My fingers tightened, crumpling the paper into a tiny ball. I threw it down and reached for my jacket just as my cell started going off. I fished it out and without looking at it, swiped to answer. “What?”
A few seconds of silence, then, “Noah?”
Cade. I took a deep breath, counted to five, then blew out slowly. “Yeah. You okay? Kori?”
“Ash—”
“I just found the note.” How the hell could she do this? What was she thinking? After all that shit I’d said last night? “Cora has her?”
“Took her away. Kori too. They let me go. We’ll get her back, though, Noah. Her and Ash.”
He was right. We’d get them back. Regardless of what feelings I did—or didn’t—have for this Ashlyn Calvert, I refused to let someone sacrifice so much for me. I gave Cade the address of the house we’d hunkered down in, then went to work on a plan.
...
By the time Cade arrived, I was no closer to coming up with a brilliant plan than I had been when I’d hung up with him. He had a black eye, but other than that, he was fine. Apparently Cora had both he and Kori in a cell—because Mom had jail cells of her very own in this crazy reality—and left them alone. No questions. No scare tactics. Apparently she’d reserved those for me.
Wasn’t I the lucky one?
“Since I’m dead here and everyone knows it, that rules out the obvious.” We’d posed as ourselves a few times to get where we’d needed to go. It usually didn’t end well, but there had been a few wins. “You didn’t learn anything about the security setup or layout? Patrols—anything?”
“They dragged us from the car and brought us into the building through a door in the parking garage. I know they took us to a sublevel. Seven it was, I think?”
“Okay. That’s something. At least we have a floor.”
“Other than that, we were put in a cell at the end of a hallway just left of the elevator. We weren’t alone, either. There were other people there.” Cade stood and started to pace. An annoying habit, but I’d learned to deal with it years ago. “At least two other cells were occupied.”
“You don’t know by who? Think one of them was the guy Brewster was talking about?”
Cade shrugged. “Possible. I yelled, but no one answered.” He frowned. “We have to get them out.”
“That goes without saying.”
“All of them.”
“All—whoa,” I said, jumping to my feet. I wasn’t sure why I was even surprised. This was so Cade. “Do you think it’s the best time to play superhero?”
“Have you met that woman?” He rolled his eyes.
“Um, yeah. I have, in fact, met her. She’s fucking certifiable—which is why I’d like to get my shit, pack my bags, and get the hell off this rock as soon as possible.”
He stopped pacing and leaned against the wall by the door. “What about Ash?”
“What about her?” Did I want to leave her? No. Did I intend to leave her? Hell, no. “Obviously we’ll get her out. I won’t leave her with Cora, but that’s all I can do.”
“There’s no way you’re going to get me to believe you’d just leave her here to rot. She’s got no future if she stays in this world. And what prompted her to do something so stupid?”
“Yeah. See, that’s another problem we have.”
“Why do I not like the sound of that…”
“Dylan is to blame for this.” Just one more thing I owed the bastard for. “He contacted me last night. Has Rabbit.”
Cade cursed. “Why didn’t I see that coming?” He kicked the side of the couch. The worn material tore and the frame inside groaned and caved. “Of course he’d go after Rabbit. Aside from Cora, he’d be the only other person with any chance of fixing the cuff.”
“Rabbit told Dylan he could fix the cuffs, but in order to do it, he needed the entire set.”
“So Ash sacrificed herself for nothing then. She’s perfect for you, man. Acts before putting any thought to it.” He let his head fall back and groaned. “She got me out, but Kori is still in there. We’re still at square one.”
“Except that it’s a lie.”
“Huh?”
“Rabbit doesn’t need the whole set. He just needs Dylan’s—which he’s already got. He was saying that to buy time.”
“I assume Dylan instructed you to contact him once we were all back together?” There was a hopeful gleam in his eyes.
“That was the plan.”
He let out a breath and some of the tension drained away. He was acting like I’d just told him he’d won the damn lottery—which, if you understood Cade, I had. The guy was all about hope and determination. Give him the smallest sliver and he ran with it. When he set his mind to something, he saw it through. No matter what. It was admirable—but it had cost him. “Then at least we have a little time. We’ll figure out a way to bust in there and get them out, then call—”
I hated to burst his bubble, but he wasn’t getting it. “Yeah. See, that’s the other problem.”
He ran his hands through his hair, pausing to tug at the roots. “You’re killing me here.”
“I don’t know how true it is, but Rabbit also told Dylan that unless the core in the cuffs is repaired, recharged—whatever—within the next fifty or so hours, then they’ll be useless and we’ll be stranded.”
“Stranded? He told you the cuffs stopped working completely?”
“That’s what he says. Tried to skip off this rock four times. We’re all still here…”
He cursed again. A bad habit he’d picked up from me in the fourth grade. It was funny. I was raised in the perfect environment. A loving family, a great home, and had every advantage a guy could have. Schools, clothing, food… We weren’t rich like we were here, but we were comfortable and happy. Cade’s family was horrible. He’d been abused and neglected, and only knew what it was like to have a real family after we’d unofficially adopted him. Yet I was the one who ended up in trouble. I was the one who became the bad influence. How many nights had my mother sat us down and tried to explain to Cade that he didn’t have to go along with every crazy thing I did? He had gotten into his own fair share of trouble, but for the most part, I was the one with the morally gray compass.
“How much time has it been? How much do we have?”
I fished out my cell and checked the time. “We probably have a little over four hours.”
Cade nodded. “Okay. Then I think I have a plan.”
Chapter Twenty
Ash
“You look worried, Ash.” Cora sat in the chair across from me wearing a grin that clearly screamed I won. Her hair was styled in artful waves, secured by pins decorated in what I had no doubt were real diamonds. Everything from her shock-red lipstick to her snow-white pantsuit was designed to stand out. To intimidate. “Why is that?”
I had no idea where we were exactly. I’d been to the Infinity building a million times over the years, but I’d never been in the basement. The elevator had taken us down to sublevel seven and I’d been deposited in a small room with pristine white walls and a strong chemical scent that made my eyes water. Like disinfectant—which made me wonder what they’d had to clean up with something so strong. What evidence had they needed to wipe away?
There were a couple of chairs and a small television in the corner and nothing else. We’d taken so many different hallways that I’d lost track of things. Even if I managed to get free somehow, I’d never find my way out. Then again, that was unlikely. If there were even the smallest chance of escape, Cora would have blindfolded me. The fact that she’d marched me in, view unobstructed? That was her way of saying I was out of luck.
“Oh, I dunno.” I wiggled my fingers to stave off the growing pins and needles sensation. After being delicately placed in the chair, my hands had been cuffed behind my back, uncomfortably tight. “Maybe because I know exactly how unhinged you are.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way.” She plastered on a sickly sweet smile and leaned forward
. The material of her shirt wrinkled and she frowned, immediately smoothing it back down. When it was perfect again, she refocused on me. “After all, you are my foster daughter. Do you really think I take pleasure in causing you pain?”
“Is that, um, a trick question?”
She laughed. To an unknowing person, the sound might come across as delicate. The soft amusement of a refined lady. Me? It was the hiss of a viper. I knew the poison that lay beneath. The true ugliness it hid. “I wonder if that dull sense of humor is what my son found so amusing.”
Actually, Noah had never truly appreciated my sense of humor. He always found it a bit too dark and sarcastic. “So what happens now?”
“Now you tell me what it is you know.”
“I know a lot of things.” I flashed her my most innocent grin. “Is there a topic in particular you’re interested in? I just read this great article about the panda population and how it’s overrunning Central Park. Did you know that they’re only here because of an agreement signed with China in the forties? We traded pandas for red squirrels. I think they got the better end of the deal. Have you ever seen panda shit?”
“What do you know about Omega?”
“That it’s a symbol in the Greek alphabet?”
“You’re trying my patience, Ash.”
“I wasn’t aware you had any, Cora.” The best defense against Cora Anderson was to keep your cool. She lived to rattle and it drove her nuts when she didn’t have that effect. The woman thrived on intimidation, and one of the things that had enraged her over the years was that I’d always come across as indifferent. I just had to focus on that. Channel that air of aloofness and hoped to hell it hid the terror squirming just beneath my skin.
“Let’s switch gears for a moment, shall we? Let’s talk about Noah. Did you think you were being sly?” She stood, and I didn’t miss the way her fingers flexed, tightening and stretching like she was just itching to take me apart. This was the Cora people didn’t get to see. The one hidden just beneath the surface. The snapping, screaming woman who I’d watched go from smiling to destructive rampage in half a second more times than I could count. “You poisoned his mind—turned him against his own family. Then you had the nerve to try seducing him to boost your standing?”
“We’ve never liked each other,” I said as calmly as I could. “But you know damn well that wasn’t what happened. First, I didn’t poison Noah’s mind. I didn’t do anything to turn him against you. You and Karl did a bang-up job of that all on your own. As for the other thing… What you saw—that kiss—was a moment of stupidity on my part. Our relationship wasn’t like that. Not at all.”
“Of course it wasn’t. How could it be? You and my Noah…” She snorted. “You know, I tried pushing you toward Corey in the beginning. He was so simple and in need of a distraction. Something to keep his small mind entertained instead of those stupid little paints and pencils he was so fond of. You were mildly pretty. I felt it was a good match. He could do as he pleased, then we could be rid of you.”
“Classy,” I said.
“I spoke to Noah about it. Multiple times.” She stopped in front of my chair and bent down so we were eye to eye. “In those early years I encouraged him to push you toward his brother. To stop spending so much time with you because it was beneath him. Do you know what his reply was?”
“Can’t say that I do.”
“He asked if it bothered me. He said that you were interesting, but if it angered me, then that made it all the more fun.” The corner of her lip twitched with a grin. “Even as a young child my Noah had a rebellious streak.”
My chest tightened.
“And you know what? I decided to let it go for the time being. I’d always found you utterly useless. A waste of space inside my home that could have been better spent on a coat rack. But if finding amusement with you pleased him for a short time, then I felt like taking you in hadn’t been such a waste.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“No? I think you do. See, I believe if you think long and hard about your time with him, you’ll be able to see it for what it really was. My son used you. You were a tool of rebellion. A way for him to show his father and me that we couldn’t control every aspect of his life.” Her smile widened. “If you think I’m lying, then how about I let Noah tell you himself.”
I didn’t understand what she was talking about. Not until she straightened and crossed the small space to the television in the corner. Fingers gliding across the remote, the thing came to life with a small pop. On the screen, she and a much younger Noah were having an animated conversation in the middle of his bedroom.
“Oh, excuse me. This works so much better with sound.”
“Mother, you never learn,” the on-screen Noah said. The sound was slightly tinny and low, but I could still make out every single word with painful clarity. He was fourteen or fifteen judging by the clothes and the posters on his wall. My heart gave a violent squeeze as he ran a hand through his hair—nearly shoulder length right before he caved to his mother’s thrashing and cut it all off. “The more you protest, the farther I’m going to go.”
“You—you had a camera in your son’s room?” All the things I’d said to him in confidence behind those walls, the times I’d let my guard down and confessed my deepest fears… Cora had seen and heard it all. White-hot embarrassment mingled with fury. She’d always known just how to get into my head. Now I understood why. “How could you—”
“Shut up!” she screamed. With a deep breath, she regained her composure and jabbed a perfectly polished finger at the screen. “Best part is coming up.”
“I will not tolerate this, Noah,” her on-screen version said. “That girl is beneath you. You will end this sickening experiment immediately.”
“Sickening?” A slow, devastating grin spread across his face. “Hell, if you think my being nice to her is sickening, Mother, then what would you say if I married her one day? Paraded her around to all your clubs and high society friends? Would our children have the signature Anderson charm? Or would they be born with her gutter class humor?”
Gutter class humor? The tightness in my chest formed a bubble that threatened to explode. To hear him talking about me like I was some thing to be used to manipulate his parents, to hear him speaking about my worth like someone who believed in the tier system, was devastating. I fought back the tears gathering in the corners of my eyes. She’d chipped a piece of my soul away, but I refused to let her see me break.
Cora turned the television off and set down the remote. “He used you to anger us, but unfortunately, after a while, he developed a…fondness…for you.” She waved her hand in a circle. “Kind of like one would with a pet. He began feeling guilty and trying to do things that might please you in order to make up for his actions. He’d always been resistant to what we do here, but when you voiced your disapproval of our company’s dealings, well, my son started digging. And, being the brilliant boy that he was, found some things he shouldn’t have.”
“So you killed him,” I spat.
“He was never comfortable with what we did, but you…you pushed him. You made him curious. What happened to him was your fault.”
“It’s my fault you decided to kill your own son?” I couldn’t hold in my snort. “Sorry. That’s all on you.”
She made a sound low in her throat then grabbed the arms of my chair, jerking it forward a few inches. “I had to make a choice. An impossible choice. You put me in a position where I had to pick between a great advancement in science for the good of an entire world, and my own son!”
I lifted my head so that I could look her in the eye. For the first time in my life, there was no fear. Cora Anderson didn’t intimidate me. She wasn’t the larger-than-life demon casting a shadow over my life. She was simply a woman. A crazy, insane woman who had chosen greed over her own child. “You made the choice you did for money. It had nothing to do with science. You’re disgusting.”
For a second I thought
she’d finally lose it. Slip over the edge of sanity and take me right along with her. But to my surprise, she took a deep breath and let go of the chair, pulling away. She straightened and fixed her blouse, then tugged the sleeves of her jacket back into place. “Well, yes. There was quite a bit of money involved.”
I shook my head. “I don’t get it. What could have been so important that you would kill your own son to hide it?” I wiggled my fingers again. My hands were starting to go numb. “You already dump our criminals on other societies. He found proof of that, didn’t he? He found proof that you don’t research the worlds?”
She frowned, but it wasn’t sincere. “He did. He confronted me with it, too. But I took care of it. Convinced him that as hard as it was to swallow, we were doing what was best for our world. We had to worry about ourselves.”
“There’s no way he would go for that. It’s not something he would have sat on.” Though after seeing that video, I wasn’t so sure. Noah had always insisted he hated the tier system. He felt it was archaic and cruel to treat people differently depending on the family they were born into. But that was a lie. Or, at least partially a lie. Cora said he grew fond of me after a while. As sick as it was, a small part of me couldn’t help clinging to that sentiment. It was currently the only thing connecting me to the friend I thought I knew, and if I lost that...
“A little bribery goes a long way—especially with someone as materialistic as my son. Noah was not quite as eager to leave his wealth behind as he would have you believe.” Her expression darkened, lips pulling back in a snarl. “But he stumbled onto something else. Something to do with a project called Omega.”
I shook my head. He’d been willing to keep the Guardian project’s true nature a secret but was going to blow the whistle on Omega? How bad could it have been? “I can’t imagine Omega being worse than dumping the worst of our society in someone else’s backyard.”
Her smile widened. “My dear, when we launch the Omega project, when people see what they can gain from my company, no one will care about where we’re dumping our criminals.”