Anarchy Found (16 page)

Chapter Eighteen - Lincoln

Molly
. I think it was her name that started it.

“Lincoln?” Sheila asks outside my bedroom doorway. “Are you OK?”

It’s an obsession. I realize this.

“Did you meet with her?”

Unhealthy for sure. And not gonna end well.

“Lincoln?”

I’m lying naked on the end of the bed with only my black leather gloves on. I can smell her lust on them. My bare feet are kicked up on the headboard, my hands behind my neck, and I’m staring up at the cave ceiling. The lights are on but the darkness surrounds me. I can see Sheila in her holographic dress from the corner of my eye and picture the day I coded her image. That day I finally stumbled down the overgrown driveway and came to terms with what was left of my life before Prodigy School. That day when my vow to get even, no matter what it took, finally coalesced into action.

Sheila’s raw personality was the only thing I took from school besides the clothes I was wearing. I don’t know why I took her. She belonged to them and she wasn’t near as intelligent then as she is now, so she didn’t give one fuck about me or my motivations. She could’ve ruined everything and Case was beyond pissed when I told him about her. But she was the only inheritance I had aside from the charred remains of the house above the cave. And that connection was enough to risk it, I guess.

The trip inside the maze tonight brought back memories I never wanted in the first place. But it was definitely Molly’s name that started it.

“She was wearing a nightgown the last time I saw her, you know. I gave her a coat and some boots and I told her to run like hell before I killed her.”

“Lincoln?” Sheila repeats, a bit of sadness in her voice. When did she acquire so many different emotions? When I first loaded her down here in the lab she only had one. I’d have called it indifference, if pressed.

Now she has so many it’s hard to keep track.

They say humans only have six emotions, sometimes only four, depending on who you talk to. Happy, surprised, afraid, disgusted, angry, and sad. But those people never had to develop a computer language and program a machine to take the place of a mother.

I did. And I know there’s a lot more going on inside Sheila than those six things.

For one, those scientists left out confused. That’s what I am right now. Or maybe I’m conflicted?

Is Molly someone I want in my life? That’s confusion.

Should I let Molly in my life? That’s the conflict.

The answer to the first is yes and the second is no.

“Lincoln, talk to me.”

Everything about Molly points to danger for me. She’s a cop, I’m a criminal. She’s good and I’m bad. She’s the end and I’m the beginning.

“You have to—”

“It was a mistake,” I finally say. “It was a mistake to see her tonight.” I look over at Sheila and she’s frowning. “Before last weekend I was fine, you know? I was alone and I was fine with that. But now…” My words trail off.

“But now what?”

I shake my head. “Now I want her. Now I can’t imagine letting her go and the only answer to my problem is to push her away.”

“Stay home tonight. Don’t go back out. It’s too dangerous. You can’t keep this up.”

I let out a long sigh, and then bark, “Lights out.” The room goes dark, only the ambient light from the computers and aquarium tank in the main cave leaking in to spoil the blackness. “I won’t push her away. But it’s the wrong decision, Sheila. I can feel it in my bones. My luck ran out when I wasn’t looking. I thought it was luck that got me out of that crash last week, but it wasn’t. It was life catching up to me. It was my past, my present, and my future all rolled up into ten minutes on a mountain road with Molly Masters.”

That’s all it takes. A few minutes with a girl I care about. One girl who means something to me. One girl who will bring up all the things I’ve been pushing down.

“It’s over, I guess. But I had a good run.”

The next time I look over at the doorway Sheila is gone.

But my dark thoughts are still here. And there are names etched into my memories that come out to play in the night. I recite them in my mind as I get up off the bed and start tugging on my jeans and boots. I slip a t-shirt over my head and then shrug on the hoodie.

Detective Molly Masters is on to me. I can feel it. She’s on to me and she’s gonna find me again and ask lots of questions. So why not get one more in before she comes? Why not take one more pathetic piece of shit down before I am stopped?

Why not?

I walk out of my room and spy my leather jacket hanging off the back of a chair, the red symbol on the sleeve practically calling my name through the green glow of digital haze.

I slip my arms in the sleeves and become Cathedral City’s worst nightmare.

I am mayhem, I am anarchy, and I am found.

But most of all, I am Alpha.

Chapter Nineteen - Molly

I’m standing in my garage trying to put the final pieces together.
Find me
, Lincoln commanded. And this should not be so hard. I’m a detective, for Christ’s sake.

Last night’s clue from Atticus has left me drained and I can’t think straight. It has to be part of the anarchy symbol. But why leave it unfinished?

My head hurts.

I also stopped by headquarters last night to pick up a fingerprint kit and I was up until four AM dusting things in my house.

No luck. Because I cleaned up after him. I bleached the hell out of this place. Wiped every smudge on every surface. Which means even if I wanted to arrest him—and I’m not sure I can after letting him publicly fuck me last night during the party—I have no evidence.

Yet. But if I can find him, I might get some.

I let out a long breath of air as I study my brother’s trailer and then I walk around to the back door, unlatch the locks, and pull them open.

Will’s bikes are state-of-the-art. His buddy down at the track has been taking care of them. Even raced them a couple times, he said. But he felt bad using them to win and just kept them in good working order until I was ready to pick them up and move on.

Which was supposed to be last weekend, but here they still are.

I have no prints. No last name
.

I could go looking in the criminal database for Lincoln’s face, but that would arouse suspicion.

So? You should be shouting it out to everyone, Molly. Telling anyone who will listen there is a creepy pervert on the loose who lives in a Batcave up in the mountains
.

But just thinking about that makes my stomach feel funny.

He intrigues me, sure. I have some personal fantasies that might involve his face between my legs and his hard chest crushing me to a bed.

But he planted a seed last night.
Give in tonight, Molly. And I’ll give in tomorrow
.

I shove a helmet on my head, walk into the trailer, release the ties that secure the street-legal bike to the walls of the trailer, then back it down the ramp and get on.

Lincoln said to come find him. And that’s exactly what I plan on doing. Only this time, I’m going prepared. I pat the pocket of my leather jacket where my gun is stashed. And I’m not coming back until I’ve checked every last dirt road on Wolf Pass Highway.

Chapter Twenty - Lincoln

A modified servo robot goes whizzing by, barely missing my head as I lie next to the bike, messing with the brake line.

“I’m not falling for your passive-aggressive bullshit, Sheila. And I don’t think you’re gonna run me over with one of those monstabots.” I do think that, actually. She’s been programmed to act like a woman and that automatically makes her cunning, vengeful, and able to carry a grudge until she wins.

But she’s not going to win. She wants details about last night. She wants for me to hear her out. She wants me to stop. And no. That’s not happening. None of it is on the table. I’m too far in. I’ve risked too much. I’ve… changed, and those changes can’t be undone.

Another servo goes by, clipping me on my bare shoulder. “Goddammit, you bitch.”

Sheila manifests into her holographic form in the center of the room. She wears the same clothes as always, but today, she’s got her hair different.

Am I supposed to notice that?

I roll my eyes and ignore her. Fucking women—even fake women—are beyond comprehension.

She walks over to me and stands there, silently waiting, and tapping her foot. It even has a sound effect. A tiny pat, pat, pat against the polished concrete floors.

“Can I help you?” I ask.

“You can’t keep doing this.”

“I can and I will. Until someone stops me.”

“Just what exactly are you trying to prove by murdering people?”

“That I’m capable. That I’m inhuman. That I’m perfect. That I’m Alpha.” I snort out a small laugh. “Even you know that can’t be changed. So why bother fighting it?”

“Because you deserve a future that’s not dependent on the past. I only want you to be happy, Lincoln. I want you to find a nice girl before you waste your youth on this plan filled with hate, and darkness, and revenge.”

“I can’t deal with this shit right now, Sheila. Just go away.”

“I think this Molly woman is the one.” She says ‘the one’ in a whisper like it’s a secret.

“Would you leave me alone? All I want to do is work on my bike in peace. And that means you need to go—”

Eeeeent, eeeent, eeent
—the perimeter alarm goes off. I look at Sheila and she disappears to go investigate. Two seconds later she’s back, smiling.

“What was it?”

She crosses her arms and looks smug.

“What the fuck was—”

“I think you better go check the tunnel, Lincoln. You have a visitor.”

“Shit,” I say, throwing down a wrench with a clang that echoes through the cave. “That girl found me.” I get up off the ground and wipe my greasy hands on my jeans as I walk over to the security room and see Molly fucking Masters on all sixteen monitors as Sheila traces her movements from the moment she crossed onto the secured property. I own more than six hundred acres in all directions from the center of the cave. But not all of it is secure. Only the parts I don’t want people to find.