Sloane

by V. J. Chambers

  “Well, we don’t even know who they are, do we?” said Silas. “We don’t know why they snatched Leigh. Or Knox. Or what the hell’s going on.”

  Griffin turned to me. “Sloane, maybe it would be a good idea if you—”

  “I’m not going to Austin.” I turned on my heel and stalked away from them.

  * * *

  “I don’t see why you’re so mad,” said Silas. We were all in the rental car that Griffin and I had gotten when we arrived. Griffin was driving, Silas was in the passenger seat, and I was in the back.

  Of course I was in the back. Once Silas was around, I was suddenly less important.

  He was peering around the front seat. “All we’re saying is that Christa might need some protection. We’re not trying to insult your abilities or something. We trust you to take care of her. It’s actually a compliment.”

  “Stop talking,” I told him.

  “You should at least think about it,” said Griffin. “Silas and I can handle the Boston front.”

  “How do you know that?” I said. “You guys don’t even know what you’re up against. Now, I appreciate the fact that you’re worried about Christa, but that’s not what this is about.”

  “Sure, it is,” said Griffin.

  “Maybe it is for you,” I said. “But, for Silas, it’s all about keeping me away from the action so that nothing bad happens to me.”

  Silas let out an annoyed sigh. “What the hell is wrong with that? You’re my sister. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

  “And I don’t want anything to happen to you,” I said. “But we have no idea what happened to Leigh and Knox. We can’t even be sure their disappearances are related.”

  “They have to be,” said Griffin.

  “You really think it’s a coincidence?” said Silas.

  “I don’t think anything,” I said. “All I’m saying is that we don’t know.”

  They were both quiet.

  “Look, we have to find out what Leigh did while she was here. We have to figure out if she spoke to anyone suspicious—”

  “Good luck with that,” said Griffin. “No one at the hotel will tell me anything. And I’m her husband.”

  “What?” said Silas.

  I rolled my eyes. “Griffin scared the woman at the desk.”

  “Woman?” said Silas. “Why don’t you let me take a crack at that?”

  Griffin glared at him.

  I settled back into my seat. “You can give the manwhore a girlfriend, but you can’t take the manwhore out of him.”

  “You know, I really wish you’d stop calling me that,” said Silas.

  * * *

  Griffin and I were on the other side of the lobby, watching Silas, who was leaning over the counter and talking to the woman back there. We couldn’t hear what they were saying, but the woman had gone pink in the face, and she was laughing now and then. So was Silas.

  He was good at that crap. At charming people. It was the reason that he’d always had girls coming in and out of our apartment before he met Christa. Silas would never have gone to a bar and sat in the corner, afraid to talk to anyone. He wasn’t like me. I completely hated that about him.

  Sometimes I thought that when Silas and I were sharing a womb, he’d managed to suck up all the good stuff. He was charming and decisive and brave, and I was just a wilting shadow.

  At the desk, the woman retrieved a piece of paper from a printer and handed it to Silas.

  He took it, saying something else, and they both laughed.

  I glowered at him.

  Why couldn’t I charm people too? Why was I so damned shy?

  Hell, maybe Silas was right. Maybe I’d be better off guarding Christa. How was I really helping this mission anyway?

  Folding up the piece of paper, Silas waved goodbye to the woman at the counter. He turned and winked at us and then headed for the elevator.

  * * *

  “These are all the calls that came in or out of Leigh’s room,” said Silas, handing me the paper he’d gotten from the woman.

  Griffin peered over my shoulder. All three of us were back in the hotel room that Griffin and I had gotten, but I realized now that it was going to get crowded. Should we get another room?

  “You see that number that’s on there like ten times?” said Silas. “That’s suspicious, right?”

  “That’s my number,” said Griffin.

  “Oh,” said Silas.

  “I was worried about her,” said Griffin.

  “Of course you were,” said Silas. “I should have realized it was you.”

  I sat down on the bed and opened my laptop. “I’ll look up the rest of these numbers.”

  “They’re all incoming calls,” said Silas. “She didn’t call anyone on her own.”

  “Why would she?” said Griffin. “She has a cell phone.”

  “Right.” Silas put his hands in his pockets.

  He and Griffin exchanged a glance. Then they both turned to me expectantly.

  So now they needed me, huh?

  I punched in the first number. I waited. “Oh, this first one is nothing. It’s a wake-up call from the hotel.” I punched in the second one. The result came up. I furrowed my brow. “Oh… that’s weird.”

  “What is?” said Griffin. He hurried over.

  I looked up at Silas. “She got a call from someone at Costello Labs.”

  Silas gave me a blank look.

  “You don’t remember Costello Labs?” I said.

  “Should I?” said Silas.

  “I went undercover at the place,” I said. “I posed as an intern to gather information for French.”

  He looked confused. “Where the hell was I when this was going on?”

  “I don’t know.” I thought about it. I remembered that Silas had been busy. “Maybe it was during the time you were… you know, with Sylvia and stuff.”

  Silas visibly stiffened. He didn’t like being reminded of the fact that he’d been basically hired out as a prostitute during his time at Op Wraith.

  “Anyway, you weren’t around, and French wanted me to be useful, so she sent me there.”

  “For French?” said Griffin. “Why? What was it about that place? What did she want you to do?”

  I took a deep breath, sifting through my memories.

  CHAPTER THREE

  four years ago…

  Jolene French’s office at Op Wraith was tastefully decorated. She managed to make the place look soft and welcoming, yet professional. There were lilies in a vase on a glass table between a couch and an easy chair. French was a psychologist, and she liked to make us feel as if we were going in for a regular counselor’s session when she spoke to us.

  Truthfully, all of us assassins knew that she was only trying to steal our secrets to use them against us whatever way she knew how. We tried to protect ourselves against French as best we could. But she was hard to resist. She could seem kind and good. It was easy to want to confide in her.

  She looked up from her desk as I entered the room, smiling widely as if I was her long lost relative or something. She seemed so happy that I was there.

  “You wanted to see me?”

  “Yes.” She got up from her desk in one fluid movement. She wore a dark blue pants suit with a white blouse beneath. Her makeup was flawless, and she looked too perfect to be real. She crossed in front of the desk to warmly shake my hand. “So happy you could make it, Sloane.”

  I hadn’t really had a choice, but hearing her say that made me feel good regardless. I smoothed the front of my gray jumpsuit. We were required to wear them all the time in headquarters. The only time we got actual clothes was when we went on missions. Wearing the jumpsuit always made me feel like a prisoner, but that might have been the point. After all, if it hadn’t been for Op Wraith, Silas and I would have been in jail for what we’d done. The thing was, being in French’s presence always made me want to look my best, and the jumpsuit made it hard.

  She gestured to the
couch. “Why don’t you have a seat?”

  I nodded and did as she said.

  She settled down opposite me on her easy chair. “How are you?”

  “Fine,” I said automatically.

  She raised her eyebrows. “Really?” she said gently.

  I nodded, trying to look as sure of myself as I could. This was what she did. She poked and prodded. She wanted to know the things that made you uncomfortable or unhappy. The more she knew, the better she could use them to manipulate you.

  “You know, Sloane, if there’s anything you want to tell me, I’m always here. I want to help you.”

  “No,” I said. “There’s nothing.”

  “Do you miss your brother?”

  Silas had been gone on missions a lot lately. Sometimes he was gone overnight. He wouldn’t talk about them, but then he never talked much about that kind of stuff. It was a little worrisome, however, because Silas and I were usually a team. They didn’t send us out individually. If they had a target for us to take out, they sent both of us. I wasn’t sure why he was working without me, but he promised me that what he was doing wasn’t dangerous. “I see him often enough.”

  She regarded me for several minutes, and I felt like she was reading all my secret feelings from my expression, even though I was working hard to keep my face blank. Eventually, she nodded. “All right, then. Even so, with Silas busy, you haven’t had anything of your own to do.”

  “I’ve been training,” I said. “I’ve been working on my hand-to-hand stuff.”

  “I see,” she said. “Well, I have something else to occupy you, but I don’t think it will involve any hand-to-hand combat.”

  I sat up a little straighter. She was sending me on a mission on my own? I was flooded with dread and terror. This was no good. I didn’t go on missions alone. When Silas found out, he was going to flip his lid. Besides, what if I froze up? I always needed Silas there. I couldn’t do it alone. But if Op Wraith found that out… found out I was useless, well they might have me killed. They didn’t keep anyone alive who wasn’t useful.

  But then I felt something else.

  Excitement. I realized that I liked the idea of being trusted to do something on my own, to prove myself, to not need Silas.

  And that disgusted me. Even if I completed a mission on my own, I couldn’t allow myself to feel… proud of killing people. I was being forced to do this against my will. It wasn’t something that I enjoyed.

  I was appalled at the thought that I might someday grow to enjoy it. I gulped.

  French had been watching me closely.

  Shit. Had she seen my emotions flit across my face? I hadn’t said anything, but French had taken pains to know me—and all of the assassins—very well. She might have been able to guess what I was thinking.

  “You’re pleased,” said French.

  “I’m… I’ll do what I have to do.”

  French smiled again, but this was a different kind of smile. It was full of satisfaction, and it made her face twist in a way that disturbed me.

  I blinked.

  And her face was back to normal. Soft and welcoming. “Don’t worry, Sloane, I don’t want you to hurt anyone. This is a different kind of mission.”

  “Different kind?” But killing people was what Op Wraith did. We were assassins for hire. Op Wraith had created us for pure profit.

  She nodded. “Yes, this is more of a… fact-finding mission.”

  I didn’t understand.

  “You got good grades in science in high school.” She was stating this as truth. She had access to all my old school records. “You won a chemistry award.”

  I nodded slowly. What did this have to do with my mission?

  “You’ll be posing as an intern at Costello Labs. They’re a leading manufacturer of medicine. That’s not what I want information about, though. They have experimental products in place as well. Products that might rival some of the things that Dewhurst-McFarland has manufactured.”

  Dewhurst-McFarland was an arms corporation, but they’d worked on prototypes of various biotech weapons. For instance, they’d designed the serum that had made all of us indestructible supersoldiers.

  “You can do that, can’t you, Sloane?” said French. “Get information about their secret labs? You’re such an unassuming little thing. Practically invisible. Once you’re inside, you’ll be able to find out exactly what they’re up to.”

  * * *

  “Wait, I do remember this,” said Silas. “You were out of Op Wraith for like six weeks at that place. It made me crazy, because I couldn’t do anything about it. I was terrified that French was going to force you to do the same kind of work I was doing. She pretty much told me not to interfere, or she’d start sending you off to sleep with guys for money.”

  I felt cold all over. I was glad that Silas had protected me from that. I didn’t know what it would have done to me. But I hated the fact that Silas had been through so much to protect me. Sometimes, it felt like everything that Silas had gone through had created a debt that I could never repay. More than once, he’d done things—horrible things—to keep me alive, to keep me safe. And with all of that piled up in our life, everything always felt unequal between us.

  I wanted to do something for him. Something big. I wanted to take the big fall. I wanted to balance things out a little bit.

  “Well, what did you find out?” said Griffin. “What were they doing in this lab?”

  “I don’t know exactly,” I said. “I stole some formulas and got them to French. I think that they formed the basis of some of the other formulas she created. The injections that erased memory and other things like that. I torched the lab after I did it, and they thought it was an accident. All their research was down the drain, but French had it. Basically, she used me to knock them off at the knees and make Op Wraith even more powerful.”

  Griffin made a face. “That sounds like French, all right.”

  “Well, it’s been years since that happened,” said Silas. “You think that they’ve gotten back to where they were? That they’re making injections like that again?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “They had human test subjects. I saw them. It was awful.”

  “So, they were just like Op Wraith then. Another ethically bankrupt group of people messing with people to make money,” said Griffin.

  “Isn’t that what all corporations are?” I said.

  We were quiet.

  Griffin started to pace again. “Okay, okay. But it still doesn’t make sense. Why would they call Leigh?”

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “You think they’re the ones who snatched her?” said Silas. “The ones who snatched Knox?”

  “We can’t know that. Leigh and Knox have no connection to this lab.” I chewed on my lip. “Unless… unless you count French.”

  “No.” Griffin turned on his heel and glared at me. “Jolene French is dead. She was blown to bits. She never had time to get out of that building.”

  Silas’ jaw twitched. He’d never liked the fact that Griffin had untied French. “We should have made sure.”

  “She’s dead.” Griffin looked back and forth between the two of us, daring us to challenge him.

  “Well, whatever the case,” I said, “we have to follow up with this lead. Costello Labs called Leigh. Dr. James Armstrong from Costello Labs, to be precise. He’s a medical doctor, but he works in research, not with patients. I remember him from when I was posing as an intern. He definitely had ties to secret experiments.”

  “We have to talk to this guy,” said Silas.

  “I think so,” I said.

  “Well, where the hell is this place?”

  “It’s in town,” I said.

  “In Boston?” said Griffin.

  I nodded.

  “Then they’re the ones who took her,” said Griffin. “We have to go and get her back.”

  “We need to be careful,” I said. “We can’t tip our hand. If they do have her, we still don
’t know why. We need more information.”

  Silas folded his arms over his chest. “It seems pretty cut and dry to me, Sloane. I say that Griffin and I go in there and convince this James Armstrong guy to give Leigh back.”

  “I should go in,” I said. “They know me. They think I’m an intern. They never figured out that I worked for French. After the lab explosion, all the interns got let go. I have a way in.”

  Silas shook his head. “No way, Sloane. This might get hairy. I think it would be better if you hung back.”

  “You always make me hang back,” I said.

  “You’ll cover us,” he said. “You’re the best shot long range. It only makes sense.”

  I sighed. “Should we be firing guns already?”

  “I want her back,” said Griffin. “God knows what’s happening to her. I want her back now.”

  Silas gave me a grim look. “We’ll do whatever we have to.”

  “But Silas—”

  “Sloane, if things get really tense, you know that you sometimes freeze.” His voice was quiet.

  Damn it. I looked away.

  “I need you on the periphery,” he said.

  All right. Fine. I’d hang back. The boys could go in up close and personal, and I’d hide out and cover them from a distance.

  * * *

  The rooftop was bathed in afternoon sunlight, but I was shivering all the way up here. It was colder in May in Boston than it was in West Virginia, and I hadn’t come prepared. It didn’t help to be twenty stories up either. It was even colder up here.

  The roof where I was set up looked directly on the Costello Labs building.

  I peered through the telescopic sight of my rifle, spotting Griffin and Silas as they entered the building downstairs.

  They looked so tiny and far away, even through the magnified glass.

  I trained my crosshairs on a security guard who was right at the door. He didn’t seem to be paying Griffin and Silas any attention. Both of them were dressed in suits and looked like businessmen going to a meeting. They walked through the lobby without stopping to speak to anyone. They looked like two guys who knew where they were going, who belonged.

  That simple trick was the most obvious skill an assassin needed, and the hardest skill to master. If you could pull it off though—if you could truly appear to be someone who knew what you were doing, who belonged—then getting through sticky situations was that much easier.