Twist (22 page)

Finn yanked on my torso as hard as he could.

“Oww.” All it served to do was pop three of my joints.

“Sorry, sweetie,” he whispered.

As his stubble scratched against my cheek, a ripple of energy zipped through me. Finn was gearing up for a synch. He must have felt it at the same moment because his breathing calmed.

Phew.

But also … dang. There was no way I could explain just disappearing. My cover would be blown.

Finn curled himself around me protectively.

How anyone could ever accuse him of some heinous crime was laughable. I mean, come on. Finn? Killing someone? Or kidnapping …

Kidnapping.

There was no way to explain Finn's presence here. But there might be a way to explain mine. That is, if he had forced me up into the Cryostorage Unit against my will.

“Please!” I grabbed Finn's arm and pushed it up so it was around my neck. “Let me go.”

“Huh?” Finn tried to pull his arm away, but I gripped it to me tighter and acted like I was choking.

“Help me,” I croaked at the scrubs. They looked at each other, at a temporary loss of what to do. Clearly, they hadn't prepared for this scenario. They probably thought they were being sent up here to take care of a lookie-loo, not a deranged criminal and his hostage.

“Ohh…” Finn had finally caught on.

“Halt!” Baldy yelled, advancing toward us.

“No, you halt!” Finn flicked my Com open to the stunner.

Nice.

“I have a gun!” he yelled.

“Stunner,” I said under my breath.

“A stunner,” said Finn. “And I'm not afraid to use it.”

From the looks on the scrubs' faces, they didn't give a flying chunk o' blark what Finn was holding. There were three of them. One of him.

But Finn didn't turn the stunner on them. He jabbed the metal into the flesh on my neck. It poked my jugular and made me catch my breath.

“Take one more step and I zap her into oblivion,” said Finn.

That's right. My boyfriend's a badass.

“Everyone, just calm down.” The nearest red scrub lowered his own stunner. Baldy, however, was apparently not willing to take orders from anyone. He advanced down the hall.

“Scream a little,” Finn whispered in my ear as he clutched me hard to his chest, maintaining his death grip on the Com pressed to my neck.

Not hard to fake that one. If his thumb slipped, I really would be in a heckapain. I yelped and pretended to try to wrench myself free.

“Stay where you are.” A voice, eerily calm, came from right behind us. Lafferty had emerged from the gravity chamber and was straightening her skirt. I wasn't sure if she was talking to the scrubs, to Finn, or to me. We all froze.

Finn's head whipped back and forth like he was at Wimbledon. We were surrounded. Genuine alarm tightened his grip on the Com.

Then I felt it. A whirring in my pocket. The reverter.

Blark it to Blarkville. This couldn't have come at a worse time. There was no way that I could click it in front of a room full of ICEers.

“Bree,” Finn breathed into my ear. His grip loosened, and I had to clutch his arm around me to remind him that he was kidnapping me.

“Look at yourself,” he said.

One glance at my reflection in the shiny metal that lined the hall revealed the reason for his shock. My hair had suddenly become disheveled. I was wearing a different set of clothes than before. I recognized them as the same ones I had been wearing two days ago, only now they were rumpled and filthy. A darkness that ran deeper than skin now circled my eyes.

I was at the bull's-eye of whatever change had just taken place on the timeline.

“I'm afraid this section isn't part of the tour.” Lafferty spoke calmly, addressing Finn. Lafferty was a nonShifter. She was oblivious to the change in my appearance. As unchipped Shifters, Finn and I were the only ones who could detect there had even been a change.

“Stay back,” said Finn. “I mean it.”

“What exactly do you hope to accomplish here, young man?” She gestured up the hall. “There's nowhere to go.”

The whirring of the reverter had already begun to slow. I pulled it from my pocket. Lafferty narrowed her eyes at the glowing contraption.

“Where did you get that?” she said. “That's a Pick. What have you done to it?”

This was now one change I
had
to fix. If I didn't, my one advantage—of being just another anonymous Shifter, a devoted girlfriend of one of their Neos—would disappear with the other timeline.

She tried to grab the reverter, her greedy fingers aimed at my only hope of repairing whatever had been broken.

“No!” I shrieked, pushing her away. But Lafferty caught the edge of the reverter, and it clattered to the ground between us.

I dove for it at the same moment as she did. But with one foot still stuck in the emergency exit and Finn's arm wrapped around me, I was like a sled dog jolting at the end of its tether. I only managed to brush the tips of my fingers against it. The reverter rolled down the hall toward the open porthole. It teetered on the edge.

“Finn!” I yelled.

He locked gazes with Lafferty, then they both sprinted at it like a starter pistol had fired. Finn reached it first. Lafferty lunged at the same moment, but instead of grabbing the reverter, she grabbed at Finn's hair.

“Oww,” he yelled, and from the satisfied grin on her face, I knew Lafferty had gotten a few strands.

Finn ran back to me and pressed the reverter into my hand. The whirring had dulled to a hum. I only had a minute or two left. He grabbed me around the waist, and I pushed the heart-shaped button. Before I had depressed it all the way in, though, I felt a familiar sensation of tingles work their way up my arms to my shoulders until they met at the top of my spine and shivered all the way down.

“No, Finn, wait!” I said. But it was too late. The hallway faded before me.

We landed in a heap on his deck.

 

chapter 17

“I'M SO SORRY,”
Finn repeated over and over as we made our way up to his house.

I still clutched the reverter, useless and unmoving, in my fist. I knew I had no right to be mad at him. He had acted on protective instinct. Still, as I sniffed a stain on my sleeve (Ugh, what was that, puke?), it was hard not to be miffed. Whatever had changed in my life, it was permanent. And now, I was back to Public Enemy #1 at ICE. They knew about the reverter.

“I promise next time I'll be more careful,” he said.

“Next time?” I whirled around. “No, no, no. There is no next time. You aren't going anywhere.”

“Wait. You would have me stay in Chincoteague while you head back there?”

“Uhh, I would have you locked up in your family's safe if I could.”

“Those people after you are monsters.”

“You're not coming back with me,” I said. “It's not safe for you in the future.”

“It's not safe for
you
in the future!”

“It's not safe for me anywhere!”

I pinched the bridge of my nose. Arguing with Finn was pointless. I just wouldn't bring him back with me. That was that. And I'd threaten Jafney with her ever-lovin' life if she even thought about it. Not that I imagined she wanted anything to do with Finn Masterson at this point. I started back up to his house.

“That's my point,” he said, trailing behind me. “You have no idea what those eight months were like for me, not knowing what had happened to you, if you were even alive or dead. It was torture. I can't do that again.”

I'd only experienced a sliver of what he had. A few days of separation. A few days of not knowing how he was, where he was.

He'd nailed it.

Torture.

But only one thing would be even more torturous—knowing that I had had a hand in his capture. I'd return safely, feed the authorities some trumped-up story that he was drunk, tell them that he didn't hurt me and had let me go freely. Surely chronoinvestigators wouldn't track him across the centuries.

But he could never return to mine.

We'd reached the back entrance to his house. I leaned against him and took a deep breath before we faced the impending onslaught. He looked down and gave me a “Shall we?” look. I heaved a sigh and pushed the door open.

Charlotte walked in from the kitchen. When she saw me, her face lit up. Before I had a chance to say “hello,” though …

Pop, pop, pop.

Quigley, John, and Georgie materialized in front of us and blocked Finn's mom from view. John looked confused. Georgie looked like Christmas had come early. Quigley looked, well …

“What in the name of all the Grecian gods and god-ettes put together have you done?” she yelled.

“I can explain,” I said.

“Please do.” A vein in the middle of Quigley's forehead throbbed. “Because for the life of me, I'm having a difficult time coming up with your rationale behind breaking into ICE's headquarters. After I expressly forbid you from doing anything that might draw attention to Resthaven. I've had chronoinvestigators crawling all over the place for the last twelve hours.”

“You did what?” Charlotte rushed to Quigley's side.

“With Finn in tow,” said Georgie gleefully. “It's been all over the news. Bree and her mystery attacker.”

“I wasn't ‘in tow,'” said Finn. “I Shifted to ICE's headquarters from Jafney's house.”

“A house that I expressly forbade you from going to,” screeched Charlotte. “That poor girl's been through enough as it is.”

Oh, yes. Poor Jafney.

“And you.” Charlotte turned on her daughter.

“What'd I do?” said Georgie.

“You've known about this for half a day and you didn't think to come and tell us what was going on?”

“And miss the excitement?”

“Georgiana Joyce Masterson!” Charlotte was really getting her shriek on now. “This is not a game, young lady.”

I had to agree with Charlotte on this one.

“Georgie, you were supposed to be keeping an eye on Finn,” I said.

“Uhh, she was supposed to be my chaperone to stop Jafney from acting like an amorous octopus,” said Finn.

“She was
supposed to
keep her feet firmly planted in the twenty-first century!” yelled Charlotte.

“How bad is it?” John turned to Quigley, frowning.

“Finn's wanted on armed kidnapping charges,” said Quigley. “Not to mention breaking and entering. Congratulations, Finnigan, you are now officially classified a Level Five Chronofugitive.”

Charlotte collapsed to the sofa, fanning herself.

“Mercy,” she said. “I'd say you were going to be the death of me if your sister hadn't tapped the last nail into that coffin years ago.”

“But Finn was already classified a fugitive,” I pointed out. “Now we just know what he's accused of. Besides, he saved my butt back there. If he hadn't shown up, I would have been caught anyway, and then I wouldn't have had a good excuse. Now, I just look like a victim, and he looks like some deranged psychopath.”

“Thank you, sweetie,” said Finn.

“You're very welcome.” I smiled.

“And what if Finn hadn't shown up, Bree?” John was calmer than his wife, but there was an anxiety in his voice not usually there.

“But he did. I'll return safe and sound. As long as Finn lays low, I doubt they'll track him down here.” I looked to Quigley to back me up, which she did reluctantly.

“It is unlikely they'd escalate it to a temporal manhunt,” she said.

Charlotte began to whimper.

“How did you get past their security?” asked John. “Or did you Shift there like Finn?”

“Ah ha!” I yelled. “See. That could have happened. Then it wouldn't have been my fault.”

“Well?” asked Quigley. “Did you?”

“No. I, ummm…” Oh, this part was going to go over like a lead balloon. “I may have slipped Wyck some opium and taken his hair. Then I snuck out during his Shift to poke around.”

I said it in a rat-a-tat cadence, hoping the faster it came out, the faster they would get over their collective anger.

No such luck.

“You what?” Finn took a giant step back, but at least he didn't let go of my hand. That had to be a good sign.

The rest of their responses kind of blurred together. I distinctly heard the words reckless, dangerous, foolhardy, rechip you myself, aftermath, and better than a telenovela (pretty sure that one was Georgie).

“Look, it's not like Wyck's some blushing innocent in all this,” I said. “He deserved what he got. He's already made one change, and…” I looked down at my grungy outfit. Great shades of blark.

“He was the one who changed my past this time, too,” I said.

“Do you have proof of that?” said Quigley.

“Wyck was the only NeoShifting at the time. It had to be him. And at the last minute, he decided to go to the recent past. He's trying to destroy me!”

“What motivation does he have to ruin your life?” asked John.

“Vendetta,” I said. “For getting him expelled from the Institute.”

“You're thinking on the wrong timeline,” said Quigley. “He hasn't been expelled on this timeline. Why would he have a vendetta against you now?”

“Maybe he was trying to get ahold of the reverter again.” Finn snapped his fingers. “Make her so desperate she just hands it over.”

“No,” I said. “Even their medical director didn't recognize the reverter for what it was. She just realized it was a Pick that had been tampered with.”

“Besides,” said Georgie, “if Wyck was trying to get the reverter back, wouldn't it make more sense for him to be the one to drug Bree and take it that way?”

“Yeah, but it's not like he has opium just lying around,” I said.

“And you do?” Charlotte asked.