by Lumen Reese
“He's dangerous,” I said, rubbing a hangnail on one finger for the grounding nature of the pain. “That's what you're telling me.”
“He might be. He might be part of an activist group. If anything were to happen to a buyer, we would see unmitigated loss. Have you ever fired a gun before?”
“Yes.” Target shooting, every year on my birthday, starting on my thirteenth. Joey took me. Although we hadn't this past year; he had to work, and we just never made it up. I was upset about it at the time. I hadn't realized the pressure he was under.
“We'll give you one, and everything else you could need. Time is of the essence, we'll be looking at other people we can put on the case, I'd like an answer from you by the end of the business day, tomorrow.”
“I'll do it,” I said. “What are you offering, for compensation?”
He was looking at me again in that intrigued way. “If you find this fugitive, we'll pay you fifty thousand. If you aren't successful, I'll pay you a standard rate for your time… a hundred dollars per day.”
I nodded at that. My heart was racing again, and my mind, too. I'd have to find the fugitive, or it wouldn't make a difference at all, when it came to taxes. If I did, though, we would be okay, for a few years at least. A year's wages at the factory, for one job; maybe a week's work. But I would have to go into that place. Face things that I probably couldn't imagine.
“We'll pick you up tomorrow morning. Are you still in that factory district?”
“No.” I took up the pen again and he pushed a scrap of paper at me. I wrote down Joey's address. Once I laid the pen back down on Mr. Sullivan's desk, we watched each other for a moment.
“I didn't expect this to go so smoothly. I have information for you about the Quarters, the same thing we give to interested buyers. And here, have your file, too. I haven't read it, in the interest of your privacy.”
I accepted the file and the pamphlet he had set on top, then stood. He stood, too.
“I'll walk you out.”
“You don't have to do that,” I rushed, meaning to squash the little trill in my stomach that sparked up at his offer.
“Actually, I do.” He produced his key card from his pocket, and I gave a bashful smile.
“Right.”
His hand went to my back again as we headed to the elevator. I felt warmed, not panicked by it. Something about him was so sincere. It was obvious to me why he was the one, out of the three partners who had built the Four Quarters of Imagination, that was the face of the organization. And it was also obvious to me that any man who ran an organization which bought and sold people could not be as good as he seemed.
He put me in the elevator, leaned in to pass the card over the panel and then pressed the button for the ground floor.
“I'll see you tomorrow, bright and early. Get home safe.”
“Thank you,” I said.
The elevator door closed, cutting us off. It started to sink downward, and almost all at once, I hit the floor. My legs just went, and I fell hard on my ass, jarring the whole thing. Everything that was then imminent was terrifying. Going into Four Quarters. Hunting someone down. And what if I failed? Then I had been given a chance to save my family and let it slip through my hands. It might kill me.
People could die of broken hearts. I had never had to worry about that happening to me before; it was something that happened when you lost a lover. But if having kids sent away could kill a person, then it would be those kids, and I would be that person.
So as the elevator made its descent I grabbed the railing and tugged myself to my feet, tucking the pamphlet into my folder.
And I promised myself, w hatever it takes .
*
Stacey and the kids were all asleep in their rooms when I got back, very late that night. I sat on the couch in the living room with a lamp on and looked at the pamphlet. My two boxes of possessions were there by the end table.
The first section of the pamphlet was for the First Quarter. The Hollow, it was named. It was the smallest of the four. All the story lines that ran through that place focused on old fairy tales. They took place in a snowy little village and miles of woods surrounding it. The buildings were log cabins, there was no electricity in the place. Photographs showed people dressed in leathers and furs hauling bundles of wood, and eating at tables lit by candles. The final picture was of a wolf, sleek and grey, on top of a clutch of rocks, howling at the moon. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
I sent out a silent prayer that I wouldn't have to go to the Hollow.
The second quarter was called Faylan. It wasn't a village, or a city. It was a realm. A place for kings, queens and knights. I wondered if they had a dragon, like the beast in the Hollow, but it seemed unlikely.
The third quarter was the largest in square feet. It not only contained a massive piece of land, with many towns, but half the western sea and several islands. It was called the Golden Age, and it was the home of several thousand pirates. I wondered if that would be the place in the Four Quarters of Imagination that had the most casualties.
The final page had a single word on the top, in gold letters. Wonderland. There were no pictures, only a sentence that took me by surprise.
Come join us in an adventure crafted by the brilliant mind of Jericho Sullivan.
I knew that he and his partner Isaac Buckley were called the head designers, but I imagined that only amounted to funding and lawsuits. The other three quarters were built from mixtures of actual history and old fairy tales. But Wonderland was marketed as completely original. Jericho had created an entire world with a few homages to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
I could hardly imagine.
I had set my file on the table and scooped it up suddenly. It was supposed to contain everything in my head, neatly organized. A part of me didn't want to look, but I was more curious than I was afraid.
There were pages and pages that I quickly flipped through, those were computer printouts, but on the very first page, there was a handwritten analysis.
Ms. Grady is intelligent and courageous. She's a natural problem-solver, and very determined. Losing her father young instilled her with a strong moral compass. She values family more than anything. Tests indicated she would favor placement in the Fourth Quarter, that she would rise to a complex and intensive role. Her physical appearance and attraction to both men and women mean that if she were willing she could be a love interest for a diverse range of buyers.
I stopped reading and closed the file, puffing out a big breath. I dropped it down on the table again. None of it was very accurate, but that was ridiculous. I was hardly attracted to anyone; certainly not everyone. That showed how well their computers worked, thinking that I was some kind of brave, brilliant, bisexual.
I was tired, and turned out the lamp and laid my head down, but sleep didn't come and after a couple more hours, Joey was coming home. I sat up and flipped on the light.
“Oh, Jesus,” he said, “you scared the crap out of me. Sorry, if I woke you.”
“I'm up,” I said.
“What? What is it? You look like you've got indigestion.”
“I got a job. PI work. It's in the Four Quarters, but it's not actually part of Four Quarters. They just have some guy in there who isn't supposed to be in there, and when I went to check the place out they pulled up that newspaper article with my name in it … Pays fifty grand if I can find the guy… Say something?”
I expected Joey to be mad, but his face had drooped so much that it was almost unrecognizable. And he lumbered over to the couch, flopped down and kicked his legs up over the side and laid his head right in my lap, which made me almost laugh.
“What are you doing?”
He blinked, looking up at me. “What did I do?”
Misunderstanding, I answered, “Your best.”
“What did I do to deserve a kid like you?”
“Jesus, I don't know. Don't embarrass me.”
“I don't know
how I did it, but we gotta figure it out so I can do it for the others, too. They all have to turn out like you. -Without the teen years if we can help it-.”
“-God, the teen years. I'm really sorry about those-.” He started chuckling and I added, “I mean it!”
“You weren't such a terror, you know. You never killed anybody, you didn't get pregnant. If I have to endure those teen years with the rest of them to wind up with three more full-grown versions of you, I'll do it. You're good . You always were, that matters a whole lot more than being polite.”
I was blushing, and turned to look at the window, where grey light was starting to come in through the blinds.
Joey added, “Fifty thousand?”
“Yup.”
“Well, that's it, then. I'm not gonna worry anymore. I'm done worrying. You have a shot, you'll pull it off.”
“You think?”
“I know my girls.” He looked out the window, too, and for a moment we were silent. He had to be tired, and I was, too, but I liked the weight of his head on me; as long as he was there, weighing me down, I was safe. Then he said, still looking anywhere but at me, “You've gotta be okay, because I don't know what I'd do if I let you go in there and you got hurt.” His voice was wavering and his eyes were getting shiny.
I couldn't believe it. He had cried about his children, the day before, and of course that had made perfect sense. I couldn't understand him crying about me, or the complicated mix of affection and embarrassment I was feeling. Even more than that, my throat was getting tight, and I knew I shouldn't try to speak but I had to try to put it into words, everything I owed him.
“You took me in. You kept me out of the system. You always let me come home when I was done screwing around, being a little asshole. You saved my life, Joe, and I never did anything to deserve that, I never even thanked you.”
He was crying, silently. He shook his head. “You don't have to. Come here.” And he reached up with both arms and pulled me forward so that I hunched over him, and I hugged him, too, and let him kiss me on the cheek.
“Should get some sleep,” I mumbled after a minute. “They're coming to get me in the morning.”
“It's morning, now,” he observed, letting me go and sitting up with the biggest sigh I had ever heard. It had to be almost dawn. “They won't let me go in with you, or something?”
“No. And you've got work.”
“I just wish you weren't going alone.”
“I'll be fine. I'm in, I'm out, fifty grand.”
I should have told him not to get his hopes up, I realized only after we fell silent again. I'm a screw up, and I'm going to screw this up.
“Does Stacey know?” he asked as he stood, and looked at his closed bedroom door.
I shook my head.
“If we aren't up when they come -and I don't expect I'm getting any sleep, today or any other day that you're in there- come beat down the door. You know, Stacey's gonna wanna hug you, and stuff.”
“Okay.”
He closed his door. I switched off the lamp and laid down. My stomach was churning.
I wish I had known, then, that the fix was in; that there was no way I was ever going to get in, get out, fifty grand. If I knew the scale of it, I would have gone in completely sure that I was screwed, and I wouldn't have bothered to worry about it.
Chapter Four
It was a few measly hours of shallow sleep later that they came and knocked on the door. I asked for a minute, went and tapped on Joey and Stacey's bedroom door, and he was there in five seconds, and she was following, in a white nightgown that she was spilling out of just a bit, her pretty blonde hair a mess. She didn't know what was going on.
“Stella's going away for a bit. She has a PI job. I'll tell you about it later, I didn't want to wake you, but I knew you'd want to say goodbye.”
She pulled me into a hug. “How long will you be gone?”
I was just a bit less comfortable holding Stacey; I adored her, really, but I preferred to do it from afar. “I don't know. Not too long.”
“Be careful,” she said, still sleepy and confused.
And Joey hugged me again, so tight I couldn't breathe. “Don't put yourself in danger.”
“Okay.”
“Write if you can.”
“Okay.”
“Every day, if you can.”
“Okay.”
He let go and I made for the door, turning back as I opened it and giving them a smile. Stacey was starting to get worried from the way we were acting, I could see it, and Joey returned my uneasy smile and that was how I saw them as I closed the door between us.
I wondered if we would exist in the same room, in the same way, ever again.
I got in the back of a black town car and the driver welcomed me and said his name was Michael. I was alone in the back and we headed up to the headquarter building, to the same one I had been to the night before. He stopped the car right in front of the lobby doors, and Mr. Sullivan came out to meet me, opening the door to let me out.
“Welcome back. Did you get any sleep, Stella?”
“No,” I admitted.
“You can sleep on the ride out. It'll be a few hours.”
“Are we taking a train?” I asked.
“No, we'll take the chopper.”
He held the lobby door then put some pep in his step to beat me to the elevator, too, so he could press the button to open its doors. The lobby was mostly empty, though there were three receptionists who took the time to watch me until the doors closed on us and we began to ascend.
Mr. Sullivan said, “Isaac and Kayla Buckley are both here to meet you, and a few lawyers with some paperwork solidifying our arrangement.”
“Are they married?” I asked. “Your partners?”
“They were.”
Something else came to mind. “If I die, doing this job for you, will my family be compensated?”
He blinked at that, and had a curious look for me. “Yes. We'll give them the full amount I offered. You can fill in their names. I don't expect that to happen, you know-,” he began, and then he was stumbling and looked away and then back. “I mean, this should be like a standard bail-bonds assignment, and you've done those before. And we don't even know that this man is a criminal, beyond his trespassing.”
“Just covering the bases,” I said.
He gave a nod, and I hoped it sounded as professional as I thought.
The elevator stopped at the top floor and opened into the spacious floor of the three glass offices. I could see the red-headed woman through the partially open blinds of the middle office, and the door to the office on the eastern side opposite Jericho's opened and a short, slight man stepped out. He had neat-cut brown hair and an unassuming face. When the woman hurried to join us I saw that she was freckled and similarly gentle-looking. She had a green, woven satchel on one shoulder.
“Hello,” the man offered his hand to me first. “Isaac Buckley.”
“And Kayla Buckley, very nice to meet you, Ms. Grady.”
“Nice to meet you,” I said, dividing the greeting evenly between them both.
“Let's gather in my office,” Jericho said. He let us all in first, and two men in suits stood from a cluster of chairs gathered around the massive, polished desk.
The papers were impressive. I signed where they told me to, only perusing them to make sense of the bold words. I could hardly stand all the eyes on me, and I wanted to get on with it already. I put in Joey's name as the beneficiary of compensation in the event of my death, signed a few more things and then the lawyers were sweeping the stacks away, and leaving the four of us alone.
Jericho had another file to give me. “This is what we have for you. The fugitive was caught on camera in the First Quarter, so that's where we'll be sending you first. This is the best resolution we could get-.” He flipped the folder open and there was a hooded man -definitely a man, from his body shape, slender but still square- and the only bit of his face I could see was
an inch of chin.
“I'm guessing his clothes gave him away,” I murmured.
“We're lucky one of our security cameras even spotted him. He hasn't showed up on any of the other cameras that we've detected, and none of our people who live in the Hollow have reported seeing him, either.”
“Show her the buyers,” Isaac prompted, and Jericho flipped a page.
“Keep this with you. These are all the buyers we have in the First Quarter right now. Try not to interact with them, they shouldn't interact with you either. Anyone else, any of the Extras around should be at your disposal and help you anyway you can. Don't worry about money, your way is paid, once you get in. There's an inn for you to bunk in, at the Hollow.”
“Here.” Kayla Buckley offered me the bag she was carrying. “These are for you, I nicked them from supplies.” She winked. “We can't have you walking around in modern clothes, ruining the experience.”
“What am I forgetting?” Jericho asked, appealing to both of them.
Isaac said, “The hand-held.”
“Right.” Jericho pulled a black phone from one of his desk drawers. “Call when you find anything, if you need anything, if you locate the fugitive. You'll get me directly. If we need to contact you, I'll send a message. Go someplace out of public view and call me back. This phone also has a tracker in it. Keep it on your person, as a precaution.”
“Right,” I said, making sure they knew I was still with them.
“I think that's it.”
Isaac said, “I think that covers it.”
Kayla, though, leaned closer to me where she was perched on the edge of Jericho's desk. “Jericho told you we were looking at some others, didn't he?” I nodded. “We'll let you know if we send someone else in, but you've got the jump on them, and I've got a good feeling about you.”
She was smiling. She had an honesty about her, the same way Jericho did, and Isaac was not off-putting, either. I could hardly believe the three of them were responsible for such a large faction of the modern slave-trade. Which led me to believe I was missing something fundamental about them, or about the Four Quarters. I decided that as soon as I had Jericho alone again, I would ask him bluntly about the discrepancy. It wasn't very like me, but I had -somewhere around the time I signed the life insurance form- decided that I was not going to act like myself while I was in that place.
