Mind Games (Mind Games, #1)(17)

Pause. “That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

“It doesn’t feel right.”

“Make it feel right then. You can focus it. I know you can.”

“Fine. Whatever.”

Then the conversation is over and I’m confused. That wasn’t what Clarice was going to talk to her about. Maybe Ms. Robertson is in charge of the self-defense classes. But what was that about a woman and a bag?

I let go of Eden’s hand and sit where I am, sifting sand between my fingers, wondering if this is the part where Fia turns back with that look on her face.

“I’m gonna go down to the water; wanna come?” Eden asks, but I shake my head, lost in what I saw. She puts her hand on top of my hair. “You worry too much. Shout if you want me.”

A few minutes later someone flops to the sand next to me, and I can tell from the scent and feel of her nearby that it’s Fia.

“What did Clarice want?”

“Nothing. Just a stupid game.”

“But you’re out of the classes, right?”

“Right.”

“Good.” I smile and lean my head onto her shoulder. “I like how it smells out here.”

“It smells like rotten things. You’re crazy.”

“It smells like it looks. And I know how it looks, too.” I smile like the crazy person Fia said I was, and she lets out a small laugh, even though I can feel from the tension in her shoulder she still isn’t happy. I’ll make her happy. I can fix things. I can be the big sister. “Oh! They said the doctor should have some of the test results back soon, but they want some samples of your DNA to compare and—”

A crack louder than thunder rips through the air, and a flash of heat whooshes past, carrying stinging bits of sand. Fia knocks us to the ground, throwing herself on top of me, and everyone is screaming and I didn’t see this, what happened, what happened?

“What happened?” I shout in Fia’s ear. But then she shoves off me and she is gone in the blackness now, screaming, screaming as loud as she can.

“WHAT DID YOU MAKE ME DO? WHAT DID YOU DO? WHAT DID I DO?”

She screams and screams until a soft thud hits the ground near me and then she is silent but everyone else is screaming and this is not the beach I saw and I crawl desperately in the sand, searching, because I don’t know where Fia is.

Where is Fia?





FIA

Monday Evening


“DRUGS, DRUGS, PLEASE GIVE ME DRUGS.” I MAKE A face at my pale reflection. My arm hurts. My head hurts. I don’t understand anything that’s happened today. Annie put the hit on Adam. She’s helping Keane. Why? And thanks to Keane’s rules, I can’t visit her or even call her without being spied on. How could she do this to me? To us? She used me.

My arm hurts.

My life hurts.

“Drugs, drugs, drugs, I want some drugs,” I sing, dancing out of the bathroom and into my living room. It’s a beautiful apartment, Lincoln Park, impeccably furnished. James picked it for me when we got back from Europe and they decided it was dangerous for me to have easy access to Annie. One too many stray thoughts of grabbing her and running. Stupid Readers.

So she stays at the school and I get “freedom” that is as much a prison as Annie’s secure hall because they know I’ll never leave her.

As long as I do exactly what I am told I am perfectly free.

“Drugs, James, drugs, drugs—” I stop short, almost tripping, and let my anger (always on simmer, I keep it on simmer just for this) explode. “What are they doing here?”

Ms. Robertson and Eden are sitting on my couch—my couch—and James is by the window on his phone. Anger, anger, anger, Eden is already squirming, looking like she’s going to be sick. I turn to Ms. Robertson and mentally list every dirty, foul, obscene word I’ve ever heard or read. I start screaming them in my head, letting them bounce around inside my skull, the whole place a vast echo chamber of filth and bile and words, words, words.

Then, because her severe mouth is a single straight line but she hasn’t gotten truly angry yet, I smile, bare all my teeth at her, and think three simple words: Andy, Ashley, Ally. She gasps in horror and rushes from the couch straight at me, grabbing both my arms (my arm, my arm, pain pain pain) and slamming me into the wall.

“How do you know their names? How?”

Andy, Ashley, Ally. Andy, Ashley, Ally. ANDY, ASHLEY, ALLY.

“STOP IT!” she screams, and I sigh in relief as James pulls her off me. Oh, my arm; spots dance in front of my eyes, but it’s worth it.

Ms. Robertson is screaming at James and he’s talking, trying to calm her down. I sink along the wall to the floor and laugh. I knew it was a good idea to pick up her cell phone when she left it out on her desk the other day. I didn’t even have to sing pop songs, and my thoughts are safe.

“If she doesn’t have anything to hide, then why does she do that? You don’t know what it’s like, having to listen in on her thoughts! She’s a monster!”

“Rawr,” I say.

James walks her to the door. “I think everyone could use a break. Doris, thank you so much for your efforts, and I promise your family is safe and she doesn’t know where they are and even if she did”—he cuts a sharp glance my direction with his warm brown beautiful eyes—“she would never hurt them. She’s just disoriented and in pain. It’ll pass.”