Sloane (20 page)

Leigh didn’t even flinch. It was as if she hadn’t
heard me. She punched me again, driving her knuckles into my
nose.

It hurt. I felt blood begin to gush. I had to stop
her. I brought my knee up into her midsection, not hard enough to
cause a lot of damage, but hard enough to knock her off of me.

She released me enough that I was able to crawl
backward and get to my feet.

French came out of the elevator, holding my gun out
to Leigh. “Finish it. Terminate the target.”

Leigh took the gun and aimed at me.

“Leigh,” I said. “What are you doing? It’s me. It’s
Sloane. Are you even in there?”

Leigh cocked the gun.

I dove for the ground just as it went off.

The bullet skimmed through the air, barely missing
me. Fuck.

“Leigh!” I screamed.

She didn’t even acknowledge my voice.

Okay, so something really bad was going on, and I
didn’t know what. But at this point, I was unarmed, and I had no
backup or help from anywhere. I couldn’t hurt Leigh—she was my
friend—but I didn’t know what had happened to her either, and she
seemed intent on killing me.

There was only one option at this point.

I had to run.

I took off down the hallway as fast as I could.

Leigh fired on me as I ran. The first two shots
missed, but the third lodged in my back.

It was a cold knife in me, cutting through me,
cutting off my breath. The pain was excruciating.

I halted for half a second, and then I kept moving as
quickly as I could.

Blood poured out of the wound, and it sent arcing
pain through me with every step I took.

I dove back through the swinging doors, into the
lobby.

French was yelling in the background, telling Leigh
to get after me, not to lose me.

I dashed across the floor to the front door. I rushed
through it, tackling the first of the guards that I came to.

The other guy was startled, but I moved as quick as I
could, pulling the downed man’s gun free and shooting his partner.
Even moving fast, I was dead accurate. I put the bullet right
between his eyes, and the man went down.

I rolled to my feet, turning to face the other
guy.

Augh. My chest was killing me. I coughed, and blood
sprayed out of my mouth.

Fuck.

I shot the other guard and stumbled backwards.

The front doors flew open and Leigh stalked out after
me. She raised her gun.

“Leigh,” I said. “Don’t.”

She wasn’t listening to me.

I raised the gun I’d stolen. I was fading fast, I
realized. The shot she’d got on me was going to make me go dark. I
wasn’t going to make it very much longer. I needed to get away, so
that I could heal. I didn’t want to shoot Leigh, but she had the
serum too. She’d heal.

So, cringing as I did it, I put a bullet in the skull
of my best friend.

Her eyes widened when it hit her, and then she
crumpled to the ground.

I winced.

And then I ran.

I hurled myself into the woods, losing myself in the
foliage as quickly as I could.

LEIGH

“Leigh.” Griffin was hovering over me.

I struggled to open my eyes.

“Talk to me,” he said. “Talk to me, doll.”

“Griffin?” I said. What had happened? How had I
gotten back here? The last thing that I remembered was Jolene
French walking into the room— French! I sat straight up. “It’s
French. She’s the one who’s got us.”

“French?” said Griffin.

Silas was peering at me. “You sure?”

I nodded. “Positive. I saw her. She talked to me… I
think. But I can’t remember anything she said or anything after
that.”

Griffin got up and began to pace. “This is bad.”

I hugged myself. I knew it was.

“We’ve got to try something,” said Griffin. “We’ve
got to get out of here.”

“I’m working on the tunnel,” Silas said, looking
stubborn.

Like the tunnel was going to amount to anything.

But Griffin only shook his head. “Something quicker.
Something more decisive. What you said before? About rushing them
when they come in the next time?”

“You said it wouldn’t work,” said Silas. “You said
they’d just shoot us.”

“We have to do it smart,” said Griffin.

We huddled together as Griffin began to talk. To
scheme. To plan.

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

I got as far as the main road before I couldn’t go
any farther. The pain in my chest was too sharp, too intense. I
could hardly breathe, and my clothes were covered in blood. I
stumbled to the ground. I managed to crawl into some underbrush
before I felt it take hold. I was going dark.

It washed over me, blank and empty.

And then I woke up again.

Gasping, I sat up. I was healed, and I was still in
the woods, but it was dark outside. I guessed the damages had been
pretty bad. It had taken me a while to heal.

The only good thing about that situation was that I
hadn’t frozen up, not like in the hotel room. I’d kept moving, kept
going, even when Leigh tried to—

Shit, I couldn’t think about that. It was too
awful.

I got to my feet and began to pick my way through the
woods, following the road and going as quietly and carefully as I
possibly could. I was away from the secret lab, but that didn’t
mean that French didn’t have guards combing the woods for me. I was
pretty sure that she didn’t want me to get away.

I couldn’t go back for the car I’d brought, which was
parked right in front of the building. They’d see me for sure. And
I couldn’t call a cab or anything, because I’d left my phone in the
car. Of course, I had a backup phone with the rest of my luggage,
but that was at Axel’s place, so it wasn’t much good to me now.

I was going to have to walk out of here. It was only
maybe five miles or so until I’d hit a bus station or something,
but it sure as hell wasn’t going to be any fun.

And when I did get back to town?

Well, I was probably going to have to go to Axel’s
place, anyway. I needed new clothes. I needed my phone. I needed my
stuff.

I grimaced. I wasn’t looking forward to that.

And the worst thing about all of this was that
something was wrong with Leigh. She’d tried to kill me. What the
hell had happened to her?

* * *

“Jesus, Sloane, are you okay?” Axel was standing in
the doorway to his apartment wearing a suit with a jade green tie
and matching shirt.

I was still covered in blood. Also, I was sweaty from
the walk. I was exhausted, and I was terrified. “I need my stuff,”
I said, pushing past him. “Don’t worry, I’ll be out of your hair in
a few minutes.”

He shut the door and came after me. “Hold up.
Seriously, what happened?”

I went into the guest bedroom, where my suitcase was.
I went through it to check that everything was there, and then I
zipped it up.

Axel was standing in the doorway, his arms folded
over his chest. “What? You can’t talk to me now?”

I picked up the suitcase. “It’s not about you
anymore. Hell, I don’t care about any of that shit. French did
something to Leigh. She brainwashed her or something.”

He furrowed his brow. “Brainwashing? Is that even
possible?”

“Apparently, it is, because Leigh tried to kill
me.”

“Jesus,” said Axel. “Is that why you’re all
bloody?”

“Look, I need to do something about this.” I started
for the doorway.

He didn’t move. “Wait. How did Leigh try to kill
you?”

“She shot me.”

“What?”

“Can you move, please?”

“What did she say while she was doing that?”

“She didn’t say anything. She was like a robot. Even
if I get her out of there, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to
make her snap out of it. And I don’t know if the same thing’s
happened to Griffin and Silas. I could go back in there and try to
save them, and they could all kill me instead.”

Axel shook his head. “Well, then you’re not going
back.”

I let out a disbelieving noise. “What did you just
say?”

“I’m not letting you get killed.” He squared his
shoulders.

“You can’t tell me what to do. You have no say
in—”

“Sloane, this is getting really fucked up. You can’t
do this on your own. Maybe it’s time to call the police or—”

“I told you, the police can’t be involved. They’d
turn us all into science experiments.”

“It’s sounds like you already are science
experiments. The others, anyway.”

“Get out of the way, Axel.”

“No.” He put his hands on my shoulders. “If you won’t
call the police, you at least have to let me help you.”

I wanted to tell him not to touch me, but the truth
was that it felt nice for him to be touching me again. I’d missed
him, even though we hadn’t been apart for longer than half a day. I
almost didn’t care that he only wanted me for sex. It had been
wonderful sex, and when he’d touched me, I’d felt so good about
myself. Axel made me feel so… noticed. Important. And…

I was crying again.

“Shit,” he muttered. He wrapped his arms around
me.

“I’ll mess up your suit,” I sniffled.

“I don’t care about my suit.” He held me close.

I grabbed onto his lapels and started sobbing into
his chest. I was so worried and confused. My best friend had tried
to kill me, and she’d looked through me the whole time, and I
didn’t know what I was going to do.

Axel rubbed my back. He whispered in my ear, “We’re
going to find a way to fix this, all right?”

I looked up at him. “I don’t see how.”

“I’m going to help you. We’ll do it together.”

“What are you going to do? If you come with me,
they’ll kill you. It’s dangerous.”

“Yeah, but if something happened to you, and I knew
that I sat on my ass and didn’t do anything, I wouldn’t be able to
deal with that.”

“Because we have such great sex,” I said, bitterness
creeping in between my tears.

He sighed. He let go of me. The front of his suit was
ruined. There were tear stains and bloodstains, but he didn’t even
seem to notice.

I picked my suitcase back up. “I’m going to leave,
okay?”

He turned back around. “Look, Sloane, I don’t know
why.”

“What?”

“I don’t know why you’re important to me. But… you
are. Ever since you came up into my office and asked for my help,
I’ve been… drawn to you. And the closer I get to you, the closer I
want to be. And that’s all I can say about it. So, can you just
promise to not die while I’m trying to figure it out?”

I bit down on my lip.

“I want you to stay here. If it matters to you, we
can keep it strictly business. No touching or whatever. But please,
don’t go anywhere. Take a shower, calm down, and then let’s talk
about what we’re going to do.”

Well… a shower did sound like a really good idea.

* * *

The phone in my suitcase was ringing. I’d just gotten
out of the shower, and I was wrapped in one of Axel’s towels. They
were fluffy, big, and decadent, and I had to admit that it was
nicer here than in a hotel. I padded across the carpet to dig the
phone out.

This phone was my backup, and I didn’t have all my
numbers programmed in to it. I squinted at the number coming in. It
took me a few seconds to recognize it. Christa.

Hell. Of course it was Christa. I hadn’t talked to
her in days.

I answered the phone. “Hey, Christa.”

“Sloane? Oh my God, I didn’t know if you were dead or
not.”

“Sorry. I know I missed some of your calls.”

“Some? I’ve been calling you every day. And you never
pick up. So, then I realized that I had this other number for you,
so I called it. Did something happen to your other phone?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Sorry. I didn’t remember your
number.” That was a lie. Silas and I forced ourselves to memorize
every number we programmed into our phones because you never knew
when you’d need to know them in an emergency. But maybe Christa
didn’t know that.

“I’m just glad you’re alive,” she said. “I was losing
my shit.”

“Sorry,” I said again. “It’s only that nothing’s
changed. I don’t have them yet.” No way was I going to tell her
that they were all possibly brainwashed into mindless killers. I
wouldn’t let her think that. Not unless I was positive that it was
true, and that it couldn’t be undone.

“Look, Sloane, you can’t do this alone. You need
help. You need me to come to wherever you are and help you get them
back.”

I picked at the towel that was wrapped around me.
“No, I can’t let you do that. Griffin and Silas want you safe.”

“I know that, but they’re stupid about this kind of
stuff. They need to worry about themselves instead of me. I can
take care of myself. I killed people when Silas and I were captured
by Rolf, you know.” There was a slight bit of hesitation before she
said Rolf’s name. The man had violently raped her, and I could tell
it was hard for her to think about him.

“That was different. You didn’t have a choice.”

“Well, if Silas is in danger, I don’t have a choice
now.”

“You can’t come, Christa. I don’t know if I can
protect you.”

“I don’t need you to. But I need to do something. Do
you understand that? I can’t sit here alone doing nothing, because
I’m losing my mind. I’m going stark raving mad. I need to
help.”

I knew how she felt, but I wasn’t sure that having
her around wouldn’t just make things tougher.

“I have good aim. I’m a fast learner. Please, Sloane,
I
need
to help.”

I hesitated.

Axel appeared in the doorway. “Who’s that?”

“Are you talking to someone?” said Christa. “I
thought you were alone out there.”