The Revolt (The Reapers: Book Two) (32 page)

It only took us half-an-hour to get to Varius
headquarters in Manassas, Virginia. We rode there in silence, Thad
driving and me staring out the window, trying to figure out the
best way to convince the Varius execs to help us.

The building looked ordinary enough, a large
warehouse space in an office park. The front of the building housed
a brightly lit reception room with ads for Hipnotast covering the
walls. A well-dressed receptionist sat behind a circular desk, and
she smiled when we entered, showing all of her teeth. She looked
like a model or an actress playing a receptionist, but there was
something predatory in her gaze when she looked at us. I hoped she
was thinking about a commission, but I suspected she was much more
than she seemed.

She picked up a phone and spoke into it
quietly as we approached the desk. “Hello, Thad,” she said, as
though the two of them were old friends. “I assume you’re
Kelsey?”

Thad froze when she said his name, so I
answered to give him a chance to recover. I wasn’t surprised she
recognized us, since Jed had probably warned the front desk. “Yes,
we’d like to see Jed.”

“Mr. Forrester is on his way down right now,”
she said. “How was your flight?”

“Smooth as silk,” Thad said, flashing a
charming grin. “Do you have a file on me or are you a
mind-reader?”

She smiled and clapped her hands like a
little kid who’d won a game. She noticed our confused expressions
and folded her hands back in her lap. “I just won a bet, sorry. You
and I actually went out on what should have been a particularly
memorable date, if you bothered to remember all the women you buy
dinner. I knew if you ever saw me again you wouldn’t remember me,
but Becker had higher expectations.”

“Damn, I thought you looked familiar. Polly,
right?” Thad’s face went a shade redder, and he took a half-step
back.

She shook her head and looked toward the
corner of the room. “Deal was he had to remember me on sight. I
still win, Becker.”

Thad and I followed her gaze to see a reaper
standing next to a potted plant. I should have noticed him when we
walked in, but I’d been focused on the receptionist. The look on
Thad’s face told me he felt the same way.

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” She said. “You
aren’t supposed to notice Becker. It’s his job to be invisible and
it’s mine to be distracting. My name is Fawn, if that helps jog
your memory.”

“Of course I remember you. We went to that
really nice place with the… it’s just been a really long day and… I
can make it up to you.” Thad tried a different demeanor with each
aborted attempt at apology: confidence, an aw shucks exhaustion,
and charm. Fawn appeared unmoved by each attempt and Thad sagged
visibly.

She flashed her teeth again. “Mr. Forrester
is waiting for you in the lobby. We prefer that our operatives not
enter the showroom. Becker will show you the way.”

“Wouldn’t she be considered an operative?” I
muttered as we followed Becker straight back and through a door
that blended in with the back wall.

Thad gave me a blank look. He either hadn’t
heard me or he didn’t understand the question. I smirked at him,
enjoying how far off balance his encounter with Fawn had thrown
him. I wondered if he was a true player or if Fawn had been an
exception. I made a note to ask him later.

Jed met us on the other side. He wore slacks
and a button-down, blue shirt. He’d lost weight and there were dark
circles under his eyes. His wrist was wrapped, but he didn’t appear
to have any other injuries.

He approached me slowly and looked me up and
down with a gaze that appeared to be strictly investigatory. When
he looked at my face again, he frowned and reached for me, almost
touching me before he pulled back. “What happened?”

“We ran into some living people who wanted to
take Kelsey with them. We fought and we’re fine.” Jed started when
Thad spoke and looked over at him like he hadn’t realized he was
there.

“When we didn’t hear anything… I thought
maybe I was wrong not to stay,” Jed said, his attention back on me,
a pleading in his eyes.

I smiled, but I didn’t say anything. I
thought he was wrong to set up my kidnapping and then run away, but
I understood that Varius was his family and I was just an asset
he’d been forced to babysit. It didn’t bother me. I smiled harder.
It didn’t bother me at all. I couldn’t think of a polite response,
so I said nothing. I felt it was a step toward maturity.

“Thanks for keeping her safe,” Jed said to
Thad, before my silence became thoroughly awkward. “Can we offer
you anything before you go?”

“Go? He’s not--”

“Jed, man, I’m not escorting Kelsey to her
new job. We’re here to ask for help. Briarton’s not done.”

Jed’s face fell, but he recovered quickly. “I
thought… we heard that the reapers have control there.”

“They almost do, but we can still stop them,”
I said, searching Jed’s face for some sign that he would be on our
side. He seemed different, awkward, and the way he was talking,
like I was a package Thad was delivering, creeped me out. “They
don’t own the town and we can make sure they don’t get it, but we
need help.”

“Let’s go to the conference room,” he said.
“You can explain everything to me there.”

He took us to a room with a wide conference
table and a view of a few trees and another office park. The grey,
rainy day did nothing to light the room, but made the bare white
walls and cherry wood conference table seem less stark and softer.
There were portfolios stacked on shelves against one wall and
brochures open on the table. Clearly this was a room for meeting
with clients of the pharmaceutical side of the business.

We told Jed everything. He leaned back and
laced his hands behind his head, thinking it all over. “It sounds
like a suicide mission to me.”

I saw my frustration mirrored on Thad’s face.
“Not if we go in with a good plan and a good team.”

“That’s the problem,” Jed said. “We’re still
picking up the pieces here. Varius isn’t going to be willing to put
a team together to save a town that isn’t obviously vital.”

“Any town they gain is vital,” Thad said.
“And this town will be off the table after the ceremony. Once they
get that energy, there will be no taking it back from them.”

Jed nodded. “I’ll call in some people who
have more sway than I do. Maybe we can convince them.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I think we have an edge
here, and we should use it.” I couldn’t help my curt tone or the
formality of my words. His lack of enthusiasm and his own formality
hurt in a way I didn’t want to think about too much.

He frowned and looked suddenly weary and
distraught. “Remember what I told you before,” he said, his voice
soft. “Don’t sell yourself to Varius to save Briarton.”

I did remember what he’d told me about
Varius. They wanted me desperate and begging them for help, because
they wanted to own me, heart and soul. “I remember,” I said.
But
I’m not sure that me for Briarton isn’t a fair trade
. I managed
not to voice my thought aloud, but Jed met my gaze and studied me
for so long I wondered if he knew how I felt.

Finally, he nodded. “Let me make a few
calls.” He stood and started away from the table. “I’ll ask Fawn to
bring you drinks and food, if you’d like.”

I expected Thad to say ‘I told you so’ as
soon as Jed left the room, but he just leaned back in his chair,
hands behind his head. “Have you thought about what we’re going to
do if they say no?”

“
We
aren’t going to do anything,” I
said, my heart pounding. I really hadn’t wanted to consider this
option. “
I’m
going to go back, find Caleb, and pretend to be
on his side, so I can stop the ceremony.”

Thad didn’t move or betray any sign of
emotion. “You know they’ll kill you, right?”

“Glad to see the recent violence hasn’t
dampened your death wish,” Tucker said.

“Took you long enough to get here, man,” Thad
said, grinning at Tucker.

“I was checking on the situation in Briarton,
man
,” Tucker said, but he smiled generously at Thad. “Len’s
back.”

“What?” Thad and I asked in unison. Thad
straightened up in his seat and leaned toward Tucker. Relief washed
through me so fiercely that I was frozen in place. My father might
not be my favorite person, but I was glad he hadn’t been
deleted.

“How is he?”

“He’s fine. He’ll be here as soon as I tell
him where you are. He thought it’d be better if I let you two know
he’s on his way. He didn’t want to shock you.”

“Well, go get him,” Thad said, his whole mood
bouncier. “We sure as hell could use him.”

“Say please, whippersnapper,” Tucker said,
but he was gone again before Thad could say anything else.

“Don’t get too used to dying, yet, Kelsey.
Your dad is the king of good plans.”

“I don’t have any plan, because there’s
nothing that doesn’t end with one or both of you getting killed.
The town isn’t worth more than the two of you,” Len said, after
Thad and I had brought him up to date. “We can’t go in without
Varius.”

“But if they get Briarton, they’ll own it
completely,” I said. “We won’t be able to get them out and once
they have one town, what’s to stop them from taking the surrounding
towns?”

“That doesn’t change the fact that we don’t
have—” Len started.

Jed walked in followed by three people. They
filed into the room and took seats at the table. Jed almost sat on
Tucker, but a tall, pudgy woman with graying hair stopped him and
he walked around the table to sit across from me.

“I take it we have some new arrivals,” Jed
said.

“Len and Tucker are here, dear,” said the
older woman. The other two people Jed had brought were men, both
tall, rail-thin, and practically identical.

Jed smiled with something like relief. “Hi
Len, Tucker. You’ve met my mother before, right? These two men here
are Frederick Jones and Alistair Forrester from our strategic
department. Mom, Frederick, Allistair, this is Kelsey Andrews and
Thad Price. Over there are Len Fitzhugh and Tucker Ferguson.”

“Hello, it’s so nice to meet you, Kelsey and
Thad, I’m Yvonne,” Jed’s mom said and he flushed. Now that I knew
she was Jed’s mother, I could see a definite resemblance. She had
the same brilliant purple eyes and dark hair, beneath the gray. She
looked at all of us with a complete lack of warmth in her
expression. I wondered if she’d always been that way, or if she’d
once been like Jed and the corporation had hardened her. “Good to
see you, Len, Tucker. Would you mind telling us exactly what’s been
going on since the reapers first infiltrated Briarton.”

“I really don’t think there’s time. Hasn’t
Jed filled you in?” I asked.

Yvonne looked at me like I was a particularly
slow child and spoke in a soft, slow voice. “I understand your
impatience, but we are not willing to risk our people or our
resources unless we know precisely where and how they will be used.
I want as much information as possible. If that takes too much of
your time, you are free to go.”

I really didn’t think I was going to like
this woman. Yvonne was more like Caleb with his hard-edged charm,
than she was like Jed in any way. I was angry and frustrated, but I
nodded. “I understand,” I said. Thad reached for my hand under the
table and squeezed. I was glad when he continued to hold my hand as
I talked.

We told them everything we knew and answered
a litany of questions. Allistair relayed what Len and Tucker said
to those in the room who couldn’t hear ghosts. Jed, his mother, and
Frederick were all deaf to the dead. I watched the minutes tick
away on the clock over the door, my anxiety and frustration growing
with each movement of the clock hand. Finally, Yvonne nodded and
said, “I think we have everything we need. You have to understand
that we have only recently recovered from an attack against our
corporation and are less than willing to send people into harm’s
way again. This new information about a magical contract is
compelling, but we are unwilling to take this on without something
substantial in return.”

“Mother—” Jed said, his voice almost a
growl.

No matter how well I thought I’d prepared
myself, it still took effort to say the words. “I’ll come work for
you if you help us.”

“Jed seems confident that you will choose to
work here of your own free will, so you aren’t offering me anything
I couldn’t get anyway.”

I looked at Jed, and he met my gaze calmly,
his expression giving nothing away. “If you don’t do this, I’ll
refuse to work for you,” I said.

“I want three years and I want you to sign a
contract.” She wasn’t even going to
try
to pretend they were
bringing me in on my own terms. Jed glared at his mother.

“You don’t have to do this,” Thad said. “We
can figure out some other way.”

“Can I see the contract?” I was finding it
hard to breathe, suddenly. I hadn’t decided not to work for Varius,
but being forced to commit three years of my life to them, made me
pretty sure it wasn’t a place I wanted to work. Sitting next to my
dad and arguing with these bigwigs, I had started to like the idea
of being on his team.

Yvonne smiled at me as though she were
enjoying my discomfort. “As you said, Kelsey, we really don’t have
time to waste.”

Thad pushed his chair back and stood, his
hands clenched in fists. I understood how he felt. I wouldn’t have
minded the opportunity to punch Yvonne’s perfectly made-up face
myself.

“Sit down Thad. I know how she operates,” Len
said. “Tell her to bring the contract and I’ll look it over.”

Yvonne nodded and signaled to Frederick,
after Thad told her what Len had said. Frederick left the room
without a word.