think Sam will drag me to the bedroom by my hair. Whatever she has planned, I don’t factor into it.
Someone’s here….
Someone’s here for us?
I go into the bedroom and twist the lock behind me. It has to be someone from the government—Officer McClintock, maybe. The guy is a pain, but he’s not stupid. He could have followed us here, and now he’s going to take me back. He’s going to bring me to Chicago and cut into my brain—
I don’t realize how hard my heart is flipping—careening—around my chest until it’s all I can hear. I wipe my slick palms against my jeans and climb over the mattress to the crevice between the bed frame and the wall.
Coward, coward, coward, coward!
“—around front—take the back—”
I have to press my hands against my mouth to muffle my sound of surprise. The man sounds like he’s right on top of me.
He is.
I’m right below the window—out of sight to someone looking through the curtains into the room. A single beam of light sweeps in, flicking over the wall and door.
“Car’s parked three blocks over—”
There are two of them?
My pulse is fluttering like a moth’s wings.
“Yeah, but one set of fresh tracks leading here. Tricky little bitch tried to cover ’em.”
“Better pan out—wasted gas—auction—” The second voice fades, breaks up into a trail of mumbled crumbs that I can’t follow for much longer.
My breath is too hot—scalding—to hold. It comes out like a silent scream.
They aren’t just here for me, are they? Soldiers would have blasted their way in by now to grab me. I only went to school for a few years, but I can put two and two together here. Sam was spotted by these men, and despite her shapeless clothes, despite her tricks, they figured out what she was and followed her back here.
The bang sends me shooting straight up off the floor, flying over the mattress.
“There you are, pet!”
Inside, they’re inside—
“I don’t know who you are—I don’t care, but—y-you can take the food, you can take it!” Sam is clearly struggling to sound calm, and it’s not working, not really. “I have bottled water, too. It’s clean.”
The men laugh. I press my ear against the door hard enough to hurt, my hand is curled like a claw around the knob. This doesn’t make sense to me. Sam is a fighter. She’s the one who won’t take an insult, who always got a second punishment for reacting to her first punishment. She’s not fighting them.
She won’t fight them.
She’s going to go with them so they don’t come farther into the house.
She’s distracting them.
She’s not fighting them because she’s protecting us.
They are going to hurt my friend.
“Take the water?” This is a new voice—a woman’s. “I think we will. You can carry it out for us. That’s right, nice and easy. You don’t want my finger to slip, do you? We don’t need you unhurt, just alive. Remember that.”
“There’s been some kind of mistake—”
“Aw, pet, don’t cry about it. We ran your li’l face through our system. Samantha Dahl. That’s your name, ain’t it?”
System? How could they know her name?
“You’ve got the wrong person—”
“You’re just a Green, but, lucky girl, there’s plenty of people willing to pay to get a look inside that brain of yours,” the man continues. “Nothing to be ashamed of. We all know that you got nothing to hit us back with. Now come on, pet….”
I’m going to be sick.
There aren’t skip tracers anymore, not according to the news. There are just snatchers and a whole new illegal market for people to buy and sell freaks—turn them into personal weapons. Study them.
They’re going to take her.
The floor creaks as I shift my weight, a quiet sound, but it blows the conversation in the kitchen out like a candle.
“Someone else here, pet?” that same man asks. “You go check—I got this one—”
“Come on, girlie, you don’t really want us to hurt you—that’s it, grab her, Bill—grab her!”
No, no, no, no, no, no—what am I doing? They’re taking Sam and any second they’re going to find Lucas and I’m in here letting it happen—
“Stop! Please!” Sam is yelling, her voice hoarse. “I’m not her! I’m not! I’ll come with you, but you—”
There’s a heavy thud, and I hear her ragged gasp.
“Don’t make me do it again!” the man grunts out.
I reach down, unlocking the door.
Heavy footsteps.
Harsh breathing.
Hate.
It boils the air like a spell, thickening the darkness around me.
Now, Mia.
The look on the woman’s face as I fling the door into