Shattered Girls (Broken Dolls Book 2) (12 page)

“You’re not human!”

“I’m not, no. My body is in a maximum security building. I can’t stay long, so how about you scream, and then we can move on? I need to show you something.”

“AHH!” Sianne takes a deep breath and flashes a gummy smile. “Okay. I’m over it. In you go.”

She leads us through the professor’s old house, but instead of settling in the kitchen, she drags us up the stairs, through the attic, and into the lab.

“Sianne, do you remember the upgrades I showed you several years ago? Before I left the company?”

She shrugs. “Upgrades are on everything. Stupid phones. Update this, update that. Stupid technology. And those updates every time I want to play a video game. Cartridge in, blow on it if it doesn’t work, BAM, the game plays. That’s how it
should
be! Not waiting eleventy-one hours for it to download!
I HATE UPGRADES
.”

“But you remember?”

“Oh yeah. But I’m busy bringing the dead back to life! That’s my current experiment. It’s important… it’s
so
important. And the goth… the goth is making me make other things… but I can’t do it without her… I’m missing something…missing one thing. I have to keep the little one safe. Always protect the little one. The human, not the possessed toy.”

The professor doesn’t even raise an eyebrow at Sianne’s nonsense. Instead, he scratched his head, despite the fact he can’t feel an itch. I would know. “Gabby, I have an important job for the two of you. Are you positive you want to help?”

She nods aggressively. “Anything to get you back. And Mom and Dad. I don’t even care about the dolls. I just want my family.”

“Me too,” I say. “Family is life.”

“Okay.” He winces. “I hate the thought of you doing this… but you can go through the back alleyway near the police station. We need to know what type of drugs and resources they have if we’re to plan an effective countermeasure.”

I scrunch up my nose. “Who, what, hey?”

“We need to know how involved the police are. We need to know whom to trust.”

Gabby chews her bottom lip, her eyes focused on the professor’s eyes, then squares her shoulders. “Okay. We’ll go hit up the police station.”

“Can I at least change out of this tutu? I need to look covert.”

A cheeky grin spreads across Gabby’s face. She’s always enjoyed dress-ups.

“When I said covert, I didn’t mean ninja,” I mumble through the balaclava Gabby threw over me. She’s dressed me entirely in black so that only my eyes bulge.

“Hey, you might need to sneak into the police station. You need to blend in.”

“Like
this
? And anyway, that place is as white as a hospital. You would’ve been better off dressing me up as an angel.”

Riding Sianne’s bike, Gabby skids to a halt three doors down from the station. The bike has a basket in front and ribbons on the handles. It’s cute, but it doesn’t belong in this time. Hiding it in the shrubbery, she keeps low and hurries towards our destination.

“Hey, Gabby? You are… almost you, again. Do you feel better about your parents now?”

“Yes and no. I mean, they’re not safe, but they’re
safe
, if that makes sense? They’re together, and they’re alive.”

“True…” I bite my tongue when we reach the dark alleyway where there’s a large dumpster and a small window. Gabby climbs up, cringing when her foot kicks the lid, setting off a clang echoing off the buildings. When nobody investigates, she sighs in relief and cautiously stands. Her chin is the height of the bottom of the window, so she has to stand on tiptoes to peer in. I jump from her shoulder onto the brick sill, feeling rather exposed. We’re right next to a door and across from a parking lot. I keep expecting a helicopter spotlight to shine on us.

“Can you see anything?” Gabby whispers.

I press my nose against the window—into an empty office. “Nope.”

“Well, Grandpa wouldn’t have sent us here if he didn’t suspect something. You’ll have to sneak in.”

“How will I get out?” The window is open just enough for me to slip through and drop to the floor, but it’s way too high for me to climb out of.

Gabby pauses. “Don’t know. We’ll improvise. We always do!”

“That’s not very reassuring.”

“Ella, this is important! I’ll wait out here for you. If you’re not back in half an hour, I’ll call Grandpa. He’ll know what to do.”

“Again, not very reassuring.” I throw one leg through the window so that I’m straddling the sill. “Wish me luck. Be careful out here.”

“Ditto,” Gabby says as I throw the other leg over.

Bracing myself, I shuffle my bottom closer to the edge. Three… two… two… two…

“Just
jump
!” Gabby demands.

“All right, all right!”

Three, two, one, jump!

I pitch myself from the window and within one abrupt second, I hit the floor. I immediately bolt for cover behind the cabinets and scope the area. I was right about how bright it is in here. The walls are freshly painted white and the floors are some kind of white linen. I’ve never been good at guessing materials.

Voices mumble and laugh not far from the office, so I run from table leg to table leg, until I’m left vulnerable in the corridor. To my left is the front reception and to my right are holding cells. This would be so much easier if I knew exactly what I was looking for.

“Ooh, you’re so… Listen, if it’s more mullah you’re after—”

My ears prick. A glance back to the reception reveals that woman from the diner. Liza? No. Lisa.

“I’ve chosen my allegiances. This is a great future. No criminals,” rumbles one of the cops. “Sorry, kid. Get back on a plane and go home. It’s over.”

“If there are no criminals, there will be no cops. You’ll be out of a job, Dean. You need the bad to have the good.” Lisa chortles. “Okay, now you’ve got to pick my side. See how deep I’m being?”

“Forget it. You want to go up against them, be it on your own head. You’re already breaching your contract talking to me. Now get out of here before I arrest you.”

There’s a twinge of hurt in Lisa’s eyes, quickly masked by fury. She throws her hoodie over her head and exits the station without another word, leaving the cop to snicker to himself.

I wonder what it is. Can’t be anything too serious. She seems like a run of the mill hooligan trying to set up like a mini drug trade empire. Or something. I’ve watched enough
Breaking Bad
to get the gist of how that world works.

“Eenie, meenie,” I mutter. I choose the holding cells, figuring if they’re converting criminals to dolls, then I better go straight to the source.

The cells aren’t as bright as the rest of the station. They don’t offer a ton of privacy either—the wall is made of glass, which can’t be a lot of fun for say, that criminal sitting on the bed. The one with a bushy beard, bloodshot eyes, and a perpetual snarl.

The cell looks decades old and features various swear words scratched into the walls. In color. I’d swear that’s dried blood, but it looks a little too brown.
Eww
.

I take cover behind a plastic plant when two officers—one thin, one fat—holding a black bag each, march up and open the cell. It’s now or never. I bolt for the door and dive underneath the bed, exactly where I can appreciate the pokey springs and the mattress looking more yellow than white.

“Well, well, well, if it isn’t the master of disguise, Eddie Brand,” the officer’s tone is patronizing.

Eddie claps sarcastically. “Congratulations, coppers. You got me.”

“Impersonating a police officer and a zookeeper was damned admirable, but breaking and entering? Eddie, you’re smarter than that.”

“I was running out of ideas, boys. Figured I might as well go old-school and commit something more blue-collar.”

“Awful considerate of you. We just don’t get enough blue-collar lunatics,” the thin officer says, raising an eyebrow.

“So what are you going to do with me?” Eddie asks. “I can’t get bail.”

“Yeah, because your frigging support network’s in the slammer. Wasting resources. Taking up space. Good-for-nothing oxygen thieves.”

“Then kill me!” Eddie says defiantly. “Go on! Police brutality at its finest! Kill me!”

“We can’t kill you, man.”

“Yeah, that would be inhumane.”

A sly grin forms on the fat officer’s lips. “We’ve got a much better idea.”

The officers are quick; much quicker than I’d ever imagine. They lunge at Eddie, who squirms and wrestles them on the bed. The mattress squeaks and bounces, the springs only centimeters away from stabbing me in the eye.

“
GET OFF ME
!” Eddie yells, but the officers only snort, no better than bullies on the playground.

“Sedate him! You got the injection?”

“Yep! You got the doll?”

“In my back pocket.”

“I’ve got him pinned. Go for it.”

“
GET OFF!”

“Got him. Grab the wires.”

The thin officer leaps from the bed and towards the black bag by the door. He whips out a bunch of cords and bounds over to Eddie.

I can only see their high-sheen boots. How can something so…
everyday
look so totally menacing? At least, the bed stops squeaking. In unison, the men climb off, and I can hear them high-fiving.

“Great job!”

“Man, this is brilliant. How did we ever get by without one of these things? Chris is a genius.”

“Let’s see ‘im,” one says.

The other grunts—and promptly drops something. It’s a doll, with a beard and bright blue eyes. It looks friendly, unlike Eddie, and adorably debonair in a sharp black tuxedo and white gloves.

“No way am I giving this scum to my kid.”

“My rascal can use him. He likes blowing up his dolls and burying them, so it’ll be worth a laugh,” the thin officer says. With it still on the spit-stained concrete, he jerks up the doll’s shirt and flicks open a… a… it’s like a plastic hatch in his back. I feel for one in my back, but there’s nothing. The cop presses something inside the hatch, closes it, and steps away.

It takes several moments for the doll to come to life. His eyes blink, and he moves each finger, one by one. He runs his hands down his suit, coming to terms with his existence, then makes eye contact with me, his head tilting to the side.

“Hey, Eddie,” the fat officer greets.

Eddie doll jumps in shock and places a hand to his chest. He glances up. “My, aren’t you big! It’s lovely to meet you, sirs. This is awkward, but I was hoping you could please explain, um, who… who I am exactly?”

“Our new toy,” the thin officer cackles. He kicks Eddie who flies across the room into the wall. Rattled, he stands and nurses his head. His tormentor scoops him up. “Best invention ever. Eddie, you’re coming home with me. You’re gonna
love
my son.”

“You have a son?” Eddie beams and claps his hands. “I can’t wait to meet him! He… he won’t kick me too, will he?”

The fat officer unlocks the cell door without so much as giving Eddie a dignity of a response. “Ray will take this piece of meat to the warehouse.” He casually kicks at the bed. “He might take up space, but at least, he won’t be stealing our all our food and water… or
time
.”

On their way out, Eddie doll pipes up. “There’s another
thing
that looks like me. She’s under the bed. Looks kind of like a ninja. Can she come with us?”

Oh,
son of a nutter
. I back away, as close to the wall as possible.

“
What?
” the thin officer snaps. “We didn’t authorize another transformation. We haven’t even had a woman prisoner for weeks!”

“Please have a look. I’m sure I saw something.”

Oh,
fiddlesticks
!

The thin officer groans as he drops to all fours, Eddie doll still in hand. Eddie spots me and waves elatedly. “There she is! Aren’t her eyes pretty?”

“
What the hell
?” the thin officer stands. “Justin, help me move the bed.”

CRAP.
I have
nowhere
to hide!

The bed scrapes against the cement as the officers drag it into the center of the room, leaving me exposed. Nervously, I twiddle my thumbs and instinctively smile as politely as I can, even though they can’t see my face. “Hello.”

The fat cop pulls his gun from his holster and aims it at me. I yelp and raise my hands in the air.

“Who are you?!”

“Gabriella! But they call me Ella!
Please
don’t shoot!”

“Don’t shoot her!” Eddie pleads. “She’s too pretty! I mean, I can only see her eyes, but they look pretty!”

“Gabriella?” the thin officer scratches his nose. “I have no recollection of anyone passing through here with that name.”

“Maybe she got her name wrong? None of these dolls remember their past lives. Someone might’ve told her it was Gabriella and she just went with it.”

“I’ll ask around. Leave her in here and we’ll interrogate her later.”

“Interrogate?” I repeat. “With like, the big lights?”

The thin officer snorts. “Yeah.
With like, the big lights
.”

Oh, funky town
! I need to be able to think of worse swear words because I’m never getting home!

I nurse my head in my hands when the room swirls. The officers are now horizontal and blurred. The floor is like water, constantly moving and unsteady.