His hands are covering his face, and when I take a few cautious steps forward, his arms fall to his sides and he pushes himself up. As he swipes his hair away from his forehead, I can see his eyes are rimmed with red, like he’s been crying. The only other time I’ve ever seen him like this was at my dad’s funeral.
“Now’s not a good time, Ree,” he says, his throat completely hoarse.
“I know; I just ran into Zoe,” I reply. “She went down to the garage to get her tab from her car.”
There’s a beat of awkward silence between us. Then he sighs, like he isn’t thrilled that I knew she was here.
“Well, I’m pretty tired. It’s been a long, shitty day and—”
“Listen, Patrick, we need to talk.”
He laughs. “Do you have any idea how much talking I’ve done in the past twelve hours? My voice is almost gone.”
“I don’t care; this is important,” I say, grounding myself by pressing down on the balls of my feet.
“What about when I wanted to talk earlier? If I remember correctly, you’ve been ignoring me,” he counters.
“I went to Orexis to meet you, but the press had the place surrounded. Ask your mom. She saw me there. You’re the one who’s playing games.”
He stands up and rubs the back of his neck. “I can’t do this now. Let’s just talk tomorrow, okay?”
“Pat, I’m not leaving here until you tell me why you keep lying to me.”
“What? I’m not lying to you.”
I roll my eyes. “Really? That’s the best you can do?”
Patrick lets out a disgusted huff and tries to leave the room, but I block his path.
“When I was in Elusion tonight, my Escape practically disintegrated. Is that what sent Anthony Caldwell and those other kids into a coma?” I say, my voice practically shaking.
“Your Escape disintegrated?” His breath catches hard on each word as he steps away from me, seemingly stunned.
“First it decomposed and then everything around me started to vanish. My emotions were raging, too. Indescribable fear mixed with uncontrollable anger. And I saw my dad again. How can you explain all that?”
“Did you go back in there on your old tab?” His face contorts into a tight grimace. “You did, didn’t you?”
“This isn’t a downloading issue with my tab and you know it,” I snap. “There are hundreds of reporters downstairs right now, here to ask you if these kids that are being found are getting hurt because of Elusion—and none of them were using my tab.”
A flash of pain crosses his eyes as he drops back down on the edge of his bed.
“You owe me an explanation. If my father were here, he’d demand one, too. Or . . .”
“Or what?” he asks, twisting his head toward me.
“I’ll talk to the media. I’ll tell them that I’ve been to the warehouse. That I see visions of my dead father while I’m in Elusion. I’ll tell them everything.”
“So you’d betray me? Like Josh did with those photos?” Patrick narrows his eyes at me. “I thought you and I . . . After everything we’ve been through together, I thought we were family.”
I recognize his tone of disbelief. I can’t believe this is happening to us either. Last week, we meant everything in the world to each other, and now it’s like we’re becoming enemies.
“I don’t want to. I really don’t,” I murmur. “But I will if I have to.”
When he doesn’t respond, my lower lip begins to tremble. I can’t cave now, but I can’t quite let go of our history together. This is so much harder than I thought it would be.
“Please, Pat. Talk to me.”
He sniffles and wipes at his nose. “Okay. There are some problems. With Elusion.”
The second he makes this admission, the air in the room feels a lot cooler, like someone just broke the thermostat. It’s actually kind of soothing.
“Hackers are hijacking the signal between the Equip and the visors so that they can dismantle some of the safety settings and adapt the programming,” he continues.
“Just like Josh said.”
Patrick grips the mattress hard with his fingers. “Those morons don’t comply with the product directions. They do whatever the hell they want, regardless of how dangerous it might be. And then who gets blamed? The manufacturers, the programmers, and everyone else in between! We’re the ones who get sued and—”
I throw up a hand to put a stop to his oncoming tirade. “How were they able to do it?”
Patrick swallows hard. “I’m not sure, but there’s a chance that the new company that hosts the main server connected to the app cloud isn’t carrying out the security protocols correctly, which would make it easier to hack in.”
I think back to the day I went to Patrick’s office with the QuTap. He and Bryce were in the middle of a conversation that I was only half listening to at the time, but now it’s all materializing in my head.
“I just found out that a couple months ago the board of directors approved a measure to outsource it to the people who maintain the emergency server instead of keeping it here, where it can be controlled and protected with the highest levels of security.”
“Why would they want to do that?” I ask.
“Well, safety measures cost a lot of money. I guess when the CIT approval was just pending, they saw this as a way to trim some fat off the budget and—”
“Are you kidding me? Orexis is already making a killing, and Elusion hasn’t even hit the national market yet!”
Patrick lets out a frustrated growl. “I just need a little more time, Ree. I can fix this!”
“How are you going to do that?”
“I can try to get the board to void the new contract somehow. I’ll put together a full report of all of the incidents this month, something really convincing.”
“Wait a sec, this month? What are you talking about? The only incidents on record have been from the past week.”
“Something else happened. A week or two before I heard about Nora,” he says, his shoulders hunching forward. “We got this anonymous tip on our customer service site. Someone wrote in to say that the Equip safety function, the one that cuts off the sensors in the visor and the wristband if the levels of serotonin and dopamine are too high, wasn’t working. Because the signal between the app and the device had been disrupted.”
“So . . . are you saying people could become addicted if they’re able to reconfigure the signal?” My heart lodges itself in my chest as I wait for Patrick’s response.
“It might be possible. We haven’t verified that yet, though.”
“Then why did you deny it when Josh confronted you?” I ask.
“Come on, Ree. There’s no way I could have said anything. We didn’t have a shred of data to support the claims, and all of that information is beyond confidential. I shouldn’t even be telling you this. Do you have any idea how much trouble I could get in?”
I let out a sarcastic chuckle. “Like you’re not in trouble right now?”
“You know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t. I don’t get how you can sit there and say you shouldn’t be telling me what I have every right to know!” I shout.
“Well, I have responsibilities that you couldn’t possibly understand,” he yells back, leaping up from his bed and pointing at me. “I feel bad that there have been some mishaps, but I’m the one who is getting burned at the stake here, for things that aren’t even my fault. And I have to answer to the stupid board, and investors, people who have put all of their money and time into this project. You don’t! If things blow up any further, my career, my reputat
ion, and everything else in my life is ruined. So please spare me the dramatics, okay?”
I’m completely unfazed by his attack on me. Maybe it’s because I can hear Cathryn’s voice telling me that Patrick is in over his head and isn’t meant for the immense stress of big business. Maybe it’s because of the way he’s biting his lip, like he does when he’s feeling guilty about something he’s done or said. Or maybe it’s because he really is family to me.
The thing is, none of it matters more than the safety of innocent people, and my father’s legacy.
“What else is wrong with Elusion? The hijacked signals can’t account for the Escapes being unstable. I haven’t done anything to dismantle the settings on my Equip or the app,” I say.
“This conversation is over,” Patrick says, and this time he pushes right past me, practically knocking me over as he leaves the bedroom. I wobble a little but then catch myself on a nearby dresser and follow him out into the hall. There’s something bigger going on here. I’m still not getting the whole story.
“And what about my dad? Why am I seeing him in Elusion?”
He doesn’t even turn around. He just keeps walking away.
“Answer me, Patrick! Someone spray-painted fifty-twenty on the wall of the warehouse. I know that number means something.”
“I want you to leave,” he says.
“I know it’s dangerous! You need to recall Elusion, and stop the national release. You need to do it before somebody gets killed.”
“You don’t know anything!” he shouts as I follow close behind. “None of these stories can be substantiated. Even the doctors don’t have conclusive reports.”
“I have proof!”
He stops so fast I almost run into him. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks, turning around to face me.
“It means . . .” I hesitate as I meet his eyes. “I have files from your computer.”
He backs away from me as if I slapped him.
“When I came to Orexis to visit you the other day, I copied them onto a QuTap.”
“You’re not capable of translating quantum files,” Patrick says, squinting with confusion.
I shift my eyes away from him.
“Of course,” he says, a coldness in his voice I’ve never heard before. “Does this have anything to do with your new friend Josh?”
I don’t respond.
“No one will be able to crack the files on that QuTap,” he says, taking a step toward me. “Your father was the best cryptologist I’ve ever known, and he’s the one who encased them.”
“We’ll see about that,” I say, as I move toward the door. It whooshes open, sensing my body movement. Before I can walk out, Patrick’s fingers wrap around my bicep and he squeezes, just enough for me to become momentarily frightened of him.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done? You stole valuable corporate information. It’s a felony—you could go to jail for this, Ree.”
I look him in the eyes, and when I notice they are beginning to water, my legs buckle. I feel his hand slipping down my arm, his thumb tracing my skin from my elbow to my palm. After what I just told him, Patrick is still concerned about me. And if that’s true, shouldn’t I still be worried about him, even though he’s letting me down in a way I never imagined he could?
But when I stare even deeper into his eyes, I finally see the desire-filled look that Josh informed me about in Elusion. It scares me more than the forceful way he took hold of my arm only seconds ago. More than disintegrating Escapes or visions of my dead father.
“You have one day,” I murmur.
Then I bolt out the door and don’t look back.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
..................................................................
FOURTEEN
IT’S NEARLY FOUR A.M., BUT I’M WIDE awake. The light is on beside my bed, my copy of Walden open on my lap. I’ve read it from cover to cover at least a dozen times since I got home from Patrick’s apartment a few hours ago, trying to find something in these pages that would make up for the fact that, thanks to Josh, Avery has the QuTap and I don’t.
My focus is almost obsessive; I’m searching for hidden meanings in each sentence, hoping that some kind of pattern might come to light. I pull out my tab and start a list of quotes that seem to connect to each other, or sound like something my father might say, like Begin where you are and such as you are, without aiming mainly to become of more worth, and with kindness aforethought go about doing good. Or Things do not change; we change.
But one line really jumps out at me every time, though I haven’t yet jotted it down:
To be awake is to be alive.
I close the book and reach into my pocket, hoping to find my black stylus there so I can add it to the list, but instead I pull out a wrinkled ball of paper. I smooth it out flat against my book, which is now lying in my quilt-covered lap. As my palms press firmly against the paper, ironing out the folded corners and crinkles in the middle, I look at the words that are written on the page over and over and over again in a frantic scrawl.
HATE OUR NEW LAND
HATE OUR NEW LAND
HATE OUR NEW LAND
I remember picking this note up off the floor in the foyer, where Patrick had thrown Josh up against the wall, most likely dislodging it from Josh’s back pocket. Then something strange happens. Just as I’m about to fold up the paper, the words kind of blur a bit, so that some letters are sharper than others. Next my gaze shifts to the title, which is at the top of the book cover, along with the author’s name.
A gasp escapes from my lips. This can’t be.
I lunge over to the nesting table at the left side of my bed, nearly knocking off the glass of rice milk I went to the kitchen for two hours ago. Thankfully, that’s where my stylus is, so now I can scribble on the screen of my tab and test out my theory to see if it works, or if I’m just delirious from sleep deprivation.
I write the phrase Hate Our New Land, grasping the stylus hard with my fingers, and then begin to rearrange the letters, just like in the word puzzles my dad and I used to play. When I’m through, my heart almost explodes.
Nora’s note is an anagram. The letters also spell out:
Walden Thoreau.
I erase all the letters on the tab and write everything out a second time, to make sure I didn’t mess anything up, but there it is, plain as day.
HATE OUR NEW LAND
WALD ENTHO REAU
My heart nearly bursts with excitement. All this time I’ve been looking inside the book for answers, and the words on the cover are what have a hidden meaning. My thoughts are stirring so fast I can barely keep them under control. I begin scribbling on my tab—anything and everything that enters my mind.
“Why didn’t you call me when you got home?”
As I catch my breath, my mother walks into my bedroom, still dressed in her scrubs, returning from her from her shift at the hospital.
“What are you doing back so early?” I ask
She isn’t supposed to be home until seven thirty.
“I was worried,” she says, folding her hands together, and sighs, as if disappointed. “I tried reaching you on your tab for hours. If I hadn’t checked the entry log at the house, I would have called the police. When I call, you answer. Got it?”
It’s as if my old mom is back, the one who was in charge and not afraid to give me a little hell for screwing up. But even though it’s encouraging, I doubt she’s strong enough for the truth. The QuTap is with Avery now, and there’s no telling what she might do with it. Everyone saw how quickly Patrick acted when Avery was just making accusations against Orexis. What she did pales in comparison to my dirty deeds. It’s only a matter of time before the police are banging at my door.
“Whatever,” I say as I scoot up, one hand closing around the paper and the other tucking my tab under my legs. I don’t want my mom to see what I’m up to. Ever since
I found the Zolpidem, I’ve been avoiding her. I haven’t been able to rule out her being involved in some kind of twisted plot with my father, especially because of that prescription she wrote for him. Josh may have told me not to jump to conclusions, but I still can’t seem to look at her without thinking the worst.
“What’s with the attitude?” she asks.
I lean forward and turn around, pretending to fluff my pillows as I shove the paper behind me. “You don’t pick up when I call you,” I say. “You didn’t even show up at the appointment to go through dad’s lockbox.”
“I see,” she says, her brow furrowed with concern. “So that’s what this is about? You’re angry with me? Trying to teach me a lesson?”
“No,” I say abruptly. What am I doing? I don’t want to fight with my mom. She just returned to work. I should be encouraging her, not acting like a bratty kid. I tell myself I’m just geared up because of my recent discovery and soften the look in my eyes. “I’m sorry. I just lost track of time.”
My mom tugs a clip out of her hair, which uncoils onto her shoulders. She walks over and sits on the edge of my bed. “No,” she says. “I’m sorry. I know I’ve let you down lately. You’ve had to be strong for the both of us. I didn’t realize what a burden I was placing on you.”
Oh God. I suddenly feel a million times worse. “It’s not you,” I say, trying to backtrack. “This isn’t a big deal. Really. I’m just . . . tired.”
“Why are you still awake?”
“No reason,” I say, with a shrug.
She glances behind me, where a corner of the paper is peeking out. And that’s when I know she’s on to me. I grab for it, but not fast enough. She whisks Nora’s paper out from behind me and stands up. “Is this from your boyfriend?” she asks, waving it in front of me.
“My boyfriend? No!”
My mom sighs. “If you don’t trust me enough to share this with me . . .”
Elusion Page 21
