Erased (Altered)

by Jennifer Rush

“Anna,” he said with a quick exhalation, “you know it’s not safe, and—”

  I couldn’t hold the tears in anymore.

  They came pouring out. I scrunched my eyes closed as I tried to get control of myself, but it was no use. My breath quivered, and Dad caught on instantly.

  “Where are you? Are you still in Michigan?”

  “Yes.”

  “What meeting place are you closest to?”

  A week after we’d escaped Branch headquarters, Dad and I had come up with several meeting places around Michigan, and a few across the country, so that we could tell each other where to meet simply by using a code.

  You could never be too sure about a secure line, or privacy, for that matter. The man wearing a business suit and bright-red tie hovering at the newspaper stand behind me could very well be a Branch employee.

  I had to be careful. Always.

  “I’m closest to location four.”

  Four was code for Millerton, Michigan, just outside Grand Rapids, and Dad and I had agreed to meet at Millerton Park, in the center of town, if location four was ever needed.

  I’d never been there before, but I’d consulted the Michigan map when Dad and I came up with the locations. I knew how to get to the park easily enough.

  “I’m three and a half hours away,” Dad said. “I’ll meet you there soon.”

  I sucked in a breath. “Thanks.”

  “Just be careful till I get there. Okay?”

  “I will.”

  “And Anna?” he asked. “Are the boys with you?”

  I squeezed my eyes shut again and wrapped the phone’s cord around my finger. “No. I’m by myself.”

  Dad sighed, like he’d expected that answer. “I’ll see you soon, okay?”

  “Hurry, please.”

  “I will.”

  I bought a coffee and a cake doughnut from the gas station and then sat in the parking lot, stuffing my face.

  Since I didn’t want to arrive at location four too soon, I waited around the gas station for at least an hour, then navigated back to the freeway. I arrived at Millerton Park just before nine.

  The park was situated in the middle of town and covered a total of five acres. There were at least six different parking lots, so Dad and I had agreed to meet on a park bench near the center, where the fountain was.

  I plopped down on a bench, zipping up my coat against the cold. Behind me, the fountain was dry, the base cluttered with trash and dead leaves. The playground just over the next hill was empty.

  It seemed to take my dad forever to show, and when he finally did, we stood awkwardly, each waiting for the other to do something. Dad and I weren’t the hugging type.

  “It’s good to see you,” he said, stuffing his hands in his coat pockets.

  “You, too.”

  I took a second to look Dad over. He seemed like he’d aged a lot in the weeks since I’d last seen him. There were new wrinkles bursting from the corners of his eyes and new laugh lines hugging his mouth.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “I’m feeling all right. And you? You look skinnier. Are you eating well?”

  “Yes. I’ve been running regularly with the boys.”

  Neither of us acknowledged the reason behind my sudden interest in endurance and physical training. After all, Dad was partially responsible for this new way of life. He’d been a Branch employee for a long time. And he’d headed the program that’d altered the boys and me.

  But I didn’t blame him. Not really. He’d been doing what he’d thought was right at the time. And he’d helped us when it counted.

  He still felt guilty, though. Which was why I mentioned the Branch as little as possible.

  “Come on,” Dad said, nodding toward the parking lot behind him. “Let’s get out of the cold.”

  I’d planned on ditching Nick’s stolen car anyway, so I’d brought my things. Dad led me to a pickup truck. It was indigo, with a few patches of rust and a white pinstripe along both sides.

  I climbed in and set my stuff on the floorboard. Dad slid in next to me and started up the truck with a bit of coaxing.

  He gave me a smile. “The Branch would never suspect I’d drive an eighty-one Chevy. It’s a good cover car.”

  “I like it.”

  “You don’t have to lie. It smells like stale cigarettes and runs like crap. But it gets the job done.”

  “That’s all that matters.”

  Dad drove south of town, sticking to back roads. The snow had let up some, but driving conditions weren’t the best, and the main streets were a slushy mess.

  “You want to tell me what’s going on?” Dad finally asked. “Last I heard, I was supposed to be looking into a new brainwashing technique at Sam’s request. Now you’re alone, and you need my help. Sam wasn’t brainwashed, was he?”

  “No, at least not that we know.”

  Dad visibly relaxed. “Well, that’s good. I don’t know that we’d be strong enough to go up against Sam.”

  We weren’t.

  “So, tell me,” Dad said.

  “I don’t even know where to start.”

  “From the beginning is usually best.”

  I recounted everything we’d learned. Dad listened while he chewed on a straw. “You suspect Sam killed your parents?” he asked a few minutes later. “That’s quite the theory.”

  “It’s not a theory. It was in Sam’s files. And my uncle was there, too.”

  Dad frowned. “Your uncle?”

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “I don’t know.” Dad shrugged. “I was told you had no surviving family. I suppose I shouldn’t have believed anything Connor told me, but I didn’t know you had an uncle out there. If I had…”

  “It’s all right, Dad. Really.”

  “Yes, well.” He let out a sigh. “Anyway.” He cleared his throat. “So you think the boys could possibly have been programmed with some kind of new brainwashing technique.”

  “Yes. Sam told you about the others we found in Delta lab, right?”

  “He did.”

  “We think maybe the Branch programmed Cas and Sam while they were at Branch headquarters a few months ago.”

  “But”—Dad lifted a finger—“if they’d been brainwashed then, why not activate them during the confrontation at headquarters? Connor could have saved himself a lot of trouble and spared his life if he had. Seems like a waste.”

  I frowned. “Yeah, good point.”

  “And to be honest, Anna, I wouldn’t believe everything I read in those files. Even if Trev’s actions were well-intentioned, that doesn’t mean the information is true.”

  “But how could they have known to plant false information at the time Trev copied the files?”

  Dad thought about that one. “I don’t know. Has the flash drive been in your possession ever since then? Has it ever been out of your sight?”

  “You mean, for someone to add that file?” I asked. Dad nodded. “I’m pretty sure it’s been with Sam since we left our last rental house.”

  “No one has had access to it?”

  “Not that I know… well, wait… Greg. Or either of the other two boys from Delta.”

  “There you have it,” Dad said as he slowed for a traffic light.

  A small feeling of hope spread through me.

  Dad clicked on his blinker. The idling of the truck engine was now the only sound between us.

  Something else wasn’t right; I just didn’t know what it was. I could see the pieces in my head, but I couldn’t put them together. I didn’t think Greg or the others had had the time to alter the flash drive. And even if they had, they would have been fully conscious at the time.

  Greg and the others had seemed grateful for being rescued. And when they were activated, they were completely blank with one sole mission: to take Sam, Nick, and Cas out. Greg had punched Dani, but once she was out of the way, they’d ignored her and gone after the boys.

  There was only one other perso
n who had access to the flash drive: Dani. And she’d been the last to speak to Greg. What had she said to him?

  It was something odd, not a frequently used word. I remembered that much.

  It was… vigilant. Be vigilant.

  Had Dani activated Greg and the others? Hadn’t she tried to get me to leave then? While the boys fought Greg?

  “Where’s your phone?” I asked.

  “Center console.”

  I dug it out and punched in Sam’s number. It rang. And rang and rang and rang.

  I ended the call and dialed Nick. No answer there, either.

  “Can you turn around?” I said. “We need to go back to Grand Rapids.”

  Dad glanced across the truck cab. “You sure?”

  “Yeah. I just… I need to talk to Sam face-to-face. I should have talked to him in the first place.”

  At the next intersection, Dad took a left, made a U-turn when the street was clear, and headed in the direction we’d just come from.

  As he drove, I went over every conversation I’d had with Dani since we’d found her.

  One of the first things we talked about was my relationship with Sam. Nick thought it was odd that Dani hadn’t reacted more to the news, but Sam and Dani had been separated for five years.

  Nick had said he didn’t trust her.

  And he had the best gut instinct of anyone I’d ever met.

  It seemed to take forever for us to reach the condominium complex. Even longer because I couldn’t remember exactly where it was. When we finally pulled into the parking lot and found it empty, I nearly lunged from the vehicle.

  “Wait,” Dad called, but I couldn’t.

  I had to see the boys with my own eyes and assure myself that they were all right. That I hadn’t just made the stupidest mistake I could ever make.

  I’d trusted Dani over Nick, and Sam and Cas.

  Dani may have been blood, but I didn’t know anything about her.

  Nick had warned me, and I’d totally disregarded him.

  Inside, I whipped open the entrance to the stairwell. The elevators were inoperable, which meant I had seven whole flights of stairs to run up before I reached the floor where the boys were.

  “I can’t keep pace with you,” Dad shouted as I pulled ahead.

  “Meet me on the seventh floor, then. It’s unit 722.”

  I made good time up the stairs and stopped at the door to the seventh floor to peek through the tiny square window. The hallway was dark despite the late-morning hour, and nothing seemed out of place.

  With my heart drumming in my ears, I tugged on the door latch and pulled it toward me. It didn’t make a sound. I eased into the hallway. Looked left, then right. Still, nothing seemed amiss.

  I crept toward 722.

  The door was slightly ajar.

  I reached for my gun and peered inside, ducking to make myself a smaller target just in case.

  There was no movement.

  No lights.

  Nothing.

  I nudged the door with my boot and it creaked open.

  Shattered glass glittered on the tile floor. A cupboard door had been ripped off its hinges and lay smashed near the pantry. One of the cast-iron stove burners had been tossed clear across the room.

  I froze just inside the door, knowing that once I searched the condo and found it empty, I’d realize they were really gone, that my sister had betrayed me, that I’d trusted the wrong person.

  So if I just stood here a minute longer, it wouldn’t be true.

  Please don’t let it be true.

  “Nick?” I called out, and my voice seemed to boomerang back at me, as if to say, Who are you talking to? There’s no one here.

  “Sam? Cas?”

  Nothing.

  Dad entered the condo behind me minutes later. “Oh no,” he said.

  I rounded the kitchen island, raced down the hallway, checked the rooms, the bathrooms, the closets. Nothing. No one. They weren’t here.

  I returned to the kitchen to find Dad staring at the stainless steel fridge, at a folded note stuck to the front.

  “It’s written to you,” Dad said, handing it to me.

  I opened it and recognized the handwriting immediately.

  “It’s from Riley,” I said. “ ‘Thank you for your cooperation in this cleanup process. We couldn’t have done it without you. Sam, Cas, and Nick fought valiantly until we told them you were already at Branch headquarters. And then they came willingly. It made my job much easier. PS: The word you’re looking for is erased.’ ”

  I frowned. “What does that mean?”

  Dad walked past me and grabbed the cast-iron stove burner off the living room floor. He said nothing as he swiveled around and stared right at me.

  “Dad?”

  His eyes were blank, unblinking. His mouth was set in a straight line.

  There was no emotion at all on his face as he swung the burner at my head.

  I ducked. Stood. Ducked for a second attack.

  “Dad!”

  He cocked his arm back, swung again. I scrambled around the island backward so I could see the next blow when it came. But I tripped over the detached cabinet door and slammed straight down on the floor.

  I saw the burner come flying toward me. I realized suddenly where I’d gone wrong.

  The Branch hadn’t brainwashed a code word into the boys.

  They had brainwashed my dad.

  25

  I FELT THE LULL OF MOVING TIRES beneath me, but I couldn’t seem to open my eyes.

  Voices rang in my head, calling me back into a dream or an old memory. I couldn’t tell which.

  There was a flash of auburn hair, spinning and spinning. And my hair, blond like dry wheat, tangled around my face.

  “Fly, bird!” Dani shouted. She let me go, and I sailed through the air, landing with a splash. The water filled in the space around me, and I kicked up toward the surface, breaking through with a deep gasp of air.

  Dani laughed. “Was that fun?” she asked.

  “That was awesome!” I shouted back, and she laughed again.

  Sam appeared behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, and I stopped smiling. Because she was no longer looking at me. She was looking at him.

  Air bubbles rose to the surface two feet away from me, and a second later, Nick popped up. He tossed his head back, like a shaggy dog, and water droplets hit my face.

  Cas ran, leapt off an outcropping, and did a cannonball, fanning water over me.

  “Cas!” I screeched when he broke through the surface laughing.

  “You’re such an idiot,” Nick said.

  “At least I’m a good-looking one!” Cas countered.

  I looked to shore. Sam and Dani were gone.

  “You think you can make it to that island over there?” Nick asked.

  I squinted against the sun as I followed his line of sight. There was a small island several yards off, with a cluster of pine trees and not much else. But I wanted to go, mostly because Nick was challenging me to. And I wanted to show him I could make it.

  “Yeah,” I said, and started swimming.

  Cas pulled ahead of me. “I’ll beat you both!” he screeched right before he ducked beneath the water and disappeared out of sight.

  I dog-paddled over because I didn’t know how to swim any other way. Not like Dani. Or the boys.

  Nick swam ahead of me, too, and I paddled faster.

  Soon my arms and legs were tired, and the island seemed a lot farther away than it had when I’d sized up the distance.

  What if I couldn’t make it?

  The doubt wedged into my chest, squeezing my lungs, and I started to panic.

  I flailed, hands slapping against the water, but it didn’t do me any good. I sank beneath the surface, and water filled my mouth.

  The lake seemed to press against me. I stretched with my foot, hoping to reach the bottom, but found only empty space.

  My legs cramped. My lungs were on fire. I needed air. />
  I was going to drown.

  A hand grabbed me by the wrist and hauled me to the surface.

  I sputtered and gasped, drinking in the fresh air like I couldn’t get enough of it.

  “You okay?” Nick asked, and I latched on to him, arms wrapped tightly around his neck.

  “Hey,” Nick said. “Climb on my back, and I’ll swim to shore. Can you do that?”

  I nodded and did as he asked, hanging on to him from behind.

  Cas swam up beside me. “You all right, bird?”

  No. I wasn’t. I felt like crying. “I’m okay,” I said, which made Nick snort.

  Cas rushed ahead of us so he could help pull me out when Nick reached the shore. Cas sat me beneath a scraggly pine tree, on a bed of rust-orange pine needles. Nick reappeared a second later with his navy sweatshirt and draped it around my shoulders.

  “Look at me,” Cas said, nudging my chin with his thumb. “Who am I?”

  “Cas.” My teeth chattered together.

  “What day is it?”

  “Saturday.”

  “She almost drowned, you idiot,” Nick said. “She didn’t get hit by a bus.”

  “Yeah, which means her brain was starving for oxygen, which means brain damage, dickhead.”

  “I’m okay,” I said again, still shivering.

  The boys stared at each other.

  “We can’t tell Dani what happened,” Cas said.

  Nick tugged on his T-shirt. “I was thinking the same thing.”

  I looked up at them hovering over me. “Why?”

  “Because she’d kill us,” Cas answered, running a towel over his head. His blond hair stuck straight up. “Kill us dead. And then kill us again.” He ducked down and ruffled my hair. “There isn’t anything she wouldn’t do for her little bird,” he said.

  We stopped moving. I opened my eyes to blinding sunlight and shoved myself to an upright position. Something tightened against me. A seat belt. Country music played softly through the car speakers.

  Dani was behind the wheel.

  “Hey,” she said.

  I tensed. “Where are we?”

  “You’re safe.”

  “Where’s my dad? And the boys?”

  “They’re safe, too.”

  My head throbbed just above my left eye, and I reached for the spot, not thinking, and winced when I felt a lump. Old blood came away on my fingers. My stomach rolled, and I had to bite down on my lower lip to stop from barfing.