The Revolt (The Reapers: Book Two) (33 page)

Thad sat down, but he still looked like he
wanted to hit someone. “We can figure out something else, Kelsey,”
he said. “We don’t need them.”

“Yes, you do,” Len said. “You can’t do this
alone, and you and I both know Kelsey isn’t going to let this rest.
We watch her sign this contract, or we watch her die.”

“Three years is too long,” Thad said. “Maybe
we can’t stop the reapers before the ceremony, but we’ll go back. I
promise.”

“They’re going to reap Angelica,” I said. I
wished there was some way I could save my best friend and not sign
that contract, but I couldn’t see a way out. “I can’t walk
away.”

“Based on our intel, the reapers have made
extensive progress in Briarton. It’s small and isolated and easy to
control,” Yvonne said. “Plus there’s Caleb’s magical connection. We
don’t fully understand the implications of that, but it seems less
than ideal. The reapers have enough power without adding magic to
the mix.”

“So help us without making me an indentured
servant.” I looked to Jed, silently begging him to help me, but he
just shook his head slightly. I took that to mean there was nothing
he could do and, probably, that he thought I should walk away and
let Briarton go to the reapers.

Yvonne shrugged. “We’ve only recently
recovered enough to be able to go into the field and there are
other towns we feel are more important. We’d get to Briarton
eventually, and we’d subdue the reapers, at the very least.
Convincing them to give up Briarton altogether will probably be
impossible.”

I didn’t like the sound of that. “You don’t
care if the reapers take over the town as long as you’re pulling
the strings?”

Thad snorted in disgust, but Tucker and Len
both nodded without surprise. Jed still wouldn’t look at me.

Frederick walked back in and sat down next to
Len with the contract.

Yvonne smiled a slow smile. “We have to keep
the reapers happy, Kelsey, or they won’t do as we wish. If having
this little town makes them happy enough to continue following our
rules, so be it.”

“And you get to own a sweet little resort
town,” I said, not bothering to hide the disgust in my voice. “What
if they won’t listen to you?”

Her expression sharpened. “We have ways of
making them listen. None of that matters if we’re going to help
you, but I need something in exchange for the sacrifice I’m going
to make. I’m not just risking my people in a silly battle, I’m
giving up the bone I was planning to throw to the reapers to keep
them happy and end this ridiculous war of theirs.”

“Yvonne, if you want to get Kelsey on your
side, you should shut up,” Len said, pushing the contract aside.
“Otherwise, she’ll go in there on her own, and probably drag Thad
and your son into it.” Len waited for Thad to relay the message
before he looked over at me. “Kelsey, the contract is what she says
it is. You’d give up three years of your life to them, but they’d
train you better than I ever could. You’d learn a lot.”

I swallowed hard. I would do it to save
Briarton, and I would learn everything I could from Varius, until I
was powerful enough to never have to bow to anyone ever again.
“Fine. Give me the contract.”

“Kelsey…”Thad said, sounding like he was
choking.

I looked at him. “Len’s right, Thad, I can
learn a lot from them.” I smiled at him and squeezed his hand
before dropping it, hoping he would understand. “I can make a
difference.”

He nodded, but he looked like he’d swallowed
a bug. “Can’t we at least negotiate the terms down from three years
to one?”

“I don’t negotiate,” Yvonne said. “And you’re
starting to annoy me. Sign the papers or we’re done here.”

I looked around the table, my heart thudding.
Yvonne appeared calm and cool, like she had already won. Jed
finally met my eyes and shook his head, again. He clearly thought
what Varius wanted from me wasn’t worth saving Briarton and
Angelica. I forced myself not to react, but inside I was going
crazy. I thought about what mattered to me, what guarantees I
needed to be able to sleep at night.

“I have two conditions,” I said.

“I don’t remember offering you an option for
conditions,” Yvonne said, but she didn’t get up or threaten to
leave. She wanted me at Varius. Badly.

“I want to be an active part of the mission
to save Briarton.” I needed to be there to make sure Angelica and
Bruce weren’t hurt.

“You’re too valuable to risk,” Yvonne said.
“And you aren’t properly trained.”

“I have connections with Caleb that you
don’t.”

For the first time, her face reddened with
real anger. “Caleb is my son. I have all of the necessary
connections.”

“Caleb thinks he’s in love with her,” Jed
said softly to his mother. “He might listen to her.”

Yvonne looked like she wanted to rip
someone’s head off, but she calmed herself with visible effort.
“Fine, you may go along, but you
will
follow our
orders.”

“Good,” I said. Once we were there, I could
do whatever I damn well pleased. What would they do? Fire me?

“Can we move on, now,” Yvonne asked, cool
once again.

“I have a second condition. I won’t kill
anyone, living or dead, for you. I’ll train and I’ll work for you,
but I won’t kill.” I’d had enough of killing to last me the rest of
my life.

I looked at Jed, but his face was still and
unreadable. It occurred to me suddenly that I might have hurt him,
since it was his job to kill for Varius, but I didn’t care, I was
sure he wouldn’t want the same job for me.

“Fine,” Yvonne said. “Anything else?”

She agreed to that way too easily. “I want it
in writing.”

She sighed. “We really don’t have time for
this.”

“We still have a plan to hammer out. Have
someone change the contract while we work out how we’re going to
save Briarton and I’ll sign it before we leave.”

That gave me a chance to back out if they
weren’t willing to do everything it took to save Angelica and
Briarton.

Yvonne motioned for the contract and I slid
it to her, she handed it to Frederick and he left the room. I
suddenly wondered if I should have asked for more since her
acceptance came so easily. Either they’d expected me to ask for
something bigger, or they figured they’d get around my request
somehow.

An hour later, we were on Varius’s corporate
jet with fifteen of their operatives, Alistair, and Yvonne. Jed had
stayed behind. He hadn’t made any attempt to leave with us. I
suspected he had a conflict of interest with Caleb, but I’d still
expected him to offer me an explanation or at least say goodbye.
He’d avoided me altogether. Clearly, his friendship had been a
recruiting tactic and I tried not to think about it. It had been
bad enough when people hadn’t wanted to be my friends because I was
a freak, but now it seemed the problem was just me.

Thad sat next to me on the plane and held my
hand the whole flight, which cheered me up a bit. He probably had
ulterior motives as well, but I chose not to dwell on the negative
and enjoyed the comfort his warm hand provided. I’d just signed
away my soul to a corporation that was at least cold and heartless,
if not downright evil, and I was heading off to my possible
death.

I leaned my head on Thad’s shoulder and let
him wrap an arm around me. He gave me a squeeze, and I tried to
calm my racing heart and breathe normally. I was afraid I might not
survive to see the sun rise again, but I was even more afraid that
I might have to watch Thad, Angelica, or Tucker killed.

Suddenly, I wanted Tucker next to me. “Hey,
Tucker,” I whispered. “Where are you?”

He popped up next to Thad, in the aisle.
“What’s up?”

“Snuggle with us?” I asked.

He didn’t laugh or roll his eyes, he just
slipped into the small space between me and the window. He took my
hand, and his own hand became solid. He somehow kept the rest of
himself ghostly. Thad looked over and whistled softly. “Holy shit,
that’s cool. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

I squeezed Tucker’s hand harder and snuggled
in closer to Thad. I tried to push down rising panic as I
remembered that the only other person who knew about my trick with
Tucker was Jed, and the only person who knew I could see past the
second curtain was Caleb. I wondered how much they had told Yvonne.
If she knew everything, I was pretty sure she’d never let me leave
Varius.

“It’s okay, Kelsey,” Thad said, running his
hand through my hair. “We’ll get you out of there if you need us
to. Fuck their contracts.”

The plane landed before I was ready, but in
plenty of time for us to stop the midnight ceremony. We just had to
find Caleb.

We holed up in an old, mid-priced chain hotel
on the edge of town, arriving in three separate vehicles, fifteen
minutes apart. Thad and I were sharing a room, which was a relief
to me. Maybe I could pretend for a little while that I wasn’t a
part of Varius, like we had pretended we were normal when we went
out to the bar together on Christmas.

The room was dim, even with all of the
available lamps turned on, and it smelled musty. The bed spread was
a brilliant orange with a pattern that hurt my eyes and the lone
nightstand was dented and scratched. Thad and I sat on the end of
the bed, my right leg touching his from ankle to thigh. Neither of
us moved.

Len paced in front of us, while Tucker headed
out with a couple other reapers to scout the situation in the
town.

I really wanted a shower, but I didn’t want
to have to put the same clothes back on again. Supposedly, someone
had packed new clothes for me and Thad, but I didn’t want to leave
his or Len’s company to go track them down. We had to wait for the
scouts to return before we headed into town, anyway.

“I don’t like this,” Len said.

“The mission, or me signing my life away to
Varius?” I asked.

“I don’t like any of it. There’s nothing we
can do about the contract right now,” he said. “But if you decide
you want to terminate it, you let me know and we’ll get you out,
okay?”

I nodded, unconvinced.

“What I really hate is the idea of sending
you back into this mess after what those reapers did to you
before.”

“I’m going with her, sir,” Thad said. “I’ll
look out for her.”

“I know you will. I want you to look out for
yourself, too. I don’t want to lose any more people.” He sighed.
“Caleb scares me more than any of them, because he’s crazy and
unpredictable. Watch yourselves, but watch him hardest of all.” Len
walked toward the door muttering and was gone.

“Where’d he go?” I asked.

Thad shrugged. “Probably to talk to Yvonne
and the others, hammer on their plan some more.” he turned to look
at me, his hand on my knee. I’d become comfortable with touching
him. I’d always been touchy-feely with my friends and Thad was my
friend. The look on his face, though, was more serious than I’d
expected, even given the situation. “This might be the last chance
we get to talk alone, before everything… I need you to know…” he
kissed me, while I was still waiting to hear what he had to
say.

The kiss shocked me and I froze, but just for
a moment. I didn’t know what it meant and I didn’t care. Based on
his reaction to Fawn, I doubted he got too serious about any girl,
and I was safe because I’d be locked away at Varius for the next
three years. So, maybe he’d misinterpreted my touchiness as
romantic desire, but I didn’t really care, the kiss felt too good.
I was tired of worrying and thinking. I just wanted to feel. I
leaned into him and kissed him back, wrapping my arms around his
neck and running my fingers through his soft hair. I tried to be
gentle, because his face was still bruised and bloody, but he just
kissed me harder. He moaned and started to push me back down on the
bed, when a knock at the door interrupted us.

He moved away from me slowly, ending the kiss
as it should be ended, rather than jumping to attention. He smiled
at me when he pulled away and I smiled back, silently praying that
we both made it through the night. He went to the door without
taking his eyes off me.

One of Alistair’s team, a small, stocky
woman, walked in with three bags. “I’m Moira and I’m here to get
you ready,” she said.

It was after ten when we drove into town in
our small two-door sedan. Tucker, Len, Thad and I shared a car,
with Thad driving. We were silent all the way there and I was glad
for it. The scouts had told us we’d find Caleb at Bruce’s
grandmother’s house with Rose, her team, and Bruce and Angelica.
There was no good way to sneak in there and I was worried about
what the reapers might do to Bruce and Angelica before we could get
to them.

Varius already had a team of fifteen men and
women hidden in the woods around the house. We were going to take
up the rear. We weren’t supposed to fight, but to clean up and get
Angelica and Bruce out.

Thad parked the car at the end of the
half-mile driveway, just off the road. “I don’t like this,” he
said.

“You don’t have to like it,” Len said.
“Varius will get the job done and we can’t.”

The way he said it made it sound more like an
order than an explanation. “Do you know something?” I asked.

“I know this isn’t going to go down how you
want it to, sugar.” He almost sounded sad, but my dad wasn’t the
sympathetic type. At least I’d never known him to be, but I really
didn’t know much about him. “Yvonne and her people, they don’t see
the world the way you do. Just remember you asked her here. She’ll
get the town free of the reapers and you’re going to have to let
her do it on her terms.”

A cold wave of fear washed over me. “Can’t we
fight her?”

“No, sugar. Maybe someday, but not today.”
Len slid out of the car.

“He’s right,” Tucker said. “Focus on what’s
important today and let the rest go for now.”