I was worried it would work, too. I was worried I wouldn’t put up a fight at all and Sam would know how much of a coward I was.
The agents pushed me into the metal folding chair. My hands were cuffed behind the back, my legs tied to the chair’s legs. The whole time, I didn’t take my eyes off Sam and he didn’t take his eyes off me.
We could get through this. Couldn’t we?
I’m sorry, I mouthed.
This was my fault.
Because I’d doubted him.
Because I’d believed all the wrong things and all the wrong people.
I tried to prepare myself for whatever was about to happen. Tried telling myself Sam was strong, that he could get through a lot of pain, that he wouldn’t want me to give in so easily.
I can do this, I thought.
And that’s when the first blow came.
It was a straight shot of a tightened fist aimed expertly at my jaw.
My chair teetered back on its legs. My teeth slammed together and the pain throbbed down to the roots, through my bones.
It wasn’t Sam they were torturing. It was me.
Another blow to the ribs. Another to the stomach. Something cracked. Chains rattled. I couldn’t see straight. Blood filled my mouth.
A boot to the head. My chair tipped over sideways, and my swollen cheek pressed against the ice-cold concrete floor.
“Stop!” Sam said. His chains rattled again. “Please.”
“I need the location of the files,” Riley said. “Every single copy. Any preplanned media spread, I want details on those, too.”
Sam didn’t say anything at first. My chair was righted. I blinked back the tears in my eyes and managed to see Sam’s face through the grimy haze.
Don’t do it, I thought.
An arm snaked around my neck. A blade was pressed into my throat.
“Come on, Sam,” Riley said, “or she bleeds out in front of you.”
I didn’t think they’d do it. Did Sam know that my uncle was the one who ran the Branch? Riley wouldn’t kill me, would he?
The blade cut into my skin, slowly, carefully.
I cried out. A trail of blood ran down my neck.
“Okay.” Sam struggled against his cuffs. His teeth were clenched so tight, I worried they’d break. “I’ll give you whatever you want.”
“Good,” Riley said behind me. “Good.”
And then I was dragged from the room.
I passed out not long after I left Sam and woke sometime later with a cold rag on my face. I shrank away when I saw it was Dani who was cleaning my wounds. “Hey,” she said. “You’re okay. I’m just cleaning you up.”
I was back in my little cell, lying flat on my bed. “I’m sorry,” Dani said.
“Don’t touch me.” I slapped her hand away.
She frowned. “It wasn’t my idea, torturing you. Riley is… well… you know how Riley is.”
Everything hurt. My head was pounding. My teeth felt crooked, as if they’d been smashed together with that kick to the face. There was something wet sliding down my nose. Dani wiped it away, and the rag came back covered in blood.
“Nothing is broken,” she said. “I had you checked.”
“Wow. Thanks for that.”
She sighed. “I really am sorry.”
“You keep saying that.”
“And it’ll never be enough.”
“I want Sam,” I said, my voice cracking, revealing all the fear I was trying to keep locked away. Was he dead already? Had Riley let Greg finish his mission?
Dani reached over and pushed a strand of hair behind my ear. “You can’t have him, bird.”
The door opened again and Dani stepped back. Greg and his partner tugged me off the bed.
“Careful with her,” Dani warned.
This time, I didn’t fight.
I was taken to a different room where two white-coated technicians readied an array of machines. Wires and electrodes were splayed out on two stainless steel trays, and I was thrust into the cushy leather chair in the middle of them. Greg tightened a strap around my upper body, locking me in place. He wasn’t acknowledging me, or speaking at all, so that gave me some hope. He hadn’t completed his mission yet, otherwise he would be back to normal.
A technician shoved a rubber guard into my mouth.
Dani came over and nudged my chin up with her index finger, forcing me to look at her. “It’ll be over soon.” She leaned in, her hair swinging off her shoulders. “I love you,” she whispered, then kissed my forehead, just as I wound my fingers in her hair and gave it a hard tug.
27
CAUGHT OFF GUARD, DANI DIDN’T FIGHT back right away.
I bucked up, slamming a knee into her head. Once, twice. She staggered. The technicians pressed themselves into the corner. The other agent started for me. I lashed out at the last second, tripping him with a foot. He pitched forward into my lap, and I snagged the knife from his gear belt.
Dani punched me. The chair rocked to the side.
It wasn’t bolted down.
She punched me again, and I aided the momentum, pushing with my feet so that I rocked to the right and tipped over.
“Sedate her,” she said, and the technicians sprang to life.
I sawed at the strap on my right arm, the one hidden from view.
I could hear the shuffle of the agent’s boots, but couldn’t see him yet around the base of the chair.
Hurry. Damn it.
I nicked myself with the knife, and sharp pain burned from the wound.
The agent wrapped his hands around my arm and lifted me upright just as the strap frayed on its last threads and finally came loose. I swung with everything I had and landed a solid punch to the man’s face. He fell back and whacked his head on the metal base of a medical machine.
Greg came for me next. I dug the toes of my boots into the floor and thrust forward with the knife, stabbing him in the chest.
The blond technician gasped and scrambled for the door, her coworker right behind.
Greg dropped at my feet.
Dani and I stared at each other.
“What do you plan to do, Anna?” she asked. “Kill me? You won’t make it out of here, not without help. And then what? Rescue the boys? They’re just boys!” She edged closer. “We are blood. Sisters.”
“I don’t even know you!” I shouted.
She shrank back. The look on her face, of pure heart-wrenching sadness, softened my resolve.
To her, I was the little sister who needed to be saved. A child, still. Someone bargained for, not with.
But to me, she was just a stranger, and I suspected that hurt worse than any physical blow.
She gritted her teeth. “I can’t lose you again. I just can’t.” She pulled a gun from beneath her sweater and pointed it at me. “Drop the knife.”
I stalled to weigh my options.
“Drop the knife!”
I did. It clattered on the floor.
Dani eased toward me. “If there were a way for me to make you remember,” she started, “I’d do it. It would be so much easier. Trust me. You would see…”
“What?” I raised my arms, annoyed. “What would I see?”
“That our parents were shitty parents. That I was the one who took care of you. That everything I’ve done, I’ve done for you!”
“Like give away the boys? I don’t want that. They deserve their freedom more than any of us.”
She laughed. “Oh, because Sam is so innocent?”
“He didn’t kill our parents, did he? For all I know, you were the one who killed them.”
“No.” She shook her head for emphasis. “We lied to protect you.”
I snorted. “I’m sure.”
“I lied about something else, too. I was there that night, the night our parents died.”
I tilted my head, caught off guard. “You were?”
“But I wasn’t the one who killed our parents. It was you.”
28
I FROWNED. “YOU EXPECT ME TO BELIEVE that? I was just a kid. I loved them.”
“You’ve been having flashbacks, haven’t you? To that night? Sam said you were. And your flashbacks have been more debilitating than Nick’s and Cas’s, haven’t they? More severe? It’s because you’ve gone through more memory alterations than the others.”
I faltered. “You mean, at the farmhouse?”
“No.” She shook her head. “Before then. When you were younger.”
I snorted. “You’re trying to tell me our parents didn’t notice their daughter coming home with no memories?”
“The Branch had just developed the ability to wipe memories and plant whatever they wanted in the voids. You were the first to receive them. And more than once.”
A lump wedged itself in the center of my throat, and no amount of swallowing seemed to dislodge it. Because I worried she was telling the truth.
“Why would they do that?” I asked.
“I think you already know the answer.”
The flashback I’d had a few days ago came back to me. In it, Dani had asked if our dad had hit me. She’d instantly gone on alert.
He hadn’t, though. Had he? I’d said no.
But even if he had, that didn’t explain why I would have killed him and our mother.
“I don’t believe you,” I said.
“I didn’t expect you would.”
Someone grabbed me from behind. Two hands on my left arm. Two hands on my right. The lab techs. They swung me around, dragging me toward the chair. I wrenched my right arm out of the woman’s grip and socked her with my elbow. Blood spurted out her nose, and she slammed into the wall.
The man was harder to slip. Once he saw his partner go down, he tightened his hold, bracing his feet. So I punched him in the face and followed it with an elbow to the same spot. His eyes rolled back, and he slumped to the ground.
I scooped up the knife and turned just in time to see the stainless steel medical tray whack me across the head. I stumbled. The coppery taste of blood ran down my throat.
Dani swung the tray again, but I ducked and thrust upward with the knife. Dani collapsed in my arms. I stumbled back from her weight.
She coughed, and her lips came away red. “Bird,” she said, “it wasn’t supposed to be like this.”
I’d kept it together this whole time. Kept the tears down. The emotion locked in a place I didn’t want to touch. But it all came pouring out at once.
“I didn’t… I didn’t mean…” I sputtered.
Dani’s legs buckled, and I eased her to the floor. The knife was lodged somewhere between her sternum and stomach. Her sweater was heavy and wet with blood.
“I’m sorry,” I said, pushing the hair from her face. “I’ll get someone. Someone can help you.”
She wrapped her tiny hand around my wrist. “No.” Her breath scraped down her throat. It sounded alien, unnatural. “You’re all I have left.…” Tears streamed down her face. “I’ve lived my entire life trying to protect you.” She laughed, and it quickly turned into long, racking coughs. “You clearly don’t need me anymore.”
I took her face in my hands and forced her to look at me. Her eyes lost focus. It was like she was looking straight through me.
“We can fix this. Tell me where the boys are. Where would they take them?”
She shook her head.
“Please.” Desperate, I threw in one more promise. “We can run together. All of us.”
“Even Nick?” She smiled. “I made you that same promise once, and that’s what you asked for. You asked for him to come with us.”
She shuddered. “There was always something about him. You should know that. That’s why you did it, I think. To protect him.” She laughed, but there was no humor in her tone. “The first time you went through a memory alteration, I got called away at the last second, and Nick was there when you woke. He was always there, every time after that.”
The agents pushed me into the metal folding chair. My hands were cuffed behind the back, my legs tied to the chair’s legs. The whole time, I didn’t take my eyes off Sam and he didn’t take his eyes off me.
We could get through this. Couldn’t we?
I’m sorry, I mouthed.
This was my fault.
Because I’d doubted him.
Because I’d believed all the wrong things and all the wrong people.
I tried to prepare myself for whatever was about to happen. Tried telling myself Sam was strong, that he could get through a lot of pain, that he wouldn’t want me to give in so easily.
I can do this, I thought.
And that’s when the first blow came.
It was a straight shot of a tightened fist aimed expertly at my jaw.
My chair teetered back on its legs. My teeth slammed together and the pain throbbed down to the roots, through my bones.
It wasn’t Sam they were torturing. It was me.
Another blow to the ribs. Another to the stomach. Something cracked. Chains rattled. I couldn’t see straight. Blood filled my mouth.
A boot to the head. My chair tipped over sideways, and my swollen cheek pressed against the ice-cold concrete floor.
“Stop!” Sam said. His chains rattled again. “Please.”
“I need the location of the files,” Riley said. “Every single copy. Any preplanned media spread, I want details on those, too.”
Sam didn’t say anything at first. My chair was righted. I blinked back the tears in my eyes and managed to see Sam’s face through the grimy haze.
Don’t do it, I thought.
An arm snaked around my neck. A blade was pressed into my throat.
“Come on, Sam,” Riley said, “or she bleeds out in front of you.”
I didn’t think they’d do it. Did Sam know that my uncle was the one who ran the Branch? Riley wouldn’t kill me, would he?
The blade cut into my skin, slowly, carefully.
I cried out. A trail of blood ran down my neck.
“Okay.” Sam struggled against his cuffs. His teeth were clenched so tight, I worried they’d break. “I’ll give you whatever you want.”
“Good,” Riley said behind me. “Good.”
And then I was dragged from the room.
I passed out not long after I left Sam and woke sometime later with a cold rag on my face. I shrank away when I saw it was Dani who was cleaning my wounds. “Hey,” she said. “You’re okay. I’m just cleaning you up.”
I was back in my little cell, lying flat on my bed. “I’m sorry,” Dani said.
“Don’t touch me.” I slapped her hand away.
She frowned. “It wasn’t my idea, torturing you. Riley is… well… you know how Riley is.”
Everything hurt. My head was pounding. My teeth felt crooked, as if they’d been smashed together with that kick to the face. There was something wet sliding down my nose. Dani wiped it away, and the rag came back covered in blood.
“Nothing is broken,” she said. “I had you checked.”
“Wow. Thanks for that.”
She sighed. “I really am sorry.”
“You keep saying that.”
“And it’ll never be enough.”
“I want Sam,” I said, my voice cracking, revealing all the fear I was trying to keep locked away. Was he dead already? Had Riley let Greg finish his mission?
Dani reached over and pushed a strand of hair behind my ear. “You can’t have him, bird.”
The door opened again and Dani stepped back. Greg and his partner tugged me off the bed.
“Careful with her,” Dani warned.
This time, I didn’t fight.
I was taken to a different room where two white-coated technicians readied an array of machines. Wires and electrodes were splayed out on two stainless steel trays, and I was thrust into the cushy leather chair in the middle of them. Greg tightened a strap around my upper body, locking me in place. He wasn’t acknowledging me, or speaking at all, so that gave me some hope. He hadn’t completed his mission yet, otherwise he would be back to normal.
A technician shoved a rubber guard into my mouth.
Dani came over and nudged my chin up with her index finger, forcing me to look at her. “It’ll be over soon.” She leaned in, her hair swinging off her shoulders. “I love you,” she whispered, then kissed my forehead, just as I wound my fingers in her hair and gave it a hard tug.
27
CAUGHT OFF GUARD, DANI DIDN’T FIGHT back right away.
I bucked up, slamming a knee into her head. Once, twice. She staggered. The technicians pressed themselves into the corner. The other agent started for me. I lashed out at the last second, tripping him with a foot. He pitched forward into my lap, and I snagged the knife from his gear belt.
Dani punched me. The chair rocked to the side.
It wasn’t bolted down.
She punched me again, and I aided the momentum, pushing with my feet so that I rocked to the right and tipped over.
“Sedate her,” she said, and the technicians sprang to life.
I sawed at the strap on my right arm, the one hidden from view.
I could hear the shuffle of the agent’s boots, but couldn’t see him yet around the base of the chair.
Hurry. Damn it.
I nicked myself with the knife, and sharp pain burned from the wound.
The agent wrapped his hands around my arm and lifted me upright just as the strap frayed on its last threads and finally came loose. I swung with everything I had and landed a solid punch to the man’s face. He fell back and whacked his head on the metal base of a medical machine.
Greg came for me next. I dug the toes of my boots into the floor and thrust forward with the knife, stabbing him in the chest.
The blond technician gasped and scrambled for the door, her coworker right behind.
Greg dropped at my feet.
Dani and I stared at each other.
“What do you plan to do, Anna?” she asked. “Kill me? You won’t make it out of here, not without help. And then what? Rescue the boys? They’re just boys!” She edged closer. “We are blood. Sisters.”
“I don’t even know you!” I shouted.
She shrank back. The look on her face, of pure heart-wrenching sadness, softened my resolve.
To her, I was the little sister who needed to be saved. A child, still. Someone bargained for, not with.
But to me, she was just a stranger, and I suspected that hurt worse than any physical blow.
She gritted her teeth. “I can’t lose you again. I just can’t.” She pulled a gun from beneath her sweater and pointed it at me. “Drop the knife.”
I stalled to weigh my options.
“Drop the knife!”
I did. It clattered on the floor.
Dani eased toward me. “If there were a way for me to make you remember,” she started, “I’d do it. It would be so much easier. Trust me. You would see…”
“What?” I raised my arms, annoyed. “What would I see?”
“That our parents were shitty parents. That I was the one who took care of you. That everything I’ve done, I’ve done for you!”
“Like give away the boys? I don’t want that. They deserve their freedom more than any of us.”
She laughed. “Oh, because Sam is so innocent?”
“He didn’t kill our parents, did he? For all I know, you were the one who killed them.”
“No.” She shook her head for emphasis. “We lied to protect you.”
I snorted. “I’m sure.”
“I lied about something else, too. I was there that night, the night our parents died.”
I tilted my head, caught off guard. “You were?”
“But I wasn’t the one who killed our parents. It was you.”
28
I FROWNED. “YOU EXPECT ME TO BELIEVE that? I was just a kid. I loved them.”
“You’ve been having flashbacks, haven’t you? To that night? Sam said you were. And your flashbacks have been more debilitating than Nick’s and Cas’s, haven’t they? More severe? It’s because you’ve gone through more memory alterations than the others.”
I faltered. “You mean, at the farmhouse?”
“No.” She shook her head. “Before then. When you were younger.”
I snorted. “You’re trying to tell me our parents didn’t notice their daughter coming home with no memories?”
“The Branch had just developed the ability to wipe memories and plant whatever they wanted in the voids. You were the first to receive them. And more than once.”
A lump wedged itself in the center of my throat, and no amount of swallowing seemed to dislodge it. Because I worried she was telling the truth.
“Why would they do that?” I asked.
“I think you already know the answer.”
The flashback I’d had a few days ago came back to me. In it, Dani had asked if our dad had hit me. She’d instantly gone on alert.
He hadn’t, though. Had he? I’d said no.
But even if he had, that didn’t explain why I would have killed him and our mother.
“I don’t believe you,” I said.
“I didn’t expect you would.”
Someone grabbed me from behind. Two hands on my left arm. Two hands on my right. The lab techs. They swung me around, dragging me toward the chair. I wrenched my right arm out of the woman’s grip and socked her with my elbow. Blood spurted out her nose, and she slammed into the wall.
The man was harder to slip. Once he saw his partner go down, he tightened his hold, bracing his feet. So I punched him in the face and followed it with an elbow to the same spot. His eyes rolled back, and he slumped to the ground.
I scooped up the knife and turned just in time to see the stainless steel medical tray whack me across the head. I stumbled. The coppery taste of blood ran down my throat.
Dani swung the tray again, but I ducked and thrust upward with the knife. Dani collapsed in my arms. I stumbled back from her weight.
She coughed, and her lips came away red. “Bird,” she said, “it wasn’t supposed to be like this.”
I’d kept it together this whole time. Kept the tears down. The emotion locked in a place I didn’t want to touch. But it all came pouring out at once.
“I didn’t… I didn’t mean…” I sputtered.
Dani’s legs buckled, and I eased her to the floor. The knife was lodged somewhere between her sternum and stomach. Her sweater was heavy and wet with blood.
“I’m sorry,” I said, pushing the hair from her face. “I’ll get someone. Someone can help you.”
She wrapped her tiny hand around my wrist. “No.” Her breath scraped down her throat. It sounded alien, unnatural. “You’re all I have left.…” Tears streamed down her face. “I’ve lived my entire life trying to protect you.” She laughed, and it quickly turned into long, racking coughs. “You clearly don’t need me anymore.”
I took her face in my hands and forced her to look at me. Her eyes lost focus. It was like she was looking straight through me.
“We can fix this. Tell me where the boys are. Where would they take them?”
She shook her head.
“Please.” Desperate, I threw in one more promise. “We can run together. All of us.”
“Even Nick?” She smiled. “I made you that same promise once, and that’s what you asked for. You asked for him to come with us.”
She shuddered. “There was always something about him. You should know that. That’s why you did it, I think. To protect him.” She laughed, but there was no humor in her tone. “The first time you went through a memory alteration, I got called away at the last second, and Nick was there when you woke. He was always there, every time after that.”
