Elite (Citizen Saga, Book 1) (11 page)

The bowl started to fall from my hands, but somehow Trent caught it, as I took a step back and spun on my heels, walking swiftly away from the cart and the dim sums and a situation that was about to blow up in my face.

I'd made a mistake, thinking naively that I could use Trent's presence as a cover. A man who looked every inch a Citizen, better than I did at the moment even in this summer dress. But I'd needed to get a better look at what was happening here. I'd needed to make sure my alias was well and truly lost.

And she was. Lena Carr couldn't be saved now. My last gift from my father slipping out of my hands and being crushed under the boot of Wánměi.

"Selena!" Trent called, appearing beside me. "What's the matter?"

I kept walking, wanting to be anywhere but here. Wanting to curl up in a little ball and cry useless tears for a father who had been dead for ten years and a world that seemed so very wrong.

"Selena," he tried again and then a voice I had hoped to avoid joined him.

"Selena? Selena Carstairs? What on earth are you doing here?"

I stopped dead in my tracks, because you didn't run from a Cardinal. Even if he hadn't identified himself as such. I felt Trent tense beside me, his gaze already telling him what my mind had recognised.

I had no choice. I had to turn.

I faced him, looking up into familiar brown eyes, noting absently that they were definitely not dosed.

"Cardinal Chew-wen Wang Chao," I said softly. "What a wonderful surprise."

I knew instinctively, neither one of us believed that. At all.

Fuck, this was bad. General Chew-wen's son, staring down at Selena like he wanted to drag her off this offending street and haul her in front of his father.

"Selena," he said again, his voice clipped and authoritative. "This is not a place for you,
toétèi
.
" He called her "his treasure." I understood now why he was so keen to protect her from the disturbing sights of a Citizen zoned
Wáikěiton
street. I glanced at Selena to see her reaction, grateful there was no simpering or swooning on her part.

I guess he'd look good to most women in his pressed cream suit and flowing red cloak. Cleanly shaven, haircut Wánměi approved. The gold buttons on his shirt, I noted absently, were polished to a high gleam and devoid of any engravings.

My eyes came back to his stern face. I was taller than him, which amused me. I straightened my shoulders, and moved to Selena's side, offering silent support at her back. I even lifted a hand and placed it against the curve of her spine, pushing my advantage home.

The sharp eyes of Chew-wen's son flicked to me, any softness that had been on display for Selena now gone.

"Why are you here, Wang Chao?" Selena asked, drawing his focus back to her instead of me. I wasn't sure if she'd done it purposely. But she wasn't pulling away from my touch either.

I smiled.

"Cardinal business," he snapped. "This street is not safe."

"Not safe for an Elite?" Selena asked innocently. Almost too innocently. I forced myself not to check out her expression, keeping my attention on the threat opposite me instead.

His eyes darted down the length of her sundress; not quite Elite appropriate.

"What are you wearing?" he demanded.

"Do you like it?" she asked and proceeded to pirouette in front of us. For a second I forgot we were on a street conversing with the enemy, my eyes locked on the dancing form of the woman before me. I noticed, once I managed to pull my gaze away and actually breathe, that Wang Chao was just as lost as I had been.

"It's lovely," he conceded. "But hardly your usual attire."

"I felt like a change, and as I was intending to try out the dim sums, at this street vendor I had heard so much about, I thought it appropriate for my day."

"Return home," he instructed.

She affected a pout. It was quite good, I must say. But also not the Selena I had come to know. She was playing him. And I suddenly felt dreadfully scared. He was a tiger and she was the mouse. No. The zebra, about to be eaten alive. But she acted as though he was nothing more than a delightfully enchanting pussy cat and she the butterfly that teased just out of reach of his claws.

"You so like to spoil all my fun," she announced with a smile. His face softened. Just minutely.

"And you like to upset my day," he threw back, almost a banter, but I couldn't see the formidable Chief Overseer's son joking like that under normal circumstances.

She laughed breezily and then looked over his shoulder as though only just noticing the rest of the street. This woman noticed everything, I'd hazard a guess Cardinal Chew-wen was aware of that fact as well. She said, "Why are there so many drones here, Wang Chao? Are you about to make an arrest? I'd love to see you in action."

Oh, but she was good.

"
Toétèi
," he said with surprising patience. "This is a side of my work I do not wish for you to observe."

His eyes abruptly left her face and landed on me. His entire being changed in an instant and there had been absolutely no warning at all.

"Introduce me," he instructed.

"Cardinal Chew-wen Wang Chao," Selena said immediately, aware the situation was deteriorating but still amazingly keeping her cool. "This is Citizen Trent Masters, a new acquaintance."

"Prepare for iRec," he advised and a chill raced down my spine. It wasn't Selena who was playing Wang Chao. It was him playing her and I think she might have known it.

No wonder this woman did what she did. She was more than trapped, being the god-daughter of this Cardinal's father, she would be often in his company and subjected to his mood swings and subtly threatening words. She knew what she was about to face when she'd turned on this street, and she hadn't baulked. Didn't even blink. The only way she could manage that was if she had an escape to retreat to afterwards. Her night time pursuits offering her a life she wouldn't otherwise have had.

"Of course," I murmured, moving so he could cup my chin with his fingers. Much like a drone, an iRec unit was strapped to his arm, which proceeded to scan my eyeball on his command.

A hum and a buzz, and then Shiloh announced out of the little device, "Citizen Trent Masters. No warrants issued."

He looked disappointed, but lowered his hand.

"You keep illustrious company, Citizen," he remarked.

"I merely offer a guard," I replied.

"How did you meet?" he demanded. Selena remained thankfully silent, interrupting would only increase the danger and she wasn't stupid.

"Honourable Carstairs served at a charity I frequent. I mentioned the dim sums. Now we are here."

His eyes darted to Selena. "You and your voluntary work. Father always wondered why you bothered."

"To be Elite is to set an example, Cardinal," she offered. "I am fortunate to be able to show those beneath me the model Wánměi way."

He stared at her a moment longer and then glanced back down the street.

"Don't come here again,
toétèi
,"
he said softly, but there was something in his tone that set off warning bells. "You might be pulled into an event that a model Elite should not be."

"I know your work is often harsh, Wang Chao," she offered, reaching forward and placing a hand on his arm in what appeared genuine concern.

I wondered why she wasn't cutting and running. I wondered why she was dragging this out even though it looked like Wang Chao was prepared to let us both go with only veiled threats. She was taking a risk.

Being reckless.

And I had a sudden sinking feeling there was a reason why.

His eyes came down to where she touched him and he lifted a gloved hand and placed it over her fingers, gripping her possessively. I forced myself not to growl out loud.

"Will you catch him?" she asked, looking almost adoringly up into his eyes. If I couldn't see how pale her face was, I would have believed the act.

But for the moment, he was the one trapped; a cat and mouse game that I reluctantly found fascinating to watch. Even as my insides were being twisted and churned.

"It's not a him,
toétèi
,
" he said emphasising the endearment. "Sometimes the worst offenders can be of the fairer sex and right under your nose."

"Indeed," she said with only a slightly shaky smile.

Wang Chao laughed. It sounded as threatening as the tone of his words.

"Do not fear, Selena. I always get my... woman."

And OK, the growl was audible, but thank God Selena was talking and covered the sound.

"But does she deserve you?" she was saying.

He cupped her cheek, it wasn't entirely tender, his eyes fleetingly flicking towards me to make sure I was watching - as if I could look anywhere else while he pawed her delicate skin - and said, "This one will receive the full extent of my power."

"Has she done you so wrong?" Selena queried quietly.

"She threatens
all
of Wánměi," the Cardinal replied, then clipped his heels, offered me one last glower, and walked away.

We stood there a few seconds longer, unable to move. For me, because I was acutely relieved to have escaped such a close call. For Selena, I think, because she was upset and could hardly breathe. Her eyes full of unshed tears, her skin ashen, her chest rising and falling above her sundress.

"Are you going to tell me what just happened?" I asked softly at her side.

She jerked, her whole body rocking at the motion, moist, and fuck me, panicked eyes flicking up to my face.

"Get me out of here," she pleaded, a rawness on her beautiful pale features that I had never seen before.

I clasped her hand in mine, rejoicing in the feel of smooth skin that fit so perfectly, and led her away.

And the entire time she kept flicking longing glances over her shoulder down the street. Past Cardinal Chew-wen Wang Chao. Past the drones and the stall vendors and the people trying to go about their business while in the shadow of the Overseers' presence on the street. Past everything it seemed, until we turned the corner and my eyes lined up with the direction of hers and I saw what she was staring at, looking at, allowing herself one last loving glance at, before she left for good.

An apartment in a nondescript building, the curtains fluttering in a slight breeze, as though someone inside had just walked past. And across the street two drones watched the movement, their attention mirrored in the rest of the fleet dotted throughout
Elliott
Street.

Now, who did she know lived there? And why did she feel their loss so acutely?

He knew. Wang Chao knew, somehow, that the person they sought in that apartment building was me. I'd never been faced with this type of terror before. I'd never compromised my alias to such a degree. My father had gifted me Lena Carr as a way to mix with the lower classes and not be seen. I don't think he'd intended for me to use her as I had done. Because I realised now, that those who knew me would put the two sides of myself together with ease.

Selena Carstairs. Lena Carr. Too close. Too obvious. And Wang Chao had made the connection easily, I feared. But why had he not pounced?

His words were simply a warning. A precursor to something else. It had always been a game with him. A hint here, a sly look there, a surreptitious touch that meant more than it seemed.

And now I was in limbo, waiting for him to follow up the act and make his intentions clear.

I wasn't sure if I could even go back to
Parnell
. But there was nowhere else for me to go.

I pulled my cellphone out of my handbag and thumbed through my saved messages, hitting send on one that I fired off to both Tan and Aiko. The message read:
Can't make our date tonight; something's come up.
But what it meant was, don't get in touch, I'll contact you when it's safe. Then I pulled the back of the unit off, removed the SIM card and crushed it under my foot.

It was only then that I realised I'd done this all in front of Trent.

"Well," he said, from his side of the empty Elite train carriage. "That was interesting."

"I'm having a bad day," I admitted.

"Yes," he replied softly. "I believe you are."

My hands shook as I returned the useless device to my bag. I cupped them in my lap and stared out the window of the train. The seat beside me moved as Trent's weight made the cushions depress.

"Your stop is next," he remarked, looking up at the light blinking over Parnell Station on the Rap-Trans map. I followed his gaze as the train began to slow.

Neither of us said anything as Shiloh announced the train station and said the obligatory
mind the platform gap
warning. We were still sitting there when the doors closed again and the train moved out.

I'd burned Lena Carr. And now I'd lost the doctored Shiloh unit my father had left me, too. And, if things were as bad as I feared, I'd forsaken the only other thing he had given me, as well.

My real name.

Until I knew what Wang Chao wanted in exchange for holding off on arresting me, I couldn't risk going home. I couldn't risk Tan and Aiko. There was no Yeh Zhang Yong to turn to. I didn't know Harjeet well enough to ask for another favour and I already owed him for one useless one. And all my other acquaintances were for black market purchases and miscellaneous transactions. Not a solid enough relationship to call on in my hour of need.

I was destitute. No longer Elite. Not even a Citizen.

I felt strangely numb.

"So," Trent started. "Any plans for tonight?"

I turned slowly to look at him, taking in the rumpled t-shirt from a day out in the sun and heat, the roughed up almost too long hair sticking up at odd angles, the deep blue smiling eyes. I didn't even know him at all and maybe that made the decision easier. Risking him held no emotional response in me. He was here. He was capable. He'd use me in a flash if the tables were turned.

"Take me to your place," I announced boldly. His eyebrows crept higher, but the glint of laughter in his eyes didn't abate.

"What if my place is a secret?" he asked.

"Is it?"

"If I tell you, I'd have to kill you." He winked.

"I'll take that risk."

"You would," he muttered, running a hand through his hair again.

"It is a secret, isn't it?" I guessed. He let a huff of breath out on a laugh that didn't sound amused.

"You have no idea, Elite."

Silence hung between us, and then I quietly said, "I'm not sure I can claim that title anymore."

He sat very still for a very long time and then lifted intense blue eyes to my face.

"Do you need anything from your home?" he asked. "Because I know this really decent cat-burglar who could probably get it for you."

I smiled for the first time since we'd left
Wáikěiton
for good.

The smile fell when I realised how difficult getting into my apartment would now be. My Shiloh would lock down if Wang Chao tried to gain access. That was something at least. The unit inoperable afterwards. But I was sure they'd eventually pull her apart and find all my secrets.

For now though,
Parnell
was off limits.

"I can't go back. You don't know him."

"I heard his threats."

Wang Chao hadn't actually made any, but the hint of what he meant was in the tone, the well chosen words. Trent had seen through him, which would make this evening go better if I could appeal to his softer side.

Hopefully he had one.

"What I meant, though," he said after a lengthy pause. "Was is there anything of significance left in your home. Something... important, say?"

I looked him steadily in the eyes well aware that even if he had a softer side it was hidden behind his desire to get that file full of Sat-Loc codes. It shouldn't have mattered. It served a purpose. He'd take me in just for that file alone. I didn't need him to
want
to help me. I just needed him to offer me a safe place to stay.

The reasons behind it were irrelevant.

"It's securely tucked away," I replied, forcing myself not to reach for my breast and lead him right to it.

I wondered if he'd have an opportunity to stumble upon it in due course. The idea held appeal, even if him getting distracted by the thumb-drive would be the height of rejection in the throes of a passionate embrace.

The image, for some reason, made me smile.

"Now why have you got that damn sexy look on your face, Selena?"

"Lena," I corrected. "My friends call me Lena."

"Lena," he repeated slowly, as though savouring the name. "Why didn't I think of calling you that? It suits you.
That
or Zebra."

A burst of laughter left me. Then his fingers picked up a few strands of my hair and my breath caught. He studied them, running the white and black stripes through his hand, then leaned forward and inhaled deeply.

"What shampoo is that?" he asked in a low voice.

"Lily of the Valley," I whispered.

His eyes came up to my face, froze there for such a long moment I thought he was about to kiss me.

But then he said, "You've made yourself distinctive. Although still appropriate, your hair is a statement that must have come to Overseer attention. Why?"

Disappointment thrummed through me, but I pushed it deep inside.

"General Chew-wen," I offered, making Trent frown. "He gave me a choice of colours when my father died. I'd tried every shade in a pitiful attempt to rebel right up until then," - Trent stilled at my words, but I kept going - "and he took it upon himself as my guardian to instil some model behaviour into me."

"What colours did the good General choose?"

"He told me, 'White and black, Selena. You pick.' So I did."

Trent chuckled. "You picked both."

"He hadn't specified one or the other, just white and black."

"And he let you?"

"He'd spoken in front of the entire Overseer council at a party he was holding at his home. They called him out when he tried to get me to change it again later."

"They stood behind you?" Trent asked, surprised.

"They stood behind model behaviour," I corrected and he nodded understanding.

"You don't go back on your word," he murmured.

"Exactly. Elite must rise above mistakes. Even if the mistakes are made by themselves."

"Do you believe that?"

"My father didn't."

"He didn't?" His voice had changed. Hardened. I wondered why.

"He believed in Wánměi," I said. "He believed we were a great nation influenced by too much peer pressure from the outside world. He believed we could become greater still, if we held to certain values and refrained from polluting our bodies through overindulgence. He did not believe that some of us were better than others. He believed we were
all
Elite, living in a society that could provide everything we needed, but kept us safe."

"He was wrong," Trent said harshly, standing from the seat and walking towards the doors as the train began to slow down.

I watched his rigid back, the muscles tense across his shoulders. His reflection in the glass showed a man angry with the world. Or just the part of the world Wánměi existed in.

"Do you think we are destined to become like our parents?" I asked from my still sitting position as the train came to a stop and Shiloh did her thing.

He turned to look at me, puzzlement on his face.

"You think you're not like him, Lena?" he asked, and the sound of my name, the one I heard most often spoken, did unbidden things to my insides.

"I loved him. I miss him," I said. "But I crave to know if there is more than the Wánměi he helped to create." The words came from out of nowhere. I hadn't consciously thought them before, let alone said them aloud.

They resonated with conviction I did not know I had.

They sounded too loud in the moment; a suspended segment of time as the entire world held its collective breath.

He stood there for too long. I expected the doors to swish closed on him at any second, but they somehow remained stationary. Then he lifted his hand and held it out.

"Come on, little zebra," he said, eyes holding mine fast. "You've just performed treason on a Rap-Trans train, it might be wise to run in the wilds for a while in case Cardinals suddenly appear."

I glanced around the Elite carriage and shook my head in disgust. Several cameras were aimed directly at me. They could have been in that position all along. Or they could have changed when they heard me say treasonous things about Wánměi. There was absolutely no excuse for my loose tongue. I was better than this.

I rose and moved quickly through the doors, grasping Trent's still outstretched hand. His free one was placing something in his ear; a communication device that I was sure was off-grid.

"Si," he said softly, pulling me further through the busy station and towards the escalators. "Can you find us? We're at
Rahroh Tohah
."

He stopped abruptly and turned around, pulling me hard behind him. In the background I heard the distinct synchronised
thump-thump
of multiple drone boots on the tiled floors. There could be only one reason why they were in formation and heading down the escalators to this platform. But so soon?

We began to run. Dodging commuters, jumping over bench seats, making shocked Citizens cry out in alarm. Colours flashed past in their mixture of Citizen and the occasional Elite clothing. The sound of the Rap-Trans train starting up again unaffected by the commotion on the platform rumbled through the air. Heat from outside the station battled the air-con units, making sweat bead on my brow and the smell of perspiration en masse reach my nose.

I slammed into a large man, rebounded off a diminutive woman, making her shopping bags spill and scatter the contents across the platform, and still Trent held fast to my hand, dragging me towards the only other exit on the platform.

It shouldn't have surprised me when I saw them at the top of the next set of stairs leading out. Drones could respond quickly and as some were already here, why not more? But still, there were
so
many. I hadn't thought much about it, but it was obvious their ranks had swollen recently. Instead of the odd two drone unit, we were faced with at least twelve. I couldn't help wondering why they were even at
Rahroh Tohah
, of all places; just what did the Overseers expected to happen in Wánměi suburbia?

We skidded to a stop at the base of the stairs, red laser dots immediately moving over our chests from the sPol above. The entire station fell momentarily silent at the ominous sight.

"Halt, Citizens!" one demanded, breaking through the tense air.

Instinct made us pause, but the sound of thumping boots behind us kicked the urge to flee into overdrive. I scanned the area, trying to locate a door leading to a supply closet or maintenance tunnel, but none existed. Panic began to well deep inside. I could scale tall buildings, hang off sky-rise ledges, break through high security electronic defences.

But I couldn't get us off this platform.

Rap-Trans commuters were huddling as far away from us as possible, their eyes large, their faces anything but complacent. Some averted their gaze and pretended to be watching their vid-screens avidly. Others were trying to hide their fear, showing instead anger at the disruption and our obvious non-model behaviour, making them brave enough to shake fingers at us and breach the silence to shout in various languages for us to obey. To submit.