Third Shift: Pact (Silo #2C)(31)

“Yes.” She nodded ever so slightly. “Father was never going to wake us. The deep freeze—” Her voice was a whisper. “I’m glad you came. I knew you would.”

A hand escaped from the blanket and gripped the edge of the pod as if to pull herself out. Donald placed a hand on her shoulder. She was in a weakened state. He turned and grabbed the thermos from the wheelchair. Peeling her hand from the lip of the pod, he pressed the drink into her palm. She wiggled her other arm free and held the thermos against her knees.

“I want to know why,” he said. “Why did you bring me here. To this place.” He looked around at the pods, these unnatural graves that kept death at bay.

Anna gazed at him. She studied the thermos and the straw. Donald let go of her arm and reached into his pocket. He pulled out the cell phone. Anna shifted her attention to that.

“What did you do that day?” he asked. “You kept me from her, didn’t you? And the night we met to finalize the plans—all the times Mick missed a meeting—that was you as well.”

A shadow slid across Anna’s face. Something deep and dark registered. Donald had expected a harsh defiance, a steel resolve, denials. Anna looked sad, instead. It was as though the conversation had taken a turn she didn’t expect.

“So long ago,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m sorry, Donny, but it was so long ago.” Her eyes flitted beyond him toward the door as if she were expecting danger. Donald glanced back over his shoulder and saw nothing. “We have to get out of here,” she croaked, her voice feeble and distant. “Donny, my father, they made a pact—”

“I want to know what you did,” he said. “Tell me.”

She shook her head. “I need to tell you something else.” Her voice was small and quiet. She licked her lips and glanced at the straw, but Donald kept a hand on her arm. “Dad woke me for another shift.” She lifted her head and fixed her eyes on him. Her teeth chattered together while she collected her thoughts. “And I found something—”

“Stop,” Donald said. “No more stories. No lies. Just the truth.”

Anna looked away. A spasm surged through her body, a great shiver. Steam rose from her hair, and condensation raced down the skin of the pod in sudden bursts of speed.

“It was meant to be this way,” she said. The admission was in the way she said it, her refusal to look at him. “It was meant to be. You and me together. We built this.”

Donald seethed with renewed rage. Confirmation was like a second discovery of an awful truth. His hands trembled more than hers.

Anna leaned forward. “I couldn’t stand the thought of you dying over there, alone.”

“I wouldn’t have been alone,” he hissed through clenched teeth. “And you don’t get to decide such things.” He gripped the edge of the pod with both hands and squeezed until his knuckles turned white.

Anna nodded. It was hard to tell if she agreed with him or if she meant to say, “It’s always up to people like me.”

“You need to hear what I have to say,” she said.

Donald waited. What explanation or apology was there? She had taken from him what little Thurman had left behind. Her father had destroyed the world. Anna had destroyed Donald’s. He waited to hear what she had to say.

“My father made a pact,” she said, her voice gaining strength. “We were never to be woken. We need to get out of here—”

This again. She didn’t care that she had destroyed him. Donald felt his rage subside. It dissipated throughout his body, a part of him, a powerful surge that came and went like an ocean wave, not strong enough to hold itself up, crashing down with a hiss and a sigh.

“Drink,” he told her, lifting her arm gently. “Then you can tell me. You can tell me whatever you like.”

Anna blinked. Donald reached for the straw and steered it toward her lips. Such dangerous lips. They would tell him anything, keep him confused, use him so that she might feel less hollow, less alone. He had heard enough of her lies, her brand of poison. To give her an ear was to give her a vein.

Anna’s lips closed around the straw, and her cheeks dented as she sucked. A column of foul green surged up the straw.

“So bitter,” she whispered after her first swallow.

“Shhh,” Donald told her. “Drink. You need this.”

She did, and Donald held the thermos for her. Anna paused between sips to tell him they needed to get out of there, that it wasn’t safe. He agreed and guided the straw back to her lips. The danger was her.

There was still some of the drink left when she gazed up at him, confused. “Why am I … feeling sleepy?” she asked. Anna blinked slowly, fighting to keep her eyes open.

“You shouldn’t have brought me here,” Donald said. “We weren’t meant to live like this.”

Anna lifted an arm, reached out, and seized Donald’s shoulder. Awareness seemed to grip her. Donald sat on the edge of the pod and put an arm around her. As she slumped against him, he flashed back to the night of their first kiss. Back in college, her with too much to drink, falling asleep on his frat house sofa, her head on his shoulder. And Donald had stayed like that for the rest of the night, his arm trapped and growing numb while a party thrummed and finally faded. They had woken the next morning, Anna stirring before he did. She had smiled and thanked him, called him her guardian angel, and gave him a kiss.