The Complication (The Program #6)(75)

“Have you found out anything about Michael Realm?” I ask. “The guy I mentioned?”

“Ah . . . ,” my grandfather says, and there’s a rustling of papers. “Speak of the devil. Your grandmother and I were just looking into that.”

“Hi, honey,” my gram calls out from somewhere in the room.

“Hi, Gram,” I reply. She must be skipping work to help him research, and I can’t think of another time when that’s happened. She doesn’t get involved in his investigations, but I guess this one is different. This is for me.

Pop tells me he’s putting me on speaker, and I stop at a red light. I adjust the phone in the cup holder.

“Any luck finding him?” I ask.

“Not yet,” he admits. “But he has quite a past.”

My stomach turns, afraid another world-upending revelation might just wreck me. “What kind of past?” I ask.

“Just a lot of chatter,” he says. “Nothing verified yet. But he was definitely involved with the reporter who broke the story on The Program—the one who got it shut down.”

“He was friends with Sloane Barstow and James Murphy,” I say. “So I guess that makes sense.”

“Like I said,” Pop continues, “it’s just chatter for now. But some of his history is hidden in paperwork—purposeful, I’d wager. I can’t even find his original admittance paperwork for The Program. There’s a lot more to his story.”

“Tell me about it,” I mutter. “Well,” I continue. “I need to talk to him. Immediately.”

“I’ll keep looking,” Pop says with a sigh. “We’ll find him.”

“Honey,” my gram says in a worried voice. “Are you sure talking to him is the best idea? For now, it might be advantageous to keep clear of him. At least until we know we can trust him.”

“I knew him,” I say, watching the road. “I guess . . . I guess I was friends with him in The Program—that part’s not clear yet. But he was right about Dr. Warren,” I point out. My grandparents go quiet, and I hate that I have to bring up something they lied about. “He told me she was from The Program, and he told me to stop seeing her.”

“Yes,” Pop says. “He was right about that. We made a mistake,” he adds. “Dr. Warren seemed sincere, but we shouldn’t have confided in her. We put you in danger.”

“Yeah, well,” I say. “You thought it was just therapy. None of us knew The Program was still operating.”

“I told her never to call the house again,” my grandmother announces defiantly. I furrow my brow, surprised.

“When?” I ask.

“Dr. Warren called here after you left today. Wanted to ‘chat’ about your last visit. Asked if she could talk to you, but I told her you were at school.”

Shit. Dr. Warren looked for me at home first. She tried to make my grandparents accomplices in my removal. Again.

“She asked if I’d bring you in for therapy,” Gram continues, and I can just about imagine the way her face is stern right now. Her little cheeks bright red with confrontation as she sweeps crumbs from the kitchen table into her open palm.

“And I told her she wasn’t welcome in our lives anymore,” Gram continues. “And that she could take her concerns and shove them up—” She stops, and I hear my grandfather laugh softly.

“Well,” my grandmother says, slightly embarrassed. “I just told her what she could do with her lies,” she finishes.

The idea of my grandmother telling someone to shove their lies up their ass is one for the scrapbook.

“Good for you, Gram,” I say. “We won’t let anyone else manipulate us. Now, Pop,” I say, glancing in my side mirror, feeling paranoid that I might be followed. “How long before you can track Realm down?”

He hums out like he’s thinking, and there’s another swish of papers. “I can try and trace some of the calls that went out of the Adjustment office, but I imagine Marie already tried that.”

Melody suggested Realm hadn’t shown because something had gone wrong. I’m starting to worry she might be right. If we’d really been friends, wouldn’t he have warned me? Stopped Derek from assaulting me? I shiver and push away the images.

“And speaking of Marie,” Pop adds, “you might want to clue her in that Dr. Warren is looking for you. Now—”

I swallow hard. “Yeah,” I say. “About that . . .” I pull onto a side street and park the Jeep. I take a breath and tell my grandparents what happened at school. I thought I was handling it, but the moment I describe Derek’s hands on me, the feeling of helplessness in a place where I was supposed to be safe, I break down crying. I was so scared. I was so fucking scared of him.

“We need to call the police,” my grandmother yells, frantic. “We—”

“We can’t,” I say. I wipe my cheeks and glance around the neighborhood, making sure no one is watching me now. “Melody—Jana, that’s her real name—she took him somewhere to keep him quiet. She said I’ll have a few days before they send more handlers after me.”

“That is ridiculous,” Gram says, and there’s a smack like she hit her hand on the table. “The police can’t ignore this. I don’t care who they’re involved with.”