Imagine Me (Shatter Me #6)(41)

I turn back to Warner. “Okay, what is going on?”

Warner almost smiles when he says, “They weren’t kidnapped.”

My eyebrows fly up my forehead. “Say what now?”

“They weren’t kidnapped.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t.”

“This is not the time, bro. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Kent tracked down Anderson on his own,” Warner says, his gaze shifting to James. “He offered his allegiance in exchange for protection.”

My entire body goes slack. I nearly fall off the bed.

Warner goes on: “Kent wasn’t lying when he said he would try for amnesty. But he left out the part about being a traitor.”

“No. No way. No fucking way.”

“There was never an abduction,” Warner says. “No kidnapping. Kent bartered himself in exchange for James’s protection.”

This time, I actually fall off the bed. “Barter himself— how?” I manage to drag myself up off the floor, stumbling to my feet. “What does Adam even have to barter with? Anderson already knows all our secrets.”

It’s James who says quietly, “He gave them his power.”

I stare at the kid, blinking like an idiot.

“I don’t understand,” I say. “How can you give someone your power? You can’t just give someone your power. Right? It’s not like a pair of pants you can just take off and hand over.”

“No,” Warner says. “But it’s something The Reestablishment knows how to harvest. How else do you think my father took Sonya’s and Sara’s healing powers?”

“Adam told them what he can d-do,” James says, his voice breaking. “He told them that he can use his power to turn other people’s powers off. He thought it m-might be useful to them.”

“Imagine the possibilities,” Warner says, affecting awe. “Imagine how they might weaponize a power like that for global use—how they could make such a thing so powerful they could effectively shut down every single rebel group in the world. Reduce their Unnatural opposition to zero.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

I think I’m going to pass out. I actually feel faint. Dizzy. Like I can’t breathe. Like this is impossible. “No way,” I’m saying. I’m practically breathing the words. “No way. Not possible.”

“I once said that Kent’s ability was useless,” Warner says quietly. “But I see now that I was a fool.”

“He didn’t want to do it,” James says. He’s actively crying now, the silent tears moving down his face. “I swear he only did it to save me. He offered the only thing he had—the only thing he thought they’d want—to keep me safe. I know he didn’t want to do it. He was just desperate. He thought he was doing the right thing. He kept telling me he was going to keep me safe.”

“By running into the arms of the man who abused him his whole life?” I’m clutching my hair in my hands. “This doesn’t make any sense. How does this— How—? How?”

I look up suddenly, realizing.

“And then look what he did,” I say, stunned. “After everything, Anderson still used you as bait. He brought you here as leverage. He would’ve killed you, even after everything Adam gave up.”

“Kent was a desperate idiot,” Warner says. “That he was ever willing to trust my father with James’s well-being tells you exactly how far gone he was.”

“He was desperate, but he’s not an idiot,” James says angrily, his eyes refilling with tears. “He loves me and he was just trying to keep me safe. I’m so worried about him. I’m so scared something happened to him. And I’m so scared Anderson did something awful to him.” James swallows, hard. “What are we going to do now? How are we going to get Adam and Juliette back?”

I squeeze my eyes shut, try to take deep breaths. “Listen, don’t stress about this, okay? We’re going to get them back. And when we do, I’m going to murder Adam myself.”

James gasps.

“Ignore him,” Warner says. “He doesn’t mean it.”

“Yes, I damn well do mean it.”

Warner pretends not to hear me. “According to the information I gathered just moments before you barged in here,” he says calmly, “it sounds like my father was holding court back in Sector 45, just as Sam predicated. But he won’t be there now, of that I’m certain.”

“How can you be certain of anything right now?”

“Because I know my father,” he says. “I know what matters most to him. And I know that when he left here, he was severely, gruesomely injured. There’s only one place he’d go in a state like that.”

I blink at him. “Where?”

“Oceania. Back to Maximillian Sommers, the only person capable of piecing him back together.”

That stops me dead. “Oceania? Please tell me you’re joking. We have to go back to Oceania?” I groan. “Dammit. That means we have to steal another plane.”

“We,” he says, irritated, “aren’t doing anything.”

“Of course we—”