Maybe this would.
“Tell me more about wombats,” I said.
With the look of a small child awaking to a miracle on Christmas morning, Sloane beamed at me and complied.
YOU
You were nervous the first time you saw her, standing beside the big oak tree, long hair shining to halfway down her back. You asked what her name was. You memorized everything about her.
But none of that matters now. Not her name. Not the tree. Not your nerves.
You’ve come too far. You’ve waited too long.
“She’ll fight you if you let her,” a voice whispers from somewhere in your mind.
“I won’t let her,” you whisper back. Your throat is dry. You’re ready. You’ve been ready. “I’ll tie her up.”
“Bind her,” the voice whispers.
Bind her. Brand her. Cut her. Hang her.
That’s the way this has to be done. That’s what awaits this girl. She shouldn’t have parked so far away from the man’s building. She shouldn’t have slept with him in the first place.
Shouldn’t.
Shouldn’t.
Shouldn’t.
You’re waiting for her in the car when she climbs in. You’re prepared. She has a test today, but so do you.
She shuts the car door. Her eyes flit toward the rearview mirror, and for a split second, they meet yours.
She sees you.
You lunge forward. Her mouth opens to scream, but you slam the damp cloth over her mouth, her nose. “She’ll fight you if you let her,” you say, whispering the words like sweet nothings in her ear.
Her body goes slack. You pull her into the backseat and reach for the ties.
Bind them. Brand them. Cut them. Hang them.
It has begun.
I slept until noon and woke up feeling like I hadn’t slept at all. My head ached. I needed food. And caffeine. And possibly some Tylenol.
“Rough night?” Judd asked the second I stepped foot in the kitchen. He had a sharpened number two pencil in his hand and filled in a line on his crossword puzzle without ever looking up at me.
“You could say that,” I replied. “Have you met Agent Sterling?”
Judd’s lips twitched slightly. “You could say that,” he said, parroting my own words back at me.
Judd Hawkins was in his sixties. His official job description involved both looking after the house and looking after us. The house was in excellent condition. As for the five teenagers who lived here…well, other than making sure we were fed and our limbs were kept relatively intact, Judd was pretty hands-off.
“Agent Sterling seems to think she’s moving in,” I commented. Judd filled in another line on his crossword. If he was bothered by the fact that an FBI agent had shown up, more or less unannounced, he didn’t show it. “Can she even do that?” I asked.
Judd finally looked up from his puzzle. “If she were anyone else,” he said, “the answer would be no.”
Given that Agent Sterling had come here at her father’s request, I understood that there probably wasn’t anything Judd could do about it. What I didn’t understand was why Judd didn’t seem to want to do anything about it. She was here to write an evaluation of the program. She’d called it damage control, but from where I was sitting, it seemed more like an invasion.
“Good. You’re up.”
Speak of the devil, and she appears, I thought. Then I stopped myself. I wasn’t being objective—or fair. I was judging Agent Sterling based more on what I thought she would do than anything she’d done already. Deep down, I knew that no matter who they’d sent to replace Locke, I wouldn’t have been ready. Every similarity was salt in an open wound. Every difference was, too.
“Do you always make it a practice to sleep until noon?” Agent Sterling asked, cocking her head to the side and giving me the once-over. Since I couldn’t make her stop studying me, I returned the favor. She was wearing makeup, but didn’t look made up. Like the clear coat of polish on her nails, the colors she’d chosen for her eyes and lips looked almost natural.
I wondered how much effort it took her to look that effortlessly perfect.
If you want to get close to an UNSUB, I could practically hear Locke telling me, don’t say she or her. Say you.
“You spent the night here?” I asked Sterling, rolling that over in my mind. Locke never slept here. Briggs doesn’t. You don’t do things halfway.
“There’s a pullout sofa in the study,” Judd told me, sounding mildly disgruntled. “I offered her my room, but Miss Stubborn refused to take it.”
Miss Stubborn? Before working for the Naturals program, Judd had been career military. I’d never heard him refer to any FBI agent by anything other than their title or last name. So why was he referring to Agent Sterling in the exact same tone I would have expected him to use with Lia?
“I’m not kicking you out of your own bed, Judd.” The twinge of exasperation in Agent Sterling’s voice told me they’d already had this argument at least twice.
“Sit down,” Judd grunted in return. “Both of you. Cassie hasn’t had anything to eat today, and I can make two sandwiches as easy as one.”
“I can make my own sandwich,” I said. Judd gave me a look. I sat. This was a side of him I hadn’t seen before. In a strange way, he almost reminded me of my very Italian grandmother, who thought I was off at some kind of progressive, government-sponsored gifted program. Nonna considered the putting of food in bellies one of her major missions in life, and woe be to the unfortunate soul who stood in her way.
“I already made myself a sandwich,” Agent Sterling said stiffly.
Judd made two sandwiches anyway. He slid one in front of me and put the other in front of an empty spot at the table before sitting down and resuming his crossword. He didn’t say a word, and after a long moment, Agent Sterling sat.
“Where are the others?” I asked Judd. Usually, I couldn’t spend five minutes in the kitchen without Lia coming in to swipe some ice cream, or Michael helping himself to food off my plate.
Agent Sterling was the one who answered. “Michael hasn’t made an appearance yet. Dean, Lia, and Sloane are in the living room, taking a practice GED.”
I almost choked on a bite of ham. “A what?”
“It’s September,” Agent Sterling replied, in that too-calm tone that I imagined made her very good at interrogating suspects. “If you weren’t a part of this program, you’d be in school. In fact, I’m fairly certain your family was told that you would be receiving schooling here. Some people might be willing to let that slide. I’m not.”
I got the distinct feeling that when Agent Sterling said “some people” she was talking about Agent Briggs, not Judd.
“You’re lucky enough to have a family who might actually check up on your schooling someday,” she continued. “Not everyone in this house is so fortunate, but you will all receive the education you were promised.” Her eyes flicked over to Judd, then back to me. “Dean and Lia have been homeschooled here for years. If Judd’s done his job right, they should be able to pass the GED. I’m not concerned about Sloane.”
That just left Michael and me. If it hadn’t been for the program, I would have started my senior year in high school this month.
“Take the practice test,” Sterling ordered in an offhand way that told me she was used to being obeyed. “If you need a tutor, we’ll get you a tutor, but either way, the other aspects of your…education can wait.”
In the time since I’d joined the program, I’d forgotten that there was a type of learning that didn’t involve the ins and outs of the criminal brain.
“Can I be excused?” I pushed back from the table.
Judd gave me an amused look. “You ever asked me that before?”
I took that as an answer and started for the door. Judd finished his crossword and turned his attention to Agent Sterling. “You going to eat your sandwich, Ronnie?”
Ronnie? My eyebrows shot into my hairline, and I slowed my exit. Out of
the corner of my eye, I saw Agent Sterling stiffen slightly at the nickname.
“It’s Veronica,” she said. “Or it’s Agent Sterling. In this house, it has to be.”
They know each other, I thought. They’ve known each other for a very long time.
It occurred to me then that Director Sterling might have chosen his daughter for this assignment for reasons other than the fact that she shared his blood.
I made it to the kitchen door just as it swung inward, nearly knocking me off my feet. Agent Briggs stood on the other side, looking like he’d just stepped off a plane. He reached out to steady me, but his gaze was directed elsewhere.
“Ronnie.”
“Briggs,” Agent Sterling returned, very pointedly not using his first name or any abbreviation thereof. “I assume the director briefed you.”
Briggs inclined his head slightly. “You could have called.”
I was right, I thought. They’ve definitely worked together before.
“Cassie.” Agent Briggs seemed to remember that his hands were on my shoulders, and he dropped them. “I see you’ve met Agent Sterling.”
“We met last night.” I studied Briggs, looking for some hint that he resented the intrusion this woman represented. “How’s Mackenzie?” I asked.
Briggs smiled—a rare enough event in itself. “She’s home. She’ll need a lot of support going forward, but she’ll make it. The kid’s a survivor.” He turned his attention back to Agent Sterling. “The Naturals program just closed its second cold case this month,” he told her. “A child abduction.”
There it was—the hint that Agent Briggs had no intention of ceding his authority to the newcomer. His words were designed to communicate one message, very clearly: He didn’t need to feel threatened. The Naturals program was working. We were saving lives.
“Impressive,” Agent Sterling said, her tone making it clear that she thought it was anything but. “Especially considering that only two children have been hospitalized because of this program and, really, only one of them was actually shot, so clearly, that all just comes out in the wash.”
Two children—Michael and Dean. I opened my mouth to tell Agent Sterling that we weren’t children, but Briggs shot me a warning look. “Cassie, why don’t you go see what the others are doing?”
He might as well have said “Why don’t you run outside and play?” Annoyed, I obeyed. When I made it to the living room, I wasn’t surprised to see that the only one actually taking a practice GED was Dean. Lia was filing her nails. Sloane appeared to be constructing some kind of catapult out of pencils and rubber bands.
Lia caught sight of me first. “Good morning, sunshine,” she said. “I’m no Michael, but based on the expression on your face, I’m guessing you’ve been spending some quality time with the lovely Agent Sterling.” Lia beamed at me. “Isn’t she the best?”
The eerie thing about Lia was that she could make anything sound genuine. Lia wasn’t fond of the FBI in general, and she was the type to flout rules based on principle alone, but even knowing her enthusiasm was feigned, I couldn’t see through it.
“There’s something about that Agent Sterling that just makes me want to listen to what she has to say,” Lia continued earnestly. “I think we might be soul mates.”
Dean snorted, but didn’t look up from his practice test. Sloane set off her catapult, and I had to duck to keep from taking a pencil to the forehead.
“Agent Briggs is back,” I said once I’d straightened.
“Thank God.” Lia dropped the act and slumped back against the sofa. “Though if anyone tells him I said that, I’ll be forced to take drastic measures.”
I truly did not want to know what Lia’s idea of “drastic measures” entailed.
“Briggs knows Agent Sterling,” I announced. “So does Judd. They call her Ronnie.”
“Dean,” Lia said, drawing out his name in a way specifically designed to annoy him. “Stop pretending to work and tell us what you know.”
Dean ignored her. Lia raised an eyebrow at me. Clearly, she thought I’d have better luck at getting him to talk than she would.
“Agent Sterling was a part of the team that took down your dad, wasn’t she?” I said, testing out my theory. “She was Briggs’s partner.”
At first, I thought Dean might ignore me, the same way he’d ignored Lia. But eventually, he put down his pencil. He lifted his brown eyes to meet mine. “She was his partner,” he confirmed. Dean’s voice was low-pitched and pleasant, with a hint of Southern twang. Usually, he was a man of few words, but today, he had five more for us. “She was also his wife.”
She was his wife, I thought. Past tense—meaning that she’s not his wife anymore.
“She’s Briggs’s ex-wife?” I said incredulously. “And the director sent her here? That can’t be ethical.”
Lia rolled her eyes. “Any more unethical than an off-the-books FBI program that uses underage prodigies to catch serial killers?” She smirked. “Or what about sending his own daughter to replace Agent Locke? Clearly, nepotism and shadiness are alive and well at FBI headquarters.”
Sloane looked up from making some adjustments to her catapult. “As of 1999, the FBI had no written policies on interoffice dating,” she rattled off. “Intercompany marriages between supervisors, agents, and support staff aren’t uncommon, though they constitute a minority of employee marital unions.”
Lia gave me a look and flipped her hair over her shoulder. “If the FBI doesn’t have an official dating policy, I doubt they have one for divorce. Besides, we’re talking about Director Sterling here. The man who basically bought Michael from his father by promising to make the IRS look the other way.” She paused. “The man who had the FBI haul me in off the streets and told me my other option was juvie.”
This was the first time I’d ever heard Lia mention her past before the program. Juvie?
“Briggs and Sterling both worked my father’s case.” Dean volunteered that information, using his own past to change the subject from Lia’s, which told me that she’d been telling the truth and he wanted to protect her from questions. “Briggs was the strategist,” Dean continued. “He was driven, competitive—not with her, but with any UNSUB they hunted. Briggs didn’t just want to catch killers. He wanted to win.”
It was easy to forget, when Dean said the word UNSUB, that his father had never been an Unknown Subject to him. Dean had lived with a killer—a true psychopath—day in, day out, for years.
“Sterling was impulsive.” Dean stuck to describing the agents. I doubted he would mention his father again. “Fearless. She had a hot temper, and she followed her gut, even when that wasn’t the smart thing to do.”
I’d suspected that Agent Sterling’s personality had undergone some major changes in the past five years, but even so, it was hard to see the connection between the short-tempered, instinct-driven woman Dean was describing and the Agent Sterling in the kitchen now. The additional data sent my brain into overdrive, connecting the dots, looking at the trajectory between past and present.
“Briggs has a case.” Michael liked to make an entrance. “He just got the call.”
“But his team just got back.” Sloane loaded her catapult again. “The FBI has fifty-six field offices, and the DC field office is the second-largest in the country. There are dozens of teams who could take this case. Why assign it to Briggs?”
“Because I’m the most qualified for the job,” Briggs said, coming into the room. “And,” he added under his breath, “because somewhere along the way, the universe decided I needed to suffer.”
I wondered if that last bit was about the case—or about the fact that Agent Sterling was on his heels. Now that I knew they’d been married, I doubted his irritation with her when he’d sent me out of the room had been entirely professional. She was playing in his sandbox—and they clearly had issues.
“I’m going with Agent Briggs.” Sterling pointedly ignored her ex-husband and addressed those words to us. “If any
of you hope to come within ten feet of a training exercise or cold case this month, you’ll have those practice GEDs finished when I get back.”
Lia threw her head back and laughed.
“You think I’m joking, Ms. Zhang?” Agent Sterling asked. It was the first time I’d ever heard Lia’s last name, but Lia didn’t bat an eye.
“I don’t think anything,” Lia said. “I know that you’re telling the truth. But I also know that the FBI brass isn’t going to let you ground their secret assets from doing their jobs. They didn’t bring us here to take the GED. They brought us here because we’re useful. I’ve met your daddy dearest, Agent Sterling. He only plays by the rules when it’s useful for him to do so, and he definitely didn’t go to the trouble of blackmailing me into this program to let you clip my wings.” Lia leaned back against the sofa and stretched out her legs. “If you think otherwise,” she added, her lips parting in a slow, deliberate smile, “you’re lying to yourself.”
Agent Sterling waited to reply until she was certain she had Lia’s full attention. “You’re only useful as long as you aren’t a liability,” she said calmly. “And given your individual histories—some of them criminal—it wouldn’t take much for me to convince the director that one or two of you might be a bigger risk than you’re worth.”
Dean was the son of a serial killer. Michael had anger management issues and a father who’d traded him to the FBI for immunity from prosecution on white-collar crimes. Lia was a compulsive liar—and apparently had some kind of juvie record. Sloane had her catapult aimed at Agent Sterling’s head.
And then there was me.
“Lia, just humor her and take the test.” Agent Briggs sounded very much like someone whose head was beginning to pound.
“Humor me?” Agent Sterling repeated. “You’re telling her to humor me?” Sterling’s voice went up a decibel.
“Lia already took the test.” Dean spoke up before Agent Briggs had a chance to reply. Everyone in the room turned to look at him. “She’s a human lie detector. She can do multiple choice questions in her sleep.”