The Atlas Six (The Atlas, #1)(29)

Not that that was the reason Reina was interested at that particular moment. Rather, she had realized that Parisa was probably piecing together the fact that she’d overlooked the person in the room with the most money, and that brought Reina so much satisfaction the weeping fig in the corner joyfully sprouted fruit.

“Yes, I’m a Nova,” Callum said, not taking his eyes from Tristan, who had still not confessed to anything. “Though, as you’ve clearly pieced together, illusions aren’t particularly my life’s work.”

“Fine,” growled Tristan. “I can see through illusions.”

Immediately, Libby’s hand rose somewhere to her cheek, and Tristan sighed.

“Yes, I can see it,” he said. “It’s just a zit. Relax.”

Then Tristan’s attention traveled slowly back to Callum, who stiffened in apprehension. Delightful, Reina thought. The only thing better would be if Tristan informed them that wasn’t Parisa’s real nose.

“I won’t tell them if you won’t,” Tristan said to Callum.

For a moment, the air in the room was so tense that even the plants grew wary.

Then, abruptly, Callum laughed.

“Let’s keep it between us, then,” he agreed, reaching out to clap a hand around Tristan’s shoulder. “Better to let them wonder.”

So there was an us and them now. That was considerably less delightful.

MotherMotherMother, the ivy in the corner whispered with a shudder of consternation, joined by the hissing sound from the nearby fig plant.

Mother is angry, whimpered the philodendron. She is angry, OhnoOhnoOhno—

“—’s no point fighting about this,” Libby was saying, as Reina quietly engaged a deep inhale, hoping not to spur any nearby greenery to mutiny. “Regardless of what we think about each other, we still have to formulate some sort of security plan, so—”

But before Libby Rhodes could come to any sort of bossy conclusion, there was a low, loud, percussive gong, and the door to the painted room flew open, the house itself seeming to beckon them down the hall.

“Guess we’ll have to formulate later,” said Callum, rising to his feet and striding forward before waiting to hear what the end of Libby’s sentence would have been.

Behind him, Tristan and Parisa exchanged a glance and followed; Nico rose to his feet, beckoning Libby with a grimace. She, however, hesitated in frustration, then turned her attention to Reina instead.

“So, listen,” Libby began, shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot. “I know I must have sounded rude before, what with that thing I said about you being a naturalist, but I was only—”

“We don’t have to be friends,” Reina said bluntly, cutting her off. Obviously Libby was about to extend some sort of olive branch, but Reina had enough actual branches to contend with without dragging any metaphorical ones into the picture. She certainly had no interest in making friends; all she wanted from this experience was to gain as much access to the Society’s archives as she could.

Though she didn’t want to close any doors, either.

“We just have to be better than them,” Reina pointed out gruffly, gesturing with her chin to the other three, and that, at least, Libby seemed to grasp.

“Understood,” she said, and then, gratifyingly, she followed Nico out the door without waiting, leaving Reina to trail behind alone while the painted room’s plants mourned her loss.





NICO



MUCH AS NICO RESENTED every syllable of what was about to come out of his mouth, he doubted there was any alternative.

“Listen,” he said to Libby, dropping his voice. “I need this to work.”

Naturally she was defensive before anything else. “Varona,” she began, “might I remind you that you’re not the only one here who has something to prove—”

“Rhodes, spare me the lecture. I need access,” he told her. “Specific access, though I don’t know what specifically yet. I just need to make sure I can get into as many of the Society’s archives as possible.”

“Why?”

She had such a tireless capacity for suspicion when it came to him. Sure, he could tell her that most research existing about the offspring of creatures was either ancient and lost or illegal and not particularly in-depth, but he didn’t really want to get into it. Those were Gideon’s secrets, not his.

“I just do,” he said, and before Libby could open her mouth again, he hastily interrupted. “I’m just trying to tell you that I’m willing to do whatever it takes to move on.”

“Nico, if you’re trying to intimidate me—”

“I’m not—” He broke off, frustrated. “Rhodes. For fuck’s sake, I’m trying to work with you.”

“Since when?”

For such a smart girl, she could be really stupid.

“Since I noticed the older three are already picking teams,” he hissed, gesturing ahead to where Tristan and Parisa had caught up with Callum.

Gradually, understanding began to dawn on Libby’s face.

“You want to be some sort of alliance, you mean?”

“You heard what Atlas said. We’re doing physical magics first,” Nico reminded her. “You and I are going to be better at that than everyone else.”