Mind Games (11 page)

“Fia,” he says, and I don’t know if he’s scolding me or moaning.

“Buy me a drink.” I bite his ear harder. I feel like I’m in control tonight. I feel like
I
am the one using
him
tonight. I feel good. Or as good as I ever do.

He leans his face into mine—his cheek has a hint of stubble, it’s rough, I want to run my mouth along it—then bends down, lets his lips touch my neck, trace it ever so lightly.

He grabs my hand and pulls me out of the crowd, toward the bar. He’s angry, with himself or with me I can’t tell, but I’m getting my way so I don’t care. “Since we’re breaking all the rules anyway.”

“That’s the spirit!”

“Annie will kill me.”

“No, she’ll just have me do it.”

He squints suspiciously at me, but I smile and twirl away to get to the drinks faster.

“Only one,” he says.

I open my blue eyes wide. I am the picture of innocent earnestness. “Absolutely.”

I can’t dance anymore. The lights are spinning and the floor is spinning. How did they install a spinning floor? It’s amazing. The whole world spins, spins, spins from the balcony where we’re sitting. I try to tap, but I can’t find my leg with my finger, and I laugh. I’m even free from my three taps.

“You know why I don’t want to be with you?” James’s eyes are as glassy as they were the first time we met.

“Because I’m too young for you? Because you’re an evil, manipulative monster and I know it?”

He smiles, and his smile has that edge I know, that sharp edge I recognize. It sings to my own sharp soul. “You knowing makes me want you more. And you aren’t young. You haven’t been young since you were fourteen.”

I smile back. “Fine, then. Because I’m psychotic and I kill people?”

“Nope.” He shakes his head, still smiling. “Because my dad wants us together.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. He suggested it when we left on the yacht. Wanted you to fall in love with me as another way to tie you to us.”

I laugh. “Wasn’t he worried I’d kill you in your sleep or something?”

“I don’t think he’d actually care.”

“Oh, poor James.” I scoot across the dark velvet of the love seat, scoot right onto James’s lap, wrap my arms around his neck. “Why do you care if he cares? Your dad is
evil
.” Is it the money? Can he not live without bottomless funds? Or does he actually believe in this shadowy network of power his dad is building? I need to know. I let myself ignore it for so long, but the why is killing me. The why of James working for his father. The why of how I can feel like this for him even though he is part of what did this to me.

He looks at my lips, leans in closer. I don’t need to know the why anymore. I don’t care. I’ll care again tomorrow, but now? I close my eyes, waiting, waiting, wanting his lips on mine.

He pecks my nose instead, then laughs. I open my eyes and glare.

“My dad
is
evil. But I’m a Keane. It’s my duty to care. I owe it to my mother.”

“So, are you finally living up to Daddy Dearest’s dearest wishes? Are you going to
seduce
me, James Keane?”

He pulls me in closer. “I’ve only stayed away from you this long because he wanted me to do the opposite. I can’t let him win, can I?”

“I won’t tell if you don’t.”

“But what about the Readers?”

“Oh, them? I think ‘I’m boinking the boss’s son!’ at them every chance I get. But only the ones who are in love with you.”

“You are evil.” But he looks at me like I’m not.

I know it’s wrong.

He’s a Keane.

He isn’t his father, but he will be.

He’s almost as good a liar as I am, and I am too drunk to sift through what he’s said.

It’s wrong, wrong, wrong.

But his hands are on my neck and in my hair and tracing my collarbone and it is wrong but it feels right, it feels like falling and I know the impact at the bottom will probably kill me, but I don’t care anymore.

“I’ve wanted to kiss you since that first night in the school. I’ve wanted to kiss you every single day since then.” He shifts me even closer. We are touching, touching everywhere and it’s wrong it’s wrong it’s wrong but right right now and I close my eyes and his lips are even better at the dulling than the drinks or the music. His lips light me on fire and dull everything else and I lose myself in them, and I am so happy and relieved to be lost I could cry.

We stumble out onto the street, wrapped around each other, and I am light-headed and my feet can’t trace a straight line,
and I can’t feel anything.

Right or wrong or even my hands.

It’s glorious.

I laugh.

James nuzzles his face into the top of my head, breathing in my hair. “You’re amazing, you know that? I think I love you.”

I push him into the wall, grab his shirt in my fists, kiss him hard. Pull away. He is such a liar. “You don’t love me, you idiot. No one does. No one should.”

“That’s not true. I do love you. I’m just trying so hard not to. It would ruin everything. But you don’t make it easy, you know?”

I laugh and walk a few steps ahead. This late/early there is no one out but a car on the corner. Delivery van.

Idling.

It’s wrong, it shouldn’t be there, I know it shouldn’t. No one would deliver something right now on these streets. I turn to James. “Something’s wrong.” I know it in my stomach sloshing with drinks.

“Nothing’s wrong.” He reaches out to pull me into his arms and I jump forward and put my foot behind his, trip him as I shove him down.

Someone swings a fist where his head was.

I lift my foot and kick backward as hard as I can with my sharp heel (the sharp heels—I needed the sharp heels), and it
slams into something and then there’s a wet give as it breaks through skin and someone shouts but it’s muffled. I yank my foot back and the shoe doesn’t come with it. I kick the other one off because now it will only slow me down.

Am I screaming? I should be screaming. James is shouting, trying to get up. The man who swung at James’s head pulls something out of his jacket and points it at James and I can’t lose James, I won’t, not now that I found his lips. I throw myself onto the man, wrap my arms and legs around him. He’s off balance and stumbling, and I sink my teeth into his shoulder as hard as I can.

I shouldn’t have had anything to drink. Annie was right. This is not a fight I should lose.

He slams me into the brick wall and the air leaves my lungs in a sad, drunken whoosh. I drop off and hit the ground on crouched legs. I need to protect James. I need to get them away from James.

I run (I can still run, I know how to run, I can do this) toward the opposite side of the street, away from the van. Glance back, they’ve left James, he’s up now and stumbling toward us, but he had even more to drink than I did and they are not drunk, they are definitely not drunk.

I can get away. I know I can. One of them has stopped, turned to face James. Does he have a gun? He might have a gun. I don’t know, I can’t tell.

If I run now, I’ll only be followed by one and I can take him down and get away.

I turn and spin past the man following me, dive for the knees of the man facing James. He falls; I am tangled up in him.

“RUN!” I scream at James. “I’m behind you!”

He waits until I’m up and then he runs and I am behind him.

And someone is behind me, arms circling my waist, lifting me off the ground. Cloth-covered hand over my mouth, pulling me backward. I am swimming and it smells stinging sweet and someone else has my legs. I can’t remember how to kick, it’s getting too dark. A light, a slamming door. James, where is James? I can’t breathe I can’t keep my eyes open.

The last thing I see is the girl with brown eyes and brown hair whose car I stole.

FIA

Two Years Ago

WHY
DOES HATING THE MOST VIOLENT THING I’VE ever done make me want to be violent?

They took away my computer when they realized I was researching jail time for various crimes. But they didn’t have to. I have nowhere to go. Annie is here.

Annie told me to get out of her life.

If I really thought she’d be safe here, if I really thought she’d be okay on her own?

I don’t know.

My closet is dark and warm. I like sitting in it. Sometimes I sleep here. Sleep, sleep. I’ll sleep now.

“Fia?”

I startle, smack my head against the wall. Ouch.

“Annie?” I push open the closet door. She’s standing in the middle of my room. She has one hand out, palm up, the way she always comes into a room where she knows I am. She’s waiting for my hand.

I hide my horrible hands behind my back. “What?”

She looks scared. Nervous. I stand and rush out of the closet. “What’s wrong? What did you see?”

“I—I didn’t see anything. I heard. Fia, what have they been doing to you? What have they made you do? Tell me. Please tell me.” Her voice cracks and if she cries, I will cry and I won’t, I won’t let myself cry.

“Bad things,” I whisper. “I’ll never tell you.”

She holds out both her hands and I trip forward, let her wrap her arms around me. “Okay. Okay. You don’t have to tell me. It doesn’t matter. We’re leaving. Today.”

“Really? You want to leave?” My heart expands, bursts—hope, there is hope, I have hope for the first time in years. We’re going to leave! Annie wants to leave, so it won’t be betraying her, won’t be taking her away from hope for her eyes.

“Pack your things,” she says. “I’ve got all my stuff ready. We can probably sell my laptop and braille equipment for a few thousand dollars. Enough to get back to Aunt Ellen’s. Once we’re there, we’ll figure out how to get ahold of her. I’ll leave a note for Eden so she knows why we left and can find us if she wants to leave, too.”

My heart sinks. “You packed? When did you decide we should run?”

“Last night. I’ve been up all night, reading train and bus schedules. Do you have any cash at all? There’s a Greyhound station. It’s a long walk, but we can do it. And you can figure out how to sell my laptop, right?”

She sounds so hopeful, so determined. I back away and slump on my unmade bed. “We can’t. They already know.”

Annie frowns, shakes her head. “No, we need to leave. We need to get you out of here.”

“We should have run last night, the moment you thought of it. It’s too late now. They already know what we’ll do. Clarice will be watching. So we can’t do it.”

“But—”

“No. Not today.”

Annie’s shoulders collapse. She tries to walk over to my bed but trips on a pile of shoes. I haven’t been keeping the floor clean. It’s dangerous for her. Bad, bad Fia.

“Sorry. Here.” I take her hand, lead her to the bed. She sits next to me, every line of her body turned down.

“I’ve ruined everything. I’m so sorry.”

“Hey.” I put my arm around her shoulders. It’s my job to take care of her. And I will. “It’s okay. Now that I know you don’t want to be here, I can fix this.” I smile; she can’t see how wicked my smile is. “I’ll get us out of here. You need to be ready to go at
a second’s notice. It won’t be easy. I don’t think we can go back home.” She has to understand. I know—I can feel—they’ll never just let me go. We’ll have to hide.

Forever.

But if we hide together, then it’s not hiding. It’s escaping.

She nods, sits up straighter. “Anytime. I’m ready. And, Fia?”

I am trying not to think of escaping. I am not planning anything. I am letting the future be a complete blank. If I have no plans, they cannot see my plans. I live now and only now. “What?”

“I know we have a future. And whatever you’ve done, whatever you think you’re guilty of? You’re not. It’s not your fault. You know that, right? You’re a good person.”

My eyes sting and my throat aches and my heart hurts and she is wrong but I want her to be right. I want it so badly, it
has
to become true. When we leave here, we will leave all this, and things won’t be wrong all the time, buzzing constantly at the back of my mind and in my hands and in my stomach with the wrongness of everything. I will feel right. I will be good.

As I finish randomly picking stocks, Clarice smiles at me like she knows something I don’t. I know what she thinks she knows that I don’t. I know she saw us leave, that she’s expecting it at any time.

I smile back at her. I hope that she’s personally taking the
extra patrol duties or whatever security measures they’ve put in place. Because it’s a waste of time. I can be patient. Annie is on my side now. I can wait and wait and not plan a thing. I am not planning a thing.

“You seem cheerful this morning,” she says, taking another sip of her coffee.

“If you were a Reader, you’d know it was because I put something in your drink.”

She glances in horror at her half-empty cup before her face smooths itself out and she smiles again. “I like your sense of humor.”

“Are we done? Because my nap isn’t going to take itself.” I stretch in my chair, put my legs up on her desk, my skirt riding up my thighs but I don’t care, because I am finally back in control.

“You keep thinking that word,” Ms. Robertson says from behind me and I freeze. I hadn’t heard the door open. Clarice must not have closed it all the way. “Control. What an interesting word for you to be dwelling on.”

“I have some other words.” I scream the F-word in my head, over and over and over again.

“We have an assignment for you,” Clarice says, but I am too busy screaming thoughts to pay much attention. “There’s a girl. We need her.”

I start at the beginning, mentally screaming every obscenity
I can in alphabetical order. Then I start setting them to the tune of “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.”

“Are you listening, Sofia?”

I nod.

“This girl we need, her family has declined our generous scholarship. So we’ve been forced to go to extreme measures to help her. You’re going to kidnap her.”

I laugh, abruptly cutting off the chorus of my song. “I am, am I?”

“Yes. We’ve got all the information here. Pictures, important details about Sadie and her family. I’ll leave it to your discretion how to go about it all, but I will note that it might be easier for everyone involved if there were some sort of accident that meant she had no more family to ask questions or look for her.”