wiped at it quickly.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and Agent Gallagher nodded, giving her a sad smile.
Jak let out a breath, running a hand over his jaw, still confused, but feeling . . . like he had two people who might . . . who might be on his side. A breeze blew through him, carrying happiness. Fear.
“I woke up at the edge of a cliff. There was a man. He told me it might be the day I would die,” he said, the words tumbling over each other like they’d been a pile of sticks dammed up for a long time and finally been pushed free.
Harper’s eyes went wide and she tilted her head, surprise so clear in her face. He pressed his lips together, not moving his eyes from hers. “But a huge piece of ice moved, making snow slide. I . . . went over.” He looked away. He wouldn’t tell about the other kids. If they knew about them, they’d find out he killed one of them. They’d find out all the other bad things he’d done. And if they found all that out, he’d stay in that tiny cage with the bad smells. He’d die there. Alone.
Harper’s face had lost color and her body was held stiff. “I don’t understand.”
Agent Gallagher gave her a look that Jak didn’t understand. But the words inside him were moving—the dam had broken. He’d never said these words to another living person.
“I didn’t then. I still don’t. I know that Driscoll was . . . in on it somehow, but he wasn’t the man on the cliff. Driscoll told me there was a war.”
“A war?” Agent Gallagher asked, and Harper seemed to lose more color.
Jak looked away from her. He hated the look on her face—unbelieving. He didn’t know if she couldn’t believe what was done to him, or if she couldn’t believe he’d fallen for it. Maybe he didn’t want to know. For the first time since he’d started talking, he wasn’t sure he should go on. But there didn’t seem to be a way to go back now.
“Jak,” Agent Gallagher said and Jak looked at the man instead of Harper. That made it easier. He wanted so much for her to think good things of him. But he didn’t want her to leave either. He wanted her to know him, to understand him.
Maybe not all. Not that wild part he kept hidden inside. The part that had come out when he was starving and suffering, the part that he never wanted to come out ever again. But most. As much as he could let her and still have her want him.
Jak told the agent about Isaac Driscoll, about the war, about the enemy and what had kept Jak alone all this time.
“Do you know why he would do that? Lie to you that way?”
Jak shook his head, the anger rising like a wave. “No. He was watching me though. There were cameras in the trees.”
“Cameras?” Agent Gallagher leaned forward, putting his hands on the table. “Where?”
“I can’t see them anymore. They’re gone. I think Driscoll took them down.” He must have noticed Jak had stolen the pictures. Known he’d been in his cabin. Known he’d found out the truth.
Agent Gallagher frowned. “Okay. Do you have any idea where the recordings were going?”
Recordings? Jak didn’t know what that word meant. “I thought they took pictures. I don’t know where the pictures are,” he lied. He’d torn them into little pieces and thrown them in the river, watched them float away.
The agent paused. “Okay. Okay. And the man on the cliff, you’ve never seen him again?”
Jak shook his head.
“Jak, can you tell me what you remember before that?”
Jak glanced at Harper, the sight of her there beside him helping him to feel brave. “A woman raised me until I was almost eight,” Jak said. “I don’t know her name. I think it was something that started with A. She said words different than the people on the TV and she told me to talk like them, not like her. I called her Baka.” He told Agent Gallagher about how she’d taught him to read, and how to count, and to believe that he was strong. “That’s all I remember. I haven’t seen her since the night I fell asleep in my bed and then woke up . . . out here.”
Harper looked sad and so did Agent Gallagher as he nodded. They were quiet for a minute before he said.