Thornhill (Hemlock) (16 page)

Jason swallowed. “It’s not as bad as you think.”

In a blur, Kyle grabbed him and thrust him against the wall of the greenhouse. The glass shook and a web of cracks spread out from the spot where Jason’s shoulders had hit.

“Kyle!” I rushed forward and grabbed his arm, but he shrugged me off.

“What did you promise them?”

Jason’s cheeks flushed bright red and his words came out a choked rasp. “An HFD and dirt on Sinclair.”

Kyle let go, stepping back so quickly that Jason lost his balance and slid to the ground.

“I wasn’t actually going to get them one,” he said, staring up at Kyle. His green eyes were dark, like the ocean at twenty thousand feet.

“Why spy on Sinclair?” asked Dex. “She’s a warden in a rehab camp—shouldn’t she be on the Trackers’ list of BFFs?”

Jason pushed himself to his feet. He glowered at Dex, not making any attempt to hide his distrust. “Why don’t you tell us what you were doing sneaking around and eavesdropping before you start asking questions?” His hand strayed toward his pocket before he seemed to remember that Dex was immune to the HFDs.

Dex shrugged. “I saw you and Mac yesterday. You were standing awfully close for a werewolf and a counselor. It made me curious.”

It wasn’t enough for Jason. “Why’d you run when I told you to stop?”

“Habit.”

For a second, I thought Jason would continue to push, but he accepted the explanation. “She’s paying the Trackers to bring wolves in. Paying them a lot. It’s making some people suspicious—especially when she could just get wolves from the other camps. Since her sister was infected, they think maybe she’s some sort of wolf sympathizer, that maybe she’s trying to create Thornhill as a safe haven for wolves.”

“If they’re suspicious,” said Eve, “why keep bringing her wolves?”

“Greed.” Jason shrugged. “Not all of the Trackers think it’s strange and not all of the ones who do care. The ones who want to know what’s really going on are the ones who got me in.” His gaze shifted to Kyle and a look that was painfully earnest crossed his face. “It was the only way I could get inside. I didn’t tell you because I knew you wouldn’t like it.”

For a moment, Kyle didn’t react, then he inhaled deeply as though reining in suspicion or anger. “All right. How do we storm the castle?”

I
PUSHED BACK A HEAVY PLASTIC SHEET AND PEERED OUT
into the camp. Flashlight beams pierced the night in the distance. Lots of them.

Eve had slipped away from the dorm just after curfew, leaving a note that said she’d meet us—as planned—at eleven. With no idea where she had gone or why, I’d had little choice but to wait until I met the guys at the half-constructed classroom we had agreed to use as a staging point.

When Eve still hadn’t shown after twenty minutes, Kyle and Dex had gone looking for her. That had been fifteen minutes ago, and every additional second made the silence heavy and the air harder to breathe.

“You ever hear that expression about a watched pot?” Jason’s voice cut through my thoughts.

I glared over my shoulder.

Moonlight filtered through the plastic, but his face was in shadow. He leaned against a support beam, bottle in hand, not drinking, just twisting the cap on and off. “I’m just saying that driving yourself crazy won’t make them show any faster.”

“Aren’t you even a little worried?”

Jason shrugged. “Kyle and Dex can take care of themselves.” But he fumbled the cap and took a swig from the bottle.

He was just as worried as I was. Maybe it should have been reassuring to know that someone felt the same way. It wasn’t.

Wearily, I walked away from the side of the building and snatched the bottle from Jason’s hand. The last thing we needed tonight was a Sheffield with lowered inhibitions. I debated taking a drink—God knew I could use something to slow the synapses firing in my head—but I capped the bottle and stashed it behind a stack of drywall.

Rough-hewn letters caught my eye as I straightened. Someone had carved
Thornhill Sucks
into a two-by-four. For some reason, the tiny act of rebellion made me feel braver.

The floor creaked behind me, but I just stared at the letters and tried to tell myself that everything would be all right.

“Are you okay?”

Jason was so close that his breath ruffled my hair.

“Yeah,” I lied.

“Mac . . . about tonight . . . if anything happens . . .”

I turned. “What is it?” Jason almost never had trouble with words. Whether they were the right ones or the wrong ones, they usually came easy to him.

Before he could reply, the rustle of plastic came from the edge of the construction site. A knot loosened in my chest as Kyle climbed into the building.

He held the sheeting aside, and Dex helped Eve through the gap. My eyes widened as the three of them drew near. Eve’s face was so pale that it practically glowed and she leaned on Dex as though her legs were shaking.

“We found her near the restricted zone in the woods,” explained Dex. “It took me weeks to build up a tolerance to the HFDs, but genius here thought she could do it in a couple of hours.”

“Was worth a shot,” muttered Eve. She pushed Dex’s hands away as he tried to steady her. “I’m fine, Dexter. I just need to shift. Besides, we’re already behind schedule.” She glanced at me. “Sorry about slipping out. And about being late.”

I shrugged. “It’s okay.” It wasn’t, but I probably would have tried the same thing in her place.

Dex walked to one of the far corners and hauled off his shirt. I quickly looked away as he reached for his fly. After a lot of debate that afternoon, we had agreed that Eve and Dex would cause a distraction to draw some of the guards out of the sanatorium. Then Jason, Kyle, and I would go in after Serena.

Eve shot Jason a glare as she headed for one of the other corners. “Sneak a peek, Tracker and I’ll gut you.”

“I could be infected with LS and dumped in an all-male rehab camp for a decade, and I still wouldn’t be desperate enough to look.”

I dropped my gaze to the floor—the safest place—as the room filled with a ghoulish cacophony of breaking bones and tearing muscle. It sounded like a slice of hell, and my fingers twitched with the urge to cover my ears.

A prickly sensation crept down my spine. I glanced up. Kyle was watching me, his face carefully blank. Was it hard for him not to shift? Did part of him want to?

When the noises stopped, I turned to face two wolves. One, Eve, was a rich silver. The other was pure white.

My heart lurched.
Dex
, I told myself.
It’s just Dex
.

The white wolf jumped gracefully to the ground, the silver wolf right on its heels.

Kyle followed, then turned to help me down. The feeling of his hand in mine was warm and familiar. Reassuring.

I glanced over my shoulder as my sneakers hit the ground. Jason was watching us—was staring at my hand in Kyle’s—with an expression filled with too many emotions to read, but entirely too easy to understand.

Wondering why things had to be so complicated, I eased my hand out of Kyle’s and put a fraction more space between us. I didn’t feel guilty—I couldn’t help the way I felt about Kyle and I wouldn’t want to—but I also didn’t want to hurt Jason. Not any more than I had to.

Love’s a game where the odds are permanently fixed
.
The house always wins, and anyone stupid enough to sit at the table is lucky if they walk away with their soul intact
. Amy’s voice echoed back through the fog of memory. At the time, I had assumed she and Jason were in the middle of one of their usual fight–make up–make out cycles. Suddenly, though, I wondered if I had been responsible for those words, if Amy had known about—and been thinking of—Jason’s feelings for me when she uttered them.

I forced thoughts of Amy away. There wasn’t anything I could do to change things—no matter how much I wished I could.

Eve let out a small yelp as she and Dex circled us. The wrist cuffs had stayed in place through the transformation, and they threw the gait of each wolf slightly off.

Kyle crouched down so he could look her in the eye. “We’ll meet back here in an hour. If you get cut off, head for the dorms. We’ll try to get Serena to the truck.”

Eve’s wolfish gaze slid to me, and I gave her the slightest nod. No matter what happened to us, she had to make it to the truck. She had to get out of the camp for everyone’s sake. She tossed her head and then took off running, Dex following right behind.

Kyle, Jason, and I made our way through the camp. Three times, we had to hide from patrols. There were definitely more guards out than there had been last night, and most of them were heading to and from the fence—a fact I took as confirmation that Hank had gotten away. Even as a reg, he’d always had nine lives.

I didn’t want to care, but like it or not, he was the only father I had.

We reached the sanatorium and ducked into the shadows along the side of the building just as dueling howls split the night.

Every inch of my body hummed with adrenaline as a group of guards—six, maybe seven—thundered past. The howls came again, drawing the men farther into the camp.

“Stay here,” whispered Jason before disappearing around the corner.

A minute later, a low whistle cut through the air.

Kyle and I raced for the door at the front of the building.

Jason held it open, then slipped in behind us. “This way,” he said, taking the lead. We headed down a maze of gray hallways, taking so many twists and turns that I was certain I’d never remember the way back. All of the corridors looked the same, and I wondered how Jason could possibly know where he was going.

We rounded another corner and I froze at the sight of a security camera. Of course. Why hadn’t I realized there would be cameras? Why hadn’t I noticed them the last time I was here?

Jason paused and glanced back when he realized I had stopped. He followed the direction of my gaze. “Don’t worry. The night shift is too short staffed for anyone to watch the footage.”

Hoping he was right, I focused on the rest of the hallway. It was different from the others. My pulse skipped a beat as I recognized the white tile and the keypads next to the doors. We rounded another corner and there it was: the steel door I had found the last time I was here.

“The stairs are right on the other side,” said Jason. “I got a glimpse of them when I was scoping out the hallways this morning.”

Kyle headed for the keypad next to the door, and Jason slipped a notebook and pen out of his pocket. “I was a Boy Scout for six months,” he said, catching my flicker of surprise. “Being prepared was a whole thing.”

“It was Cub Scouts,” corrected Kyle, “and you got the both of us kicked out after three weeks.” He leaned down and put his face near the keypad.

Please
, I prayed.
Please let this work
.

“Well?” asked Jason.

“Hang on. There are a lot of different scents on this thing.”

My heart plummeted. It had been a stupid idea. It had—

“Nine . . . three . . . two . . .” Kyle turned his head and sneezed. “Four and eight.”

Jason glanced at his notebook. “That’s only five numbers.”

Kyle checked the keypad again, then straightened and shook his head. “All the buttons smell, but it’s strongest on those five.”

“Maybe one number is in the code twice.” I walked forward and nudged Kyle aside. “Read me them?” I asked Jason.

“Nine, three, two, four, eight.”

I repeated them softly and began punching in different combinations as quickly as I could. Each time I entered a code, a small red light flashed for half a heartbeat.

My fingers started to cramp and the taste of copper flooded my mouth as I bit my lip. How many strings had I tried? Fifty? A hundred?

Footsteps and the sound of someone whistling echoed down the adjacent corridor. For a horrible second, I froze, then my fingers flew over the keypad in a blur.

“Mac . . .”

I blocked out Jason’s sharp whisper. I blocked out everything but the keypad and the small flash of red.

Suddenly, there was a soft click and the light turned green. I threw open the door and the three of us tumbled inside seconds before the footsteps reached the corner.

I blinked in the too-bright light at the top of a too-white stairwell. Before my eyes could adjust, Kyle’s hands were on my back. “Move!” he hissed as he herded Jason and me down the stairs.

We reached the bottom and hurtled through another door only to find ourselves in a hallway just as sterile as the stairwell. White doors lined both sides of the corridor and each had a keypad.

We were trapped. No better than rats in a maze.

“Back,” snapped Jason, grabbing my arm and tugging me behind him before wedging us both in the small space to the left of the stairwell entrance. To Kyle, he said, “If it’s just one, you can grab him when he comes through.”

My mind full of Tasers and guns and HFDs, I started to object, but I could hear steps descending the stairs.

My heart thudded in my chest—so fierce and fast that I was sure Jason would feel it despite the layers of clothing between us.

With a soft
whoosh
, the door swung open, hiding Jason and me from view. I heard something shatter followed by a strangled cry and a loud thud.

I pushed past Jason as the door swung shut.

Kyle held a program coordinator pinned—face-first, arms behind back—to the wall. Shards of a broken mug lay in a puddle of coffee on the floor. The man tried to twist away and I caught sight of a birthmark on his cheek: it was the program coordinator I had asked about Serena that first morning in Thornhill.

“How did you get in here?”

Kyle glanced at me and there was something cold and a little inhuman in his eyes—it was almost like the wolf was peeking out. “Go check for Serena.”

I nodded, but before heading down the hall, I stepped up to the coordinator and checked his pockets.

“Do you have any idea how much trouble you’re in?” asked the man as I took his HFD. His voice was steady and laced with authority, but his face was beet red and sweat dripped off his brow. “When the warden gets her hands on you . . .”

In response, Kyle pulled the man’s arms sharply back, eliciting a ragged grunt of pain. “Don’t look at her. Don’t talk to her. Forget you’ve even seen her.”

“Kyle . . .”

“Check for Serena.” His voice came out with the hint of a growl.

I shot a worried glance at Jason, but did as Kyle said.

The first two doors were plain and unbroken, but every door after that had a slitlike window at eye level. Each window looked in on sparsely furnished rooms lit by rectangular yellow lights over narrow bunks. The wolves in rooms one and two looked emaciated and sick—like the girl I’d seen that morning in the hall. And, just like the girl, both were hooked up to IVs.

Shayla, the missing girl from my dorm, was in the third room. Her body sprawled bonelessly on her bunk and she looked so out of it that I wondered if she had been drugged. Could you drug a werewolf?

Room four was empty, and rooms five and six both held boys.

I peered through the slit into room seven. For a moment, I thought it, too, was empty. Then I caught sight of the small figured huddled at the head of the bed.

Serena.