Wasted Lust - JA Huss Page 0,79
you think?”
“I heard you did.”
“From who?” His knowledge is bugging me. “How do you know all this?”
“I have rats too.”
My back straightens again. Rats. That’s the word Jax used to describe what his father does in the FBI. He runs the rats.
“Julian, the priest,” Nick says with an air of contempt. “They run a school, Sasha. Or they did until I got here and put a stop to it. A school for girls. Julian was in charge of it.”
“Who would send their children to a school with that creep running it?”
“Who do you think?”
I close my eyes. “No. No. Please.” I let out a laugh that is so far from laughter, it strikes fear into my heart. “No. They aren’t allowed to do that shit, Nick.” I look him in the eyes as the pieces start to fit together. “You—”
“Don’t get paranoid on me, Sasha. It’s my job to know what they’re doing. I’m still the Admiral’s son, after all. Did she tell you some story about the Zeros?”
My chest hurts. I might be having a heart attack.
“Sasha,” he says, turning his body so he can face me full on. His scarred face is hard for me to look at, but I force myself. He deserves to be seen. He earned it. I owe him. “That program they had to raise Zeros, it’s all true. You were one of the first, but there were more. Michael, the foster kid Jax loved so much. He was one of them too. Your father—”
“No.”
“Yes, Sasha. Your father was in on it with your aunt. They started that program but they never had a boy who didn’t go crazy. And all they had to do was look at James to see what the future of that program would bring. He was, I guess, the pilot kid. The one they tried everything out on first. Including his capture and imprisonment in Honduras back when he was sixteen. But the girls were different. They were trainable, but they didn’t snap like the boys. They’ve been breeding them for more than twenty years now.”
Breeding them? That’s how they think of us? Offspring? What the fuck is wrong with people? How do you do that to your kid? “She said you were one too, ya know.”
“I was Number Eleven, Sash. You know that. You were always a Zero. Harper, she was a Zero, but my father set her up to fail on purpose. And I helped him. There was no way we were giving Harper up to that sick program.”
“But your father, the Admiral, he was a bad guy.”
He looks at me sideways, one eye peeking out from his hoodie. “We’re all bad guys, remember?”
“We can’t all be bad, Nick. Someone has to be good. The whole world isn’t bad. I mean, I get it, there’s shades of gray and all that good shit. But seriously, I need to believe in something right now. I have no idea what’s happening. And then you show up and spill this shit on me. I can’t take it anymore, Nick. I swear to God, I want to scream, that’s how confusing this is.”
“Whatever Madeline told you, she lied. She’s gonna use you, Sasha. To train more Zeros. She’s gonna use you to bring the Company back to life, only this time she’ll be in charge. Matias is the de facto leader at this moment because I made that deal with him back in Santa Barbara. It was planned that way, Sasha. I’ve been plotting this moment for more than a decade. But he’s meeting with Madeline tonight at that estate. They are forging a new relationship—”
“Matias is Company?” Jax was right. How many other things was he right about?
“Why do you think he let me live?” Nick grabs my hand and squeezes hard. “Think, Sasha. Why me? Why did he want me?”
“You’re a killer? He needed you?”
“Why did he need me?”
I know where he’s going with this line of questioning, but I can’t bring myself to say it. Because if I do, then I have to admit that my life was planned for me as well. That I am just a pawn in a game. I am offspring.
“I’m the Admiral’s son. I’m the next in line. I’m the only thing left of the Company leadership.”
“You’re not still Company. You left. We all left. That was the whole fucking point of killing all those people ten years ago. We set the kids free—”
“I am the Company heir, Sasha.” He says it hard.