James would hate that nickname. I’ll have to use it. I feel a little better today. More patient. I roll my eyes, the word sticking in my head like one of my taps. Awful word.
The main office door opens and a woman walks in. “Afternoon,” she says, her voice low and sleepy.
Pixie pops her gum loudly, then pushes a button under her desk that opens the door to the hall. The woman goes straight back.
“We should see a movie. Movies are quiet. People don’t think much during them.” Pixie’s voice buzzes at me, but I can’t quite focus on it.
Something.
Something.
Something.
Something is wrong. Very wrong. SO WRONG.
I whirl around just in time to see the door close behind the woman. “What was she thinking?”
Pixie sees my expression and frowns. “I don’t know, paperwork deadlines. Her thoughts are never interesting.”
“Let me back.”
“Fia, I can’t—”
I jump over the desk, knock her down, and push the button. The doors click unlocked and I throw them open, sprint through. A guard stands up from his chair and sputters something, blocking my way. I punch him in the neck and keep going.
Around the corner. Everything is buzzing, every internal alarm ringing, I feel sick and I feel tight and coiled like a spring. I see the back of the woman as she opens a plain door and walks in.
Wrong.
“You can’t be back here,” a man says, roughly grabbing my elbow. I put a foot against the wall and use it for leverage, shoving myself into him. He’s off-balance. I drop to the floor and sweep his legs, knocking him down.
Can’t stop. Can’t wait.
More footsteps pounding behind me but I don’t care, I throw myself at the door, slam through.
Everything is fuzzy, the room out of focus except the woman. Her back is to me but she is in sharp relief, every line clear, every instinct in my body tuned in to her.
Stop stop stop stop her, I have to stop her! I lower my shoulder and run straight forward, slamming her head into the edge of a table with a resounding crack. She collapses on the floor and I pin her arm behind her back.
My heart races, but everything else starts to calm, the rush in my ears fading and my vision going back to normal. She looks small and fragile there on the carpet, wearing a white blouse and charcoal dress slacks. Her hair is still perfectly set in a bun at the base of her neck and I—
Oh, no, please no, please no no I didn’t mean to I didn’t want to—
I see her chest move and I lean back, exhaling with relief. She’s not dead.
I’m grabbed roughly from behind. Elbow to the nose, turn, knee to the crotch, I am a fury of fists and knees and elbows, but there are a lot of them. I don’t know why I’m fighting them, I don’t need to fight them except they won’t leave me alone.
They have stun guns. Now I want to fight them. I break a nose, pop an arm out of its socket, fight my way into the corner. Two left. Two on one. Not fair.
Not a problem.
“Stop! Get off her!” James shouts.
The security guard immediately in front of me pauses. I slam my head into his nose and he stumbles backward, clutching it.
Good. Now no one is touching me. I don’t want anyone to touch me. I smooth down the front of my black tee, then finally take in the room. Several men in various stages of shock sit around a large oval table. The table I slammed the woman into. She’s still lying on the floor, but James is crouching next to her.
“She’s not dead,” I blurt, needing to say it and needing him to confirm it. “I didn’t kill her.”
James finally looks up and meets my eyes. I can read the panic hidden there, but his face is carefully composed. “She’s unconscious.”
“Why did you attack her?” a handsome older man with salt-and-pepper hair asks, and when I look at him I feel
nothing
nothing
nothing
so much nothing I worry that I will lose myself in it.
I shake my head, trying to snap out of it. He is worse than the distraction of the wrong feeling. There is something so strong in the way I react to him that it goes beyond right or wrong. I can hardly breathe. “I needed to.”
“She’s worked here for five years.”
James stands, holding a handgun. “She had this. I think Fia saved your life.”
The man’s expression doesn’t change. He doesn’t have an expression. He’s not a person. For the first time in my life I think I know what fear—true fear—feels like. Because everything about him is off, so far off I don’t even know how to process it.
“Aren’t you going to introduce us?” he says, and I think he is smiling, but it isn’t a smile because he isn’t a person. My instincts made me run in here, my instincts made me stop whatever this woman was going to do. But this man can’t be right, can’t be.
James sets the gun on the table. “Fia, this is my father, Phillip Keane.”
I smile because there is no other option. It is all I can do to hold in a burst of laughter, because this is the funniest thing that has ever happened to me and I am broken, once and for all, completely broken.
I just saved the life of the man I’ve vowed to destroy.
ANNIE
Two and a Half Months Before
“FIA,” I MUTTER, STOMPING INTO MY ROOM AND throwing open my closet door. “You’d better be having the time of your life to make up for abandoning me and forcing me to figure this all out on my own.”
When I agreed to talk to Mae, I didn’t realize they’d track her down within a day. I wanted to be useful, I did, I do, but this feels fast. I’m not sure what to say to save this girl. But it should work out, shouldn’t it? Since I’m doing the right thing?
There is the tiniest hint of an exhalation in the room and I spin around, clutching my things to my chest. “Who’s there?”
No one answers.
My heart racing, I edge toward the door. Now that I’m listening I can hear all the little sounds a body makes when it is trying its hardest to be silent. I open my mouth to scream, but . . . I know everyone in this house. I’m not going to be scared in my own room.
I plaster a smile on my face and shake my head. “You’re going crazy, Annie.” I let my shoulders relax, hum, and toss my clothes toward the bed, then walk out into the hall and close the door behind myself.
I count to twenty, then throw the door open and scream “GOTCHA!”
I’m answered by a shriek. A guy’s shriek. “Adam?”
“I’m so sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to—You came in, and I didn’t want you to know—I was looking for something but then it was too late to let you know I was in here, and then once I was quiet for a few seconds, it felt too weird to suddenly announce myself, and . . . I am so, so sorry.”
I frown. This is unlike him. He always lets me know when he comes into or leaves a room. “What were you looking for?”
“Umm. The phone. I was checking the phone. Rafael found a lab for me, so I won’t be here when you get back. I wanted to make sure we hadn’t missed any contact from Fia.”
I walk and sit down on the edge of my bed. “You could have asked.”
“Are you sure there’s no other way she might try to contact us? Email? Anything?”
“I would tell you if there were.”
He exhales heavily. “I thought she’d be back by now. I’m worried.”
My heart feels heavy in my chest. All Adam’s careful attention, all his kindness. He’s been good company, but now I know it has nothing to do with me. It’s about Fia. Everything always is, even when she is nowhere near, even when she left all of us. We still orbit the brilliant, chaotic burning of her star.
“You really care about my sister, don’t you?” I don’t want him to. He’s so sweet. I can’t imagine anyone loving Fia without being hurt by it.
I love her more than anyone, and it’s killing me.
He sits next to
me. “I lost everything and everyone. I haven’t even been able to contact my family. They think I’m dead, Annie. My mom, I can’t even imagine . . .” His voice breaks, and I reach out for his hand. It’s not, I note with no small amount of relief, the hand from my visions. “Fia’s the reason I’m here, and I can’t believe that there isn’t a purpose behind it all. Not with what I’ve seen, not with what you all can do. There has to be a reason we met. A reason that makes everything worthwhile.”
I’m the reason they met. Not fate. I created this future with my stupid reaction to my visions. But I don’t think Adam would see it that way. Clinical, brilliantly medical-minded Adam believes in fate. A fate with Fia.
“We change the future with every choice we make,” I say softly. I don’t know whether I mean it to encourage or discourage the torch he carries for my sister.
Something thuds outside the bathroom. I leave the shower running but climb out, curious. The stone tiles are cold under my feet as I pad across them and put my ear against the door.
“If you so much as look in her direction again, I’ll kill you.” Cole. He insisted on coming with me to North Carolina on the Mae trip, so Rafael sent him and Nathan. It was the most awkward car trip in the history of car trips: Nathan with his terrible choice in music, Cole silent and fuming.
Nathan answers. “Relax! I was just in here for—”
“I’ve seen you watching her when you think no one notices. One more time—” Something thuds against the wall and I jump back, nearly slipping on the tiles. “One more time and I’ll break your neck.”
Well then. Horrified, I climb back into the shower.
After my hair is dry, I dress in the bathroom, now hyperaware of who might be hanging around my room in the hotel suite unobserved. At least I can smell Nathan coming from several rooms away. Sure enough, as I walk out into my bedroom the sharp stinging stink of him lingers.
The television is on, too. “Hello?” I say.
“It’s me,” Cole answers.
“And if I had walked out naked?”
“My eyes are closed. Can I open them now?”
I walk to the bench at the foot of the bed and sit down. “Yes. Why are you in my room?”
“Bored.”
“So, slamming Nathan into the wall isn’t enough to keep you entertained for a few minutes?”
“Ah.” He makes a small, regretful noise with his mouth. “You heard that. Sarah says I don’t play well with other boys. Oh, your phone kept beeping while you were in the shower.”
My heart skips a beat—what if it was Fia?—but I try to sound casual. “Who is it? You can check, I don’t mind.”
Cole gets up and then says, “Adam. Five texts. I can read them to you.” He pauses. “Unless they’re personal.”
I roll my eyes. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I’m pretty sure he’s desperately in love with my sister.”
Cole snorts. “He’s crazy.”
“He’d have to be, right?” I stop, horrified with myself. Cole bursts out with a shockingly staccato laugh and then I can’t help but laugh, too. Maybe it’s betraying Fia, I don’t know, but it feels good to be able to laugh about her with someone who knows her, or at least has met her. Makes me feel less alone.
I twist my hair up into a bun, a smile lingering on my face. “Oh, speaking of crazy, do I need to be concerned about Nathan?”
“No.”
“Because you’re watching him?”
“Because if he tries anything, you can handle yourself.”
I jerk my knee up, then pantomime grabbing my groin and falling to the floor in pain. I’m rewarded with another bark of laughter.
Pushing myself up, I sit on the floor and pull out my hair, redo it. “Did Rafael call?”
When Cole says Rafael’s name, it sounds like he’s bitten into something bitter and wants to spit it out. “No, Rafael didn’t call. But Mae works at a restaurant and has a shift this afternoon. It might be an easy way to meet her and establish contact—less threatening than showing up at her house.”
“It’s a plan. You coming with me?”
“I think it’d be better for you to be alone, but I’ll be close by.”
“Fair enough.” I can handle this. I can.
But by the time he drops me off at the café I’m a raging bundle of nerves.
I sit in a booth, nervously tapping on my plate until I’m hit with a sudden longing for Fia. I adjust my sunglasses, then fold my hands in my lap.
I put my elbow on the table and lean my chin against it. Mae, Mae, Mae, I think. Where are you, Mae? I want to talk to you. I feel like an idiot, sending out thoughts to the café when I have no idea if she’s even here. What if she didn’t show up for her shift today? What if it’s the wrong Mae Rubio?
Someone sits across from me with a huff. “Will you stop it? You’re giving me a headache with all that shouting. It’s creepy.”
I sit up straight and smile. “Mae?”
“No, the other mind reader you’ve been screaming at for the last thirty minutes of my shift. What’s your problem? And how do you know about me?” She sounds young, but with a hard edge.
“I’m Amy.” I hold my hand out straight, but she ignores it, so I drop it and fiddle with my cutlery.
“Wonderful, Amy. That explains everything.”
“I know about you because I work for a group dedicated to protecting women like us.”
“Like us?” She’s quiet for a little bit, then she snorts. “No reaction. Obviously you are not like me.”
“No, not exactly. I’m not a Reader, I’m a Seer. I see things before they happen.”
I gasp as a glass of ice water is thrown in my face.
Mae laughs. “Guess you didn’t see that coming.”
I fumble for my napkin, knocking a spoon or fork off the table with a metallic clatter that makes me cringe. “It doesn’t work like that. I don’t see everything before it happens, just like you don’t hear every thought anyone ever has.”
“Pretty close,” she says, and I’m surprised to hear a tinge of—sadness? Wistfulness? “Though I can’t figure you out. You haven’t had one snarky thought about me. Most straight girls think mean things the second they see me. You aren’t going to comment on my hair or my clothes? What about my boobs? No boob judgery? What are you, a robot?”
I push my sunglasses to the top of my head. “I tend not to care what people look like.”
“Oh.” She sounds deflated. “Sorry.” She sips, and then a cup clinks down. “So, what are you doing here?”
“You’re going to get—or may have already gotten—an offer to go to a special school for girls. You should know what you’re dealing with.”
I lean back and think—details, the few insights I have from visions, memories. The night I overheard the teachers talking about how to keep various girls under control. The bruises all over Fia’s body I didn’t know about until Eden told me. When Mr. Keane personally threatened to kill me if I messed up.
He would have done it. Still would, given the chance. I have no doubt.
Mae lets out a long breath. “Well. That was a lot of information.”
“They’ve already trapped too many girls, stolen too many futures.” I wait expectantly for her to ask how to get away from Keane and stay unnoticed.
“How do they get girls to do it? They’re targeting psychics and mind readers. How do they fool them into working for them?”
I frown, taken aback. I hadn’t planned on getting into this much explanation. Cole said to scare her away. “Well, not everyone is as skilled as you. I had no idea anything was wrong with the school for years.” Fia always knew. I should have paid more attention. They’d destroyed her before I even figured out I should worry. “It’s not like they start out most girls with assassinations. It’s little things. And they pay really well.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. At least that’s what I heard. The school is prestigious. My aunt was thrilled to send us. And then
they set up the girls who are talented enough with jobs. But they own you. You can’t get out. Mr. Keane, the man in charge of everything, is pretty patently evil.”
“What’s the point of it all?”
“I don’t know the endgame. I only know details. He’s got eyes and ears in a lot of things. I think he wants power and control, and he uses and manipulates a lot of people to get it.”
“Hmm. And Fia? Where is she now that you can’t go three thoughts without missing her? Dead?”
“I . . .” My stomach drops. Oh no, what have I done? Cole said to stay anonymous, and here I’ve already shown her that I’m a blind psychic connected to Fia. How many of those are there walking around?
“Yeah, you aren’t very good at this.” She laughs and I put a hand over my mouth, horrified. “Relax, ‘Amy’ the Blind Psychic. I’ve been around the block. You learn about people pretty quickly when you can listen in on the stuff they don’t filter. You’re a good person and you really think you’re doing me a favor by warning me about this sinister organization that wants to use my powers for eeeeevvvvviiiiillll.” She pauses. “I was stroking an imaginary beard when I said that, just so you know. Answer me this: Why is Fia still working for them?”
My shoulders slump. “I honestly don’t know.”
“I think I understand,” Mae says, her voice soft. “Because here’s where you’re wrong. You’re treating all these women as victims, unable to get out of this crazy trap. But can’t you see that we’re the ones with all the power?”
“You don’t know what they’re like, what they’ll do to control you.”
“No, I can imagine. But if they’re willing to go that far to use us, it makes me think they’re scared silly that someone else will beat them at their own game. And I like that. I think Fia figured it out, too. Plus, to be honest, I kind of dig the idea of being showered with money and power for something I can do in my sleep.”
“But—”
“No buts. I’m not a victim and I’m not going to let a corporation turn me into one. Girls like you and me? We hold all the cards. We just have to be smart enough to see it.”
“You’re going to say yes to them,” I whisper. How could I have messed this up so bad?