A PART OF ME WISHED I could back out of the deal, but I wasn't going to slip away. Too many things were at stake to allow myself that. Mr. Kennedy gave us a rapidly-approaching date where we could use the school basement. He obtained the alarm code to deactivate the system in a reversible way.
Apparently, the enigmatic Tony had agreed to patrol the vicinity. Everything fell into place, but I was nervous. How could I not be?
House arrest had improved this week—hopefully the last of it. When it was Luc or Ben's turn around our property, I could convince them to let me walk from school or out on a stroll if they joined. We roamed the woods like I was the one joining patrol duty.
Luc didn't talk much. He wasn't a chatty guy while we were outdoors, but he looked less bored whenever I'd ask him to show me some mutant party tricks.
My favorite one was how he managed to pop up tiny lights right under his skin, and they moved. He called it the lava lamp trick.
"Was it true when you told my dad about those seniors? Idiots who thought they could shoot a Wanderer ahead of Halloween trick-or-treating?"
He peered high over his shoulder. "All true."
I almost tripped under an exposed root when I lifted my foot, forgetting to pay attention. "No freaking way. There was one roaming in the area and it just... left them alone?" I halted by a moss-covered boulder, forcing him to turn around.
Luc threw his head toward the sky and sighed. His hands balled into fists under his hoodie. "Well, okay, there was one of us with them that night. We're able to sense them before we see them. That poor creature did notice at some point. I don't know how exactly—she snuck off to steer it away, came right back to the group before anyone realized."
I was puzzled at the odd, tight-lipped smile he gave. He wasn't telling me something, and I briefly recalled Emma mentioning she'd been close to someone they had in common. Someone who wasn't here anymore.
"I don't suppose Devin was the offender for such a kind gesture."
"Wow, you're a quick one." With a dismissive glance, he resumed his walk, not checking to see if I kept up. At the hospital, he'd revealed that his parents died a long time ago. But he'd never said that about his sibling in the framed photograph.
I jogged up to his side, mentally cursing his long, agile legs. "You're more likely to do that than her."
"Nah. I was busy and I knew they were in better hands. Those kids got very lucky. Most of us wouldn't do VIP bodyguard duty for some stupidly curious high schoolers." And he stared straight at me like his eyes were holding back arrows. "Which makes me a special breed of fool."
I gripped my mounting irritation just enough to evaluate my options. I could let it loose and start an insult match, hold my tongue, or ask more questions. My mind was torn between the first and last, and he amusingly read the effect he had on me.
"Careful there," I needled, heart racing as the words began to cross my lips. "You might let people believe there's some softness underneath that mean, crusty shell of yours."
For a full beat, he reared back, nose twisting like he smelled cow dung. I felt glowing with satisfaction to have found the right stab to shut him up, but my blissful moment was brutally terminated. The warm wind around me was the only warning he offered.
My stomach flipped then sank, and the leaf-strewn ground started to fall under me. By the time I realized it wasn't the soil shrinking into the Earth, I was pinned to a tree. Unable to even move a finger.
Luc stalked closer, hands still in his pockets. He'd placed me barely above his head.
"What the hell, dude?" I legitimately couldn't move a muscle. "Put me down! This is so not funny."
This was beyond degrading for a harmless tease. My puny arms and legs strained against a steel band. He smiled broader, fiercer at my attempt, and it drew him even closer. Every inch of his body was braced, all up to the unforgiving lines of his face.
Then, he cocked his head to the side.
"You really want to push it today, don't you? So let's get some things straight between you and me. Ready?" He took my acid glower at face value, seeming to commit it to memory for a few seconds. "I need you alive to bait these motherfuckers who aren't behaving like anything I've ever seen before. I'm not here to make friends. I have friends like me who I don't have to watch with eyes behind my head in case they tell their government-connected parent about us. Friends I can trust. You, on the other hand..."
My heart stuttered, but I made it a point to meet his challenging stare, even when mine became watery. "I'll never tell him. You said it yourself that it'd put him in danger."
Luc angled his body away like he wanted to walk off and leave me there. "Good intentions are often not enough, Sunshine. If you've seen some of the shit people do with good intentions, you'd understand how little it matters. And you don't understand any of this." He bent his head down. "I hope for your sake that you never will."
"So I'm just a means to an end. Got it."
Loud and clear.
His head shook from side to side and he looked back toward the waning sun. "No. This plan is insane, but you should come out of this alive and I can see that through." He gazed down through dark strands of hair, searching me. "I can also see to it that if you ever pose a threat, a pack of Wanderers will be the least of your problems."
Those last words prickled my skin. It was so unnecessary. I'd never do that to them after the way they worked to save my life—begrudgingly so, but still. I swallowed hard.
"I won't." Damn it, I hated how choked I sounded.
"Even if he catches on and tries to get it out of you? Can Daddy's girl resist that kind of pressure?"
A huge ball of fire radiated in my chest as he snorted. I thought I loathed him before, but never as much as I did now. "You're the absolute worst. And no, I'm not going to let him find out and you know why. Now please put me down so you can get the fuck out of my face."
His sneer dimmed but that didn't temper the razor-sharpness of his eyes. "Right. Fun's over."
I slid down gently enough to catch my weight, and a big part of me wanted to kick the head off his shoulders. The other part wanted to burst into tears as soon as I'd regain my room. Orange sunrays splayed over the top branches.
"Sun's setting," he declared before I could. "Time to skedaddle."
And I didn't argue there.
Nothing to see here, I thought, just Luc having a normal day.
To some extent, I understood how chafing it could be to monitor someone he didn't trust out of fear for their safety. It shocked me to imagine I had that power over them as one regular person. But to them, I was a tear in an airtight chamber.
I quietly tossed up all these things in my head until I returned home. His asshattery wasn't personal, for the most part. As D-day loomed around the corner, I wasn't the only rustling bag of nerves. I tried real hard to change my feelings and muster enough patience, yet the reasoning did jack for me.
Gosh, I wanted to run back out there and twist his arms off, so much so that I considered breathing exercises to reset my mood. Or punching the pillows. I thrust both curtain sheets over the window, retreating with a hissy sigh.
Ben was more talkative, even soft-spoken at times. Walks with him were a breeze in comparison. Since his TV show recommendation, he could tell me all about Breaking Bad and others in my bucket list.
I wasn't surprised to catch the fellow snacking constantly with the mountain of muscles he had to maintain. If I knew he was on watch, I'd bring the sweetest, most caloric thing in the house with me and watch him total it in ten seconds tops.
I hadn't slept at all the night prior to this one. When it was time and Dad slept in his room, I snuck out the front door, careful not to slam it. The cool breeze swept my face. The moon was strung high up in the sky, partly hidden by evanescent clouds. Luc had parked his car behind the SUV, headlights and motor out. I opened the door and let myself in.
"Are you okay?" he asked me.
I nodded, feeling like a five-year old trapped in a dentist's waiting room, brimming with untamed nerves.
"Remember, the moment we take over, you back out. No questions asked."
"Why do you have to keep reminding me this?"
His lips pressed together. "If you pull a stunt out there without warning, it will backfire on all of us. I need you to stick to the plan." He hesitated. "For your own sake. It's not the time to be stubborn."
"I won't, Luc," I assured him, annoyed that he constantly reminded me of that. "I won't do anything."
He accepted that, and we drove off to the school where we waited in the parking lot. As predicted, no soul had ventured outside. Luc was calm and collected, head thrown back over the driver's seat, lids closed. His breathing was regular, but I knew he was unrelaxed and preparing mentally.
The wait felt unbearable. My mouth was dry and my heart was pounding. Unlike him, I needed a distraction, to talk or have some noise in the car.
"That girl on the missing list—Lauren," I started quietly, and his eyes snapped open. "She was your sister... wasn't she?"
A troubled crease deepened between his brows. I'd hit the sensitive cord, stomped right on top of it.
"How did you find out?"
It took me a while to link her to him, given that the poster with her face on it was black and white.
"She seemed familiar when I saw her in your living room picture. When I looked at the doors again, I recognized her and the surname, then."
At that moment, I understood why I've never seen her around or why he wouldn't mention her. He'd lost her last year. Which made him the one and only survivor in the family.
The silence seemed to stretch forever, to the point where I thought he didn't intend to speak. I started regretting bringing it up. His head bowed.
"Your life would have been much better if you would have dealt with her instead of me." An obvious hurt crossed his face, leaving me captivated. "Her healing ability consistently outmatched what I can do to this day. She was the exact opposite across the board. Emma's best friend. You would have loved her, too."
I pulled a joyless smile. "I'm going to take a wild guess and project she was the one who saved the seniors and their hunting party, right?"
He forced a chuckle and the soreness in his voice was palpable. "It's always the best among us who are taken too soon."
I gazed at him like he'd grown two heads. Raw pain lurked behind those words—the kind of pain that haunts you at night and that sits on your shoulders during the day. They were struggling so hard to protect each other from exposure, and the Wanderers threatened their stability all the time.
I imagined how tough it must have been to deal with the attention when Lauren was falsely reported as missing and having to lie about it. After the few weeks I'd gotten acquainted with his circle, I could now put my finger on why they were standoffish, beyond what their exposure issue could answer for.
I had the strong impression he wasn't the only one to have lost a loved one. That turned them desperately territorial over what was left.
"You guys don't deserve this, always worrying about who might be next and the hunting and..." I stopped. I couldn't put this in words. It was so unfair to Luc and the others. The burden. The pressure. When would they ever have a normal life? "You deserve to be happy, even Devin."
He stared into the parking lot heavily. "It's just what works. We search for Wanderers stumbling into town, over and over, or for some..." He didn't finish that but tensed.
"Look, I know you guys think I might turn on you somehow. It's a lot to handle, but I'm not going to be a problem no matter what happens tonight. You will never have to worry about that. Never. Dad hasn't asked much about you since. If he tries, mum's the word. Scout's honor."
He scanned my face up and down. At the beginning of the school year, I used to feel incredibly small when he did that, but tonight I found myself staring back unreserved. I wanted nothing more than for him to believe me when I said this. Still, I couldn't help the little flip in my heart.
"What?"
"You know, when I revealed to you what we are, I expected you to cry and panic. I was afraid you'd go to the press or whatever and make a lot of noise. You turned out very different from what I expected."
I grinned, uneasy. "Wow, thanks?"
"You handled everything from the beginning, and I'm surprised to see you still holding up through the end."
The end. Right.... If this worked out according to plan, it would all be over. No more monitoring, no more paranoia, no more killings. We would be free to go our separate ways.
"I don't want to be a coward," I said. "And I don't want to fail you guys."
He opened his mouth to respond but didn't get to. His phone rang once, meaning he'd gotten a text. He pulled it out and lit up the screen.
"They're here."
Just as he announced that, a dark form moved in the parking lot, converging toward the school. It reached the doors, pulled out a set of keys and got inside. It must be Mr. Kennedy deactivating the system. I nodded at Luc and left the Rover after a few minutes, exposing my arms to the chilly nocturnal wind.
I had to be visible while walking to the school alone. My gaze swept the building's terrain, half prepared to see phantom silhouettes blinking back, but I couldn't see a thing through the wall of shadows.
✩
Here's your daily chapter, readers! Can I just say that I love writing those Riley/Luc car scenes? I love to make them forget their differences and actually stick with each other.