Sloane (15 page)

When Axel came back, he was in sweatpants and a
t-shirt. I’d never seen him wear anything so informal, but I had to
admit that it was appealing. He looked softer and more accessible.
He tossed me another shirt and a pair of sweats. “You can put this
on if you want.”

I caught the bundle of clothes. “I should leave.”

He shook his head. “I told my driver he was done for
the night and sent him home. I could drive, but I don’t like to
drive after drinking.”

“I’ll call a cab.”

He shook his head. “Stay. I won’t try anything else,
I swear.” He sounded defeated.

I looked down at the clothes. They looked really
comfortable. I stood up.

He pointed. “There’s a bathroom through there.”

I went in and changed. There were hangers on the back
of the door, and I hung up my dress there. Then I padded back into
the living room, where Axel was sprawled beside the coffee table,
cutting up lines of cocaine.

I hesitated. I didn’t want to watch him do drugs. I
didn’t even know why I was still here.

“I think it’s about sixty,” he said.

“What?” I said.

“Sexual partners.” He used a razor blade to even out
the lines.

I didn’t say anything for a second, just letting that
sink in. “Jesus.”

“It’s not really that bad,” he said. “I’ve been
sexually active for twelve years, so that’s only… five people per
year. One for every season and two at Christmas.”

“I really should—”

“Stay.” He got out his wallet and peeled out a bill.
He rolled it up, fitted it to his nose, and sucked up one of the
lines.

I twisted my hands together. This didn’t feel
right.

He rubbed his nose and looked up at me. “That’s
better.”

“Is it?” I said.

“You should have one,” he said.

I shook my head.

He laughed softly. “Why not? You told me you killed
people, right? How on earth could doing a little blow be any worse
than that?”

“That’s not why I don’t do it,” I said. “Not ‘cause I
think it’s wrong.”

“That’s why you won’t fuck me, right?” He raised his
eyebrows.

I drew myself up. “No. I don’t do those things
because they’re dangerous.”

He nodded. “Oh, I get it. But running around with a
gun, shooting people? That’s not dangerous?”

I pressed my lips together.

“If you have that serum stuff that makes you heal so
well anyway, then how dangerous could the coke be, really?”

“I could get addicted,” I said.

“Like your parents,” he said. “But that was heroin,
right? It’s not the same.”

“It’s not good,” I said.

“You know, Sloane, I think you’re afraid of a lot of
things,” he said. “But I think the primary thing you’re afraid of
is experiencing anything. You say that people don’t notice you, but
you try really hard to be noticed. And you block lots of things
out. I think you don’t like being out of control.”

I shook my head. “You don’t know anything about
me.”

“You don’t know anything about cocaine,” he said.
“How can you know it’s bad if you haven’t even tried it?”

“That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard.”

He held out the rolled-up bill. “Try it. Try one
crazy thing. One thing that will make you lose control.”

“I’m not going to let you goad me into this,” I
said.

Axel grinned at me. And there was something about the
way he smiled. Especially when he wasn’t all dressed up in his
coiffed suits. He looked so good, and I knew I couldn’t touch him.
But God, I wished I still was. I wished I hadn’t stopped him.

I didn’t know what it was about him, but when I was
with him, I didn’t seem to be able to do the smart thing.

He unraveled me.

I lurched across the room and snatched the dollar
from him. I bent over one of the lines, closed a nostril, and
sucked it all up.

“Whoa, go easy,” said Axel.

Ouch.

It stung. It burned.

I sat back, holding onto my nose and squeezing my
eyes shut.

And then… and then it coursed through me, like liquid
courage and fire, and I threw my head back, sucking in breath and
shaking. “Shit,” I whispered.

* * *

“More,” I said. “I want more.” We were still sitting
on the floor next to the coffee table, but there had been a lot of
cocaine in the past… however long it had been.

Axel laughed. “We just did more.”

“Did we?” I giggled. “That seems like it was… years
and years ago.” I wasn’t sure how long the cocaine snorting had
been going on, but it seemed like a long time. All I knew was that,
from the minute I’d felt the first wave of it, all I wanted was
more. More. More. More. I wanted more of it so badly that I
couldn’t even quite enjoy how I was feeling, and I was feeling
really, really
good
.

I wasn’t the least bit insecure. Usually, I’d worry a
little bit about what I was saying, but now I felt as if I was
simply
bursting
with brilliant pieces of conversation. I
could hardly keep my mouth shut.

Axel and I had been chattering at each other, back
and forth, interrupting each other, laughing and connecting. We
were both so crazily amazing. Everything we thought was perfect and
achingly cool.

Man. If Axel was snorting this all the time, no
wonder he was a self-centered asshole. That was a really cool
thought. I had to say it out loud. “I figured out why you’re such a
jackass.”

“I thought we weren’t going to call me that.”

“It’s because of this. Because of the blow. The blow
makes you think that you’re brilliant.”

“How do you know what I think?”

“It makes everyone think they’re brilliant. That’s
what I mean. By ‘you,’ I mean everybody.”

“Ah.” He nodded. “But does it
actually
make
you brilliant?”

“I don’t know.” I furrowed my brow. “Actually,
probably not. Like, I was thinking that you and I were the most
intelligent, awesome people in the history of the world—”

“That’s funny, because so was I,” he said. “I was
thinking that we were basically living gods.”

I giggled. “But the thing is, we probably sound like
idiots. Or else, we’re really annoying.”

“We only annoy mere mortals,” he said. “They can’t
understand our brilliance.”

“Maybe.” I bit my lip. “Axel,” I whined. “I want to
do more.”

He burst out laughing. “All right, all right. We’ll
do more.” He started laying out the lines.

At the sight of them, my whole body tensed in
anticipation. I could taste it. The harsh, cool bite of it against
the back of my tongue. It was almost sweet. I thought it was my new
favorite thing to taste. “This stuff is evil,” I said. “Like I just
did it once, and I already think it’s the best thing on earth.”

“Well, yeah,” said Axel. “I mean, why did you think
people did it?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I thought they were
stupid.”

He straightened up the lines. “Well, we probably are.
But it’s not that bad. I mean, it feels good, and it’s fun, and it
makes for a good time.”

I chewed furiously on my lip. I wasn’t sure if I was
having fun or not. My heart was pounding out of my chest. I felt
wide awake and ready to tackle anything. And I thought I was the
most brilliant person in all of history. And… I really wanted more
cocaine. “I don’t think I ever want to do this again.”

He gave me a funny look. “You just said you wanted
more.”

“Well, I do now. But… I can’t just keep doing lines
forever. I mean… can I?”

He held up a finger. “No. That’s a bad thing. You
really shouldn’t do that.”

“Am I always going to want it like this?”

He paused, hovering over the lines he was cutting
up.

“Oh my God, Axel, what the hell did you do to me? You
are such an asshole.”

“Hey,” he said. “You’re the one who made the decision
to do this.”

“Yeah, because you pushed me into it,” I said. “I
mean how many times did I say no? It’s like you just keep pushing,
and pushing, and pushing, and—”

“Maybe,” he said. “I don’t know. Earlier, I hadn’t
done any. And then after I had some, I didn’t want to do it alone.
I wanted you with me. Because otherwise you’d just fall asleep and
I’d be alone.” He handed me the rolled-up bill. “You first.”

I took it from him. I tried to find the willpower to
say no to it, to say that I wouldn’t snort any more of it ever
again. But it was stupid to fight, and so I lowered my head and
sucked it up.

He took the bill back from me. “In answer to your
question, no, you will not always want it like this. It’s worse
after you start. You can’t stop after you start. But if you don’t
start, it’s not nearly as bad.”

I rubbed my face. “Oh my God. Oh my God.” I felt so
good. I was invincible. I was the queen of the universe. I
moaned.

He snorted up the next line. “I’m sorry I made you do
it.”

I rested my forehead against the edge of the coffee
table.

“You’re right.” He sighed. “I am a jackass. I don’t
really feel bad about it right now. But I feel like I
should
. Does that mean anything?”

I lifted my head. I stretched my jaw. I’d been
clenching it. “I don’t think it does.”

He laughed helplessly. “Why are you even spending any
time with me?”

“I don’t know,” I said. I felt just as helpless.
“It’s like I can’t say no to you.”

“You
only
say no to me. What are you talking
about?”

“You’re like…” I surveyed him. “The devil. You are
the devil incarnate. You’re all the bad things in the world, and
you make them seem fun. You make me feel like I haven’t ever lived.
And whenever I’m around you, you make me feel like I’m something
special. Like I matter. Which I know is bullshit, because I don’t
matter to you at all. Nothing matters to you.”

“That’s not fair.” He looked offended. “Things matter
to me. And you are, you know, special.” Then he made a face. “Did I
just say you were special?”

I snickered.

He started giggling wildly.

I hugged myself. “Oh my God, Axel. I have so many
things I want to tell you.”

“So tell me.”

“No.”

“See, there you go again.”

“I shouldn’t be doing this. I’m supposed to be saving
everyone, not sitting here in your apartment getting fucked
up.”

“Oh yeah,” he said. “I totally forgot about the fact
that Leigh was kidnapped.”

“I did too!” I smacked him. “You made me forget.”

“I didn’t. You made yourself forget. You can blame me
all you want, but you wouldn’t be doing these things if you didn’t
want to do them.”

“How do you know that? Maybe you have some sort of
control over my brain.”

“Look, let’s start thinking about how we’re going to
save them. We’re all lit up. Our brains are firing on all synapses.
We can figure it out now.”

“Can we?” I squeezed my eyes shut.

“We totally can.”

“Well, the problem is that we don’t know where the
secret lab is. So we have to find someone who knows, and we have to
find a better way to get information from them than capturing them
and shoving guns against their heads.”

“Okay, so who knows about the secret lab?”

“Armstrong, but he’s dead.”

“Who else?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know who works there or who
helps him. When I was under cover as an intern there, I knew all
about the way that things worked, but—” It was like a light bulb
went off in my head. “Interns!”

Axel nodded. “Interns would know. And you know what?
I happen to know where interns from places like Costello Labs hang
out. There’s a couple bars in town where they go a lot.”

“Really? You do. So, that’s awesome. We’ll go there,
and we’ll talk to them, and—”

“Yeah, we’ll just buy them drinks until they’re
trashed and then—”

“You can flirt with them,” I said.

He raised his eyebrows. “What? Me?”

“Yes!” I got up. I was excited now. “You’re good at
that. You find some girls that work for Costello Labs and turn on
your charm, and they will tell you
everything
.”

“So I get to help, then?”

“Are you kidding? I
need
you,” I said. “I
can’t flirt worth a damn.”

Axel hugged me. “I’m so glad you’re letting me
help.”

I hugged him back. “I’m so glad I have you.” I
squeezed him. “Is there any more blow?”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I opened one of my eyes. I felt like someone had run
over my body with a truck. “What?”

Axel bent over me. I was lying on the bed in his
guest room. His hair was all messy. “I just wanted to see you were
awake.”

“What time is it?” We’d gone to sleep when the sun
came up. Axel had given me some kind of pill to counteract the
effects of the cocaine. Within a half hour of taking it, I’d fallen
asleep, which was good, because I didn’t think there would have
been any way to get to sleep otherwise.

“Three,” he said.

“In the afternoon?” I groaned.

He gave me a wry smile. “Welcome to my life.”

I flung an arm over my head. “I feel really bad.”

“You want me to let you go back to sleep?”

I thought about it. Then I struggled to sit up. “No,
that’s okay. I need to go back to my hotel anyway.”

“Actually, I was thinking about that,” he said.

“What’s there to think about?”

“Well, if we’re going to work together to get Leigh
and the others back, it only makes sense for us to be, you know,
around each other. And I was thinking that my apartment would be a
good sort of headquarters.”

I put the heels of my hands against my eyes and
applied pressure. I wasn’t sure exactly how to characterize how
terrible I felt. For one thing, my nose and throat were sore. They
burned really badly. And for another thing, my whole body ached.
And… I felt groggy, but I thought that might have been a leftover
effect of the downers I’d taken. “I have no idea what you’re
talking about.”