Mindsurge (Mindspeak Book 3) (8 page)

“Girlfriend?” Jonas feigned a shocked hand over his mouth, ignoring me and belittling the girlfriend label. “I thought you two had broken up. ‘Needed space.’” He placed air quotes around the last two words. “That’s what you said this morning. Isn’t that why you deserted Lexi when she practically begged you to be there for her?”

“Jonas, stop,” I said. “It’s okay.” It was actually for the best, because now, I didn’t have to feel guilty about all of the secrets I was keeping from Jack.

Jonas stopped smiling. “It’s
not
okay. You needed him. We all need each other, and he left you alone.”

“I told Jack I needed space. It’s not his fault.”

“But you’re hiding things, and you just can’t,” Jonas said. “Sandra isn’t gone. She’ll be back. You think your twin clone showing up last night was a coincidence? It wasn’t. It’s a sign. This is not over.”

“I know Sandra’s not gone. You of all people know that I’m well aware that Sandra will be back…
is
back.” I turned my back on both of them. I had to think, get my priorities straight. But first I wanted to know the truth. I faced Jonas. “What did Jack mean when he said you set him up?”

Jonas wasn’t smiling. “I sent him a message with my mind. Told him he needed to come.”

“To watch you try to kiss me,” I said—a statement, not a question.

“No… well, yes, I did, but—”

I held up my hand to silence him. “Don’t even bother.”

“Lexi, you needed him here, and by staging that kiss and his reaction to it… I’ve proven that Jack still cares.”

Jack’s mouth fell open as he looked at me. “Is that what you think? That I’ve somehow stopped caring about you?”

“I didn’t say that.” I drilled two fingers into the center of my forehead. This was stupid. A laugh bubbled up through my throat and across my lips before I could stop it. “Are you hearing yourselves? We’ve resorted to staging kisses and arguing over who cares and who doesn’t. I’m so done with this.”

“All I was trying to say was that you needed Jack. And he needed to be aware of that, and of what you’re going through. And now you’ve been left the responsibility of running Wellington, along with a group of crazy adults we don’t even know we can trust.”

I looked from Jonas to Jack and back. “You’re right. I
did
need Jack.
And
you. That’s why I met with both of you this morning. You’re also right that I’m hiding things.” I looked at Jack. “And after your reaction to my need this morning…” I turned to Jonas. “And after your typical games here just now… I’m right back to where I was when I first learned of my father’s death. On my own.”

“That’s not fair.” Jack’s arms hung limp at his sides in defeat.

“Oh, yeah? Well, guess what? I don’t care if it’s fair. You both need to grow up. I’m being forced to, so why can’t you?” I shoved past them, assuming they would know better than to follow me.

I had hoped to have them both with me this morning, learning with me more about this life we were being forced to lead—a life we would have to protect if we wanted to see our nineteenth birthdays. I had known that the meeting with the lawyers would be crazy hard. Asking Jack and Jonas to be there with me was my way of telling them that I believed we were a team—and at the same time, I had hoped it would keep them from invading my head uninvited.

But now that they knew I was hiding things, Jonas would constantly be looking for a way in, and I would have to work extra hard to shut him out. I couldn’t have anyone knowing the amount of money my dad had left me. At least not until I knew why.

I made it through the wrought-iron gate of the cemetery before Jonas mindspoke.
I’m sorry.

I threw my hand in the air, giving him a backward wave.
Whatever.

Sunday morning, I jogged to Gram’s nursing home—a place I once upon a time used as an escape from boarding school life.

Gram was sleeping when I entered her room. Her breakfast sat on a tray, untouched. I could see that she’d lost weight in the last month. Seth had told me that Gram’s body was suffering the effects of cancer, but that Gram had expressly requested—before the Alzheimer’s took over—that she not undergo invasive radiation or chemotherapy treatments, or major medical treatments of any kind. And Seth confirmed that surgery was not an option.

In short, I was losing Gram, the only mother I’d ever known.

I leaned over and gave my grandmother a soft kiss on the cheek. Her skin was silky smooth and smelled of moisturizer. After memorizing the peaceful look on her face, I turned and exited the room in search of the person that was supposed to meet me.

The nursing home was already humming despite the early hour. At the entrance to the common area, a sign read:
Church Service, 11:00 A.M
. The area was mostly empty, but I suspected that, come eleven, the home would be abuzz.

I continued further into the room. Around the corner, by a window overlooking the parking lot, was Seth Whitmeyer, sitting with one of the residents while she ate breakfast. I approached the table hesitantly, my running shoes squeaking on the tile floor. “Hello, Mrs. Whitmeyer.”

Seth’s and Sandra’s mother paused mid-bite to look at me. Her cheeks lifted and her eyes brightened. “Sandra, dear.”

“No, Mom.” Seth grabbed his mother’s hand. “This is Lexi. She looks a lot like our Sandra, but this is one of my students. The one I was telling you about.”

Mrs. Whitmeyer’s eyebrows tilted inward. “Oh.” She stared at her warm cereal, and Seth gave her hand a squeeze and attempted to comfort her through the confusion.

I pulled a chair back and took a seat facing Seth. “Thank you for meeting me away from school.”

He shrugged. “After recent events, I’d say you’re finally starting to put a lot of pieces together.”

My leg began its nervous bob. Seth had appeared in my life shortly after Jack, and had made no secret that we were
not
friends—not yet anyway. After first meeting him, I had even considered that perhaps he had murdered my father and was at Wellington to kill me. “Why did you come to Wellington?” I asked.

“I came in search of Jack and you, and the others.”

“When did you know about us?”

“About ten years ago. Before Wellington even existed.”

“Wellington is that new?” I didn’t know why, but I had always assumed that Wellington had been around for a while. I never thought to question that.

“Wellington was opened for you. For all of you.”

I thought of the list of clones Dad had been compiling. “Dad was searching for clones. He was searching for them even when I was only ten or eleven. Bringing them here.”

“That’s right.”

“Do you know how many clones are at Wellington?”

He nodded. “Fifty-two. All younger than you and Jack and the rest of the original group.”

“What about outside Wellington?”

“That’s a little trickier. No one seems to know how many embryos survived after the lab burned down eighteen years ago.” Seth glanced over at his mother, who seemed oblivious to our entire conversation. “Here’s the thing, Lexi. Sandra is creating more cloned humans every day. She’s been creating these clones since before the original lab burned. And she’s getting better at it.”

“How is she doing this?
Where
is she doing this? How many surrogates could she possibly have that are agreeing to this?”

“Those are huge questions. As far as the ‘where,’ I think a facility is already in place when she leaves one lab and goes to another. Hard to say the exact locations.”

“You think
she
burned down that lab—the one where she, Dad, and Dr. DeWeese worked? The same way she destroyed the lab at the University of Kentucky?”

An orderly rolled a large cart down the hallway behind me. I stood and paced a moment, processing this new information. If Sandra had been cloning humans all these years, where were they?

I faced Seth. “So, did Dr. DeWeese know where Sandra was after the original lab fire?”

“Not at first. No one knew where she was. But John and Sandra had been in love—”

“Some form of it, anyway.” I laughed under my breath, although nothing about this was humorous.

“I can’t disagree that their connection is strange. But after the fire, my sister disappeared. John, your dad, Cathy, Roger, and even your mother—they were left behind to pick up the pieces. Everyone else pretty much scattered.”

I squeezed the bridge of my nose, attempting to ignore the comment about my mother. “Why did Dr. DeWeese marry Cathy? Did he think Sandra was dead?”

Seth smiled. “Oldest trick in the book… so to speak. Cathy became pregnant with John’s clone.”

“So… what? You’re saying John wanted Jack? And Cathy tricked him into marrying her?”

“Control is everything. Controlling the cloned humans that survived. Controlling future research. Controlling who knows what and when—”

“Controlling who gets to live or die.” I watched Mrs. Whitmeyer slowly lift a spoon to her mouth and take a bite of her oatmeal, and I was struck by her gentleness. Her daughter was nothing like her. How had Sandra become so evil?

Then again, Dr. DeWeese, too, had seemed gentle and caring when I first met him. But after facing him and Sandra inside The Farm… and if he was responsible for killing Dad—his best friend…

“Mr. Whitmeyer.” A nurse approached. “It’s time for your mother’s bath.”

Seth leaned over and kissed his mother on the temple. “Good to see you, Mom.”

She squeezed her son’s hand with a palsied but firm grip. “I hope you’ll both come see me again. Your voices are lovely.”

“Of course we will.” I smiled as I watched the nurse wheel her away.

When she was gone, Seth said, “I was sorry to hear about Danielle.”

My heart constricted just hearing my best friend’s name. “Were you?”

“Of course I was. I’m not my sister, Lexi. I’m hoping since you asked me to meet you here, you’re figuring out that I’m here to help you.”

Had
I figured that out? “How do you know so much of this history if you weren’t actually a part of the original lab?”

“Who said I wasn’t?”

“So you were
there
? When Sandra decided to clone human beings? Did you know she planned to implant them?”

“I’m the twin brother no one notices, Lexi. Sandra was always the star, the one going places. But yes—I was there.” Seth stood and faced the windows overlooking the grounds. “And I knew that she would never destroy those embryos once she figured out that she could not only clone a human, but actually alter their genetic makeup.

“We tried to stop her. A plan was in place—to destroy the embryos—but then the fire started. Everything was so chaotic. We had no warning. But Sandra knew. It was all part of her plan.”

I stared at Seth’s back as he remembered his sister’s actions all those years ago. “Something obviously went wrong.”

He faced me. “What do you mean?”

“Well, the embryos weren’t destroyed, but she also lost control of them. In some cases, she didn’t even know where they ended up.”

“Not all of them,” he corrected. “At least not at first.”

“Jonas,” I said, mostly to myself. Not to mention the non-altered clones: Dia, Lin, and Ty. “What about the other clones? The ones that don’t seem to have the same abilities we have?”

“A control group to compare the altered clones against.”

“How did Sandra keep control of those, but not the DNA-altered ones?”

“Good question. I don’t know.”

“And Addison? She seems different.”

“That she is. An anomaly.” Seth nodded. “She remains a mystery to me. She doesn’t talk about her time in Sandra’s facilities. However, she seems to escape every time. I don’t even know who she was cloned from, or if she has any healing powers. So far, all I know is that she has incredible mind-altering abilities.”

“I’m assuming her disappearances occurred once Dr. DeWeese was back in touch with Sandra. Why was Jack never taken to one of the facilities?”

Seth smiled. “Don’t underestimate a mother bear protecting her cub. I’m fairly certain Cathy had no idea that Addison and her mother disappeared to one of the facilities from time to time, but Cathy knew her husband, and she was careful to never let Jack out of her sight. Not for long, anyway.”

I stood and stared out the window. Two squirrels chased each other around the base of a tree. “Which is why she homeschooled Jack.” I remembered how protective Cathy had been when Jack first met me and insisted on enrolling at Wellington. “But Dr. DeWeese seemed to be on board with Cathy’s decision to keep Jack hidden. And they kept a lot of the truth from him. What changed?”

Seth joined me by the window. “It has always been important to both of them that Jack learn who he was over time. To become well-educated. And Cathy tried to maintain complete control over that. Educating Jack worked for both Cathy’s plans and John’s… in different ways, of course.”

Cathy was definitely a control freak. “So, why The Program?” I asked.

Seth crossed his arms and rocked back on his heels. “Ah, yes. The Program was
my
invention. Once I discovered that some of the clones had survived, and were even thriving as human beings, I began watching everyone closely. I knew Sandra had gotten in touch with John in the last few years, so I suspected he knew that she hadn’t stopped cloning. And Cathy and Roger had kept in touch. Of course, Roger was in touch with Peter since Peter was the money behind Wellington.

“Anyway, the lines were pretty clear, so I constructed The Program. It was my way of approaching Roger and Cathy separate from John and Sandra. And once I had The Program, I began building my database of what clones existed. I had the trust of all parties.”

“What about my dad? Did you ever talk to him?”

“We were supposed to meet the day he died. But he knew about The Program, and had given Roger his blessing to start teaching you and the other clones.”

I stared at Seth. “You were supposed to see him? That was the day you found me here.”

“Yes. And for the first time, I was afraid for the future of the clones I knew existed. I already knew that Peter had been back in touch with John, and that they were best friends. The lines had blurred. I didn’t know if Peter had been in collusion with John and Sandra, or if his loyalties lay with Wellington, the clones who lived there, and especially his daughter—you. Most importantly, I didn’t know who would have wanted him killed.”