Sloane (27 page)

We both shared an agonized look.

Axel put a hand on my shoulder. “I think I’m out of
my depth here.”

I covered his hand with my own. “It’s okay. It’ll be
over soon.”

Leigh looked at the way we were touching each other.
She furrowed her brow. But she turned back to the lab workers
without saying anything.

Griffin stood up.

“Griffin,” said Leigh. “You okay?”

In response, Griffin tore across the room at her. He
closed his hands around her neck and propelled both of them back
into the wall.

Startled, Leigh dropped her gun.

French started laughing. “That’s it, Griffin. That’s
your target. Kill her.”

Griffin’s hands tightened around Leigh’s neck.

Leigh tried to push him away. Her face was turning
colors.

“Silas!” I yelled, darting across the room towards
them.

The lab workers glanced at each other with terrified
eyes.

“Axel, don’t let them leave!” I shrieked.

It was as if my words spurred them on. They all took
off at once, scrambling out in all directions, running as quickly
as they could.

Axel shook his head. “I… Sloane, I don’t I think I
can…”

I hesitated, looking back at him.

He wasn’t moving.

Damn it. “Well, help Leigh then.” And I took off
after the lab workers. “Back to the corner,” I yelled at them. “Get
back now.”

They kept running.

So I shot one of them in the head. It was the woman
from the front desk. The one who’d been on the phone when I’d come
in posing as a delivery worker.

When she crumpled to the ground, there was a look of
horrified surprise on her face.

The lab workers all stopped running and went back to
the corner. The women were crying.

Silas was yanking on Griffin’s shoulders.

Axel was next to Leigh, his hand pushing on Griffin’s
face.

French was watching the whole thing, glee in her
eyes.

“I’m just going to shoot him,” said Silas, bringing
up his gun.

“Wait, before you do that,” said Axel, and he hauled
back and punched Griffin in the face. “Sorry. I’ve just wanted to
do that for a long time.”

Silas brought up his gun.

But Griffin let go of Leigh. He was rubbing his jaw.
“What’s going on? Where are we?”

Leigh massaged her neck, gasping for breath.
“Griffin?”

Griffin knitted his brows together. “What was I
doing? Leigh, what was I doing to you?”

She wrapped her arms around him.

I put my gun in French’s face. “You. Back with the
others.”

* * *

The lab was in disarray. Everything had been
completely destroyed. The guards were all dead. French and the lab
workers were all still alive, and they cowered in the corner while
I kept my gun trained on them.

Behind me, the others were talking.

“French needs to die,” said Silas.

“I know that,” said Leigh. “They all have to die.
They all know about the serum. They all know about the brainwashing
injection. They all could decide to recreate the research. They
could make more assassins. Or they could come after us again. We
can’t let that happen. But…” Her voice broke. “I don’t want to do
it.”

“It’s okay, doll,” said Griffin. “You don’t have to.
You don’t even have to watch. I can do it.”

“No,” she said. “I don’t want you to do it either. I
don’t like what it does to you.”

“This is the last time,” said Griffin. “This will end
the threat forever. I know it bothers you, but the last time you
made me stop, French got away. And she almost made me kill you. I
can’t let her live.”

French opened her mouth like she was going to say
something. I jammed my gun into her face. “Shut up.”

“I don’t see why it matters if I speak or not,” she
said. “You’re going to kill us anyway.”

“Well, you deserve it,” I said.

She smirked. “The problem with all of you is that you
were too soft to ever be assassins. You were too worried about the
people you killed. Or worse. You were worried that it was
‘changing’ you. You’re all pathetic.”

“Yeah, I don’t care about that shit,” said Silas.
“Fuck it, I’ll do it. Griffin can stay out of it, and Leigh can
stay out of it, and I’ll get the job done. Stand back,
everyone.”

I turned around. “That’s not true, Silas.”

“What isn’t?” He looked genuinely confused.

“You say you don’t care,” I said. “But I know
different. You didn’t get into this because you like killing.”

Silas smirked. “Sure about that, sis? Because French
sure seems to think I do.”

“It’s true,” said French softly. “Your weakness isn’t
sentimentality, Silas. Your weakness is Sloane.”

Silas winced, like she’d hurt him somehow.

I shook my head. “That’s not true either. I’m your
strength, Silas. You only did what you did because you care about
me.”

His gaze darted away from me.

“You had to protect me,” I said. “I know you thought
you did. And it changed you.”

“I do have to protect you,” he whispered. “You’re my
sister. Now just stand aside, and I’ll get the rest of this over
with. I don’t mind, really. I can handle it.”

“No, you can’t,” I said. “Not always, you can’t. Not
everyone else knows, but I know. I know about the paranoia. I know
about the dreams. I know what you’ve put yourself through for me.
And… Silas, I can’t let you do it again.”

“You have to. Leigh and Griffin shouldn’t have to do
this, and there’s no one else.”

“There’s me,” I said.

Silas’ face paled. “No. No, Sloane, I would never ask
you to—”

“I’m not doing it because you asked,” I said. “I’m
doing it because you need me too. Because for once, I need to
protect
you
.”

His jaw twitched.

I turned around. I brought up my gun.

I pulled the trigger.

CHAPTER
NINETEEN

We stood outside the secret lab, feeling the cool
night air on our faces. My hands were shaking from cutting the
necks of all the lab workers, just in case they had the serum. In
the end, French had gone down just like the rest of them, just like
everyone. She was just a human, just a bag of flesh and bone, and
I’d stopped her from moving.

Killing always made it clear to me how fragile we all
were, even those of us with the serum. It was so easy to end each
and every one of us, and we were all just seconds away from it
happening. Every day.

Axel tried to take my hand, but I didn’t let him. I
didn’t want to touch anyone at the moment.

“What should we do?” said Griffin. “We need to clean
this up.”

“Yeah,” said Silas. He nodded out at the parking lot.
“We can hotwire a car, go get some supplies and level the place.
Everything will be gone.”

Leigh shuddered.

Griffin put his arm around her. “It’s better not to
leave loose ends. Why don’t you and Sloane get out of here, and
Silas and I will take care of it?”

Leigh looked at me.

Axel cleared his throat. “Uh, what about that Christa
girl?”

Christa! I hadn’t even been thinking about her. What
had happened to her?

Silas and Griffin both turned to him sharply.
“Christa?” they said at the same time.

“Um, she came to Boston.” I cringed. “She sort of got
shot.”

“What?” Silas took me by the shoulders. “Why in the
hell would you let her—”

“I didn’t!” I said. “She showed up without asking.
And then the guards followed her to Axel’s apartment, and that’s
how Axel and I ended up in here.”

“Shot?” said Griffin. “Shot where? Shot how?”

“In the shoulder,” said Axel.

Silas put a finger in my face. “You take us to where
this happened
right now
.”

* * *

But there was no one in Axel’s apartment. The living
room was completely destroyed. The furniture had all been shot to
hell, the wall had holes in them, and there was shattered glass
everywhere.

Axel stood in the middle of the mess, massaging the
bridge of his nose.

Griffin and Silas tore through the rest of the place,
searching through every room. Finding nothing, they came back.

“Where was she?” said Silas.

“I left her in the kitchen,” said Axel. “In the
pantry. Sloane told me to hide her.”

“Well, she’s not there now,” said Griffin.”

“I know that,” said Axel, staring mournfully at his
couch.

“It was pretty noisy,” I said. “There were a lot of
gunshots and stuff. Maybe one of your neighbors called the
police.”

Axel shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. I have
noisy things happening up here all the time. I actually bought out
the level below this one as a buffer for that. But anyway, everyone
in the building knows not to get the police involved. If they’re
annoyed by the noise, they know to call my father instead.”

“Your father?” I said. “You think Christa is
there?”

He turned to me. “What did you say before? You said
she would have gotten herself to a hospital, didn’t you?”

“Well, if her shoulder was fucked up, how would she
have driven?” said Silas. He was really mad. I could feel the
tension coming off of him in waves.

“She didn’t have a car, Silas,” I said gently. “She
probably took a cab or something.”

“Look, have any of you tried calling her?” said
Axel.

Silas and Griffin both looked at each other.

“We don’t have phones,” Leigh spoke up.

Axel stalked out of the room and came back with a
cordless. “Assuming you know her number—”

Silas snatched it from him and began to dial.

Griffin stood close as Silas held the phone to his
ear.

We all watched without speaking.

Silas looked at us. “It’s ringing.”

I held my breath.

Silas clutched the phone, closing his eyes.

In the distance, I could hear the sound of the wind
whistling around the tall building.

“Baby?” said Silas, and his voice cracked.

I let out the breath.

* * *

Visitors’ hours were over at the hospital, and we
knew that if we went over there, they’d never let all five of us in
at once. So, Griffin and Silas went, figuring that if they wouldn’t
let Silas in, they’d at least let Griffin, who was immediate
family. Christa had told Silas that she’d be released in the
morning anyway. The bullet had gone through and through, and it
should heal well. Silas said she sounded a little loopy, probably
from pain killers, but otherwise fine. He even hugged me and said
he was glad that I’d hidden her in the pantry, because that must
have been why she didn’t get captured as well.

I told him that Axel was the one who hid Christa.
Silas gave Axel a look, and it wasn’t friendly. But he didn’t say
anything.

That left Leigh, Axel, and me to deal with leveling
the secret lab, so we went out for supplies, went back, and blew
the place up, just like we’d done with the Auxiliary Unit of
Operation Wraith. All the bodies were burnt up and buried in
rubble. The entire place was gone.

Afterward, we came back to Axel’s building. Even
though his apartment was a wreck, he did have the entire level
below his penthouse, and there were four apartments down there.
Axel had them made up like guest rooms.

We all took showers as the sun came up.

Silas and Griffin still weren’t back, so Leigh came
to find me. Her hair was still wet, but I’d lent her some clothes
from my suitcase upstairs at Axel’s. She looked clean, but her face
was drawn and exhausted.

I was on the phone. I’d realized that someone needed
to call Knox’s girlfriend and give her the bad news. It wasn’t
something I wanted hanging over my head, so I just did it. It was
only as I was standing there, listening to the phone ring and ring,
that I realized it was probably too early to be calling people.

But before I could hang up, someone answered.
“Hello?”

“Uh…”
Jesus, what do I say?
“I spoke to you
before. About David?” That was the name that Knox had been using,
right?

“You.” The woman’s voice got chilly. “What do you
want?”

“I wanted you to know that he’s… he’s gone,” I said.
“We found him, but we weren’t in time. I’m sorry.”

Silence on the other end.

Leigh gave me a confused but concerned look.

I gripped the phone tight, feeling ill. “I’m really
sorry. I’m so very, very sorry.”

More silence.

Finally, a whisper. “I knew it. Somehow, I knew he
wasn’t coming back.” And she hung up.

I yanked the phone away from my ear and squeezed my
eyes shut.

Leigh was next to me. She put her hand on my back.
“Hey. What was that about?”

“Knox,.” My voice sounded choked. “I needed to let
his girlfriend know that he… that…”

She nodded slowly. “Of course.”

I sank down on a couch—which actually looked very
similar in style to the one upstairs that the guards had blown to
smithereens upstairs. I took a few deep breaths.

“What about Dixie?” said Leigh.

“Dixie?”

“Knox’s daughter.”

I shook my head. “I don’t know. I didn’t ask.”

She sat down next to me.

We didn’t say anything for what seemed like a very
long time. The sun was struggling higher into the sky, and we could
see it through the window across the room. It stained the room
orange and bright pink. We looked at the sky, and we were
quiet.

I turned to her. “You should get some sleep.”

She shook her head. “No, I’ll wait until Griffin gets
back.”

I nodded.

And then we were quiet again. I ran my hand over the
arm of the couch. The fabric was soft and white. I thought about
pressing my cheek against it and closing my eyes, floating out into
oblivion. But if Leigh was going to stay up, I felt like I should
too.