Vengeful (Villains #2)(47)

Every pre-med student did dissections. Eli had done a dozen his freshman year, peeled and pinned the skin of small animals out of the way to examine the organs beneath. The photos in the black folder reminded him of that. The only difference, of course, was that Eli had been alive.

The pain itself was gone, but the memory of it etched along his nerves, echoed through his bones.

Eli wanted to sweep the file from the table, tear it to shreds, but he knew he was being watched—he’d noted the cameras set into the ceiling, imagined Stell standing in some control room, a smug expression on his face. So Eli stayed seated, and turned through every page of the gruesome, graphic record, studying every photograph, every diagram, every scrawled note, every aspect of torture laid out in sterile detail, memorizing the black folder so that he would never have to look at it again.

You’re not blessed, or divine, or burdened. You’re a science experiment.

Maybe Victor was right.

Maybe Eli was just as broken, just as damned, as every other EO. It was true, he hadn’t felt that presence the night he killed Victor. Hadn’t felt anything like peace.

But that didn’t absolve him of his task.

He still had a purpose. An obligation. To save others, even if he couldn’t save himself.





XVI





TWENTY YEARS AGO


THE FIFTH HOME


ELI ran his fingers over the cover of the book.

It was massive, and heavy, and every single page detailed the marvels and miracles of the human body.

“I thought we should get you tickets to a game,” said Patrick, “but Lisa insisted—”

“It’s perfect,” said Eli.

“See?” said Lisa, shouldering Patrick. “He wants to be a doctor. You’ve got to start young.”

“From ministry to medicine,” mused Patrick. “John must be rolling in his grave.”

Eli laughed, an easy sound, practiced to perfection. The truth was, he didn’t see the two avenues as separate. Eli had seen God the day he arrived, in the drawings on his wall; saw Him again now in the pages of this book, in the perfect fit of bones, the vast intricacies of the nervous system, the brain—the spark, like faith, that turned a body into a man.

Patrick shook his head. “What fifteen-year-old boy would rather have a book—”

“Would you rather I asked for a car?” asked Eli, flashing a crooked smile.

Patrick clapped him on the shoulder. These days, Eli didn’t flinch.

His attention fell back to the anatomy textbook. Perhaps his interest wasn’t strictly normal, but he could afford this small divergence.

At fifteen, the personality he’d crafted was nearly perfect. The day after he arrived, Patrick and Lisa had enrolled him in school, and Eli had realized the hard way that a six-month crash course in normalcy was a pale foundation of what he’d need to survive. But it was a big school, and Eli was a quick study, and soon charming, focused, clever had not only been cemented, they’d been joined by handsome, friendly, athletic. He ran track and field. He aced his classes. He had a winning smile and an easy laugh, and nobody knew about the scars on his back or the shadows in his past. Nobody knew that it was all an act, that none of it came naturally.

*

LISA’S laughter rang through the house like bells.

Eli could hear it over the classical music in his earbuds as he did his chemistry homework. A few moments later, Patrick knocked on the doorframe, and Eli hit Pause.

“You guys off?”

“Yeah,” said Patrick. “Show starts at seven, so we shouldn’t be back late. Don’t work too hard.”

“Says the professor to the student.”

“Hey, studies show that variation is good for retention.”

“Come on!” called Lisa.

“I put money on the counter,” said Patrick. “At least order a pizza. Steal a beer from the fridge.”

“Will do,” said Eli absently, already hitting Play.

Patrick said something else, but Eli didn’t catch the words over the concerto. At nine, he finished his homework and ate leftovers at the kitchen counter. At ten, he went for a jog. At eleven, he went to bed.

And fifteen minutes later, his cell phone rang, a number he didn’t recognize, a voice he didn’t know.

“Is this Eliot Cardale?” said a man.

A stillness formed in Eli’s chest. Not the kind he’d felt when he pushed his father down the stairs. No, this was colder, heavier. The weight of finding his mother floating in the tub. The exhaustion as he sank like a stone to the chapel floor.

“I’m afraid,” continued the man, “there’s been an accident.”

*

ELI wondered if this was shock. He sat on a flimsy plastic chair, a social worker at his side, the doctor straight ahead, an officer looming like a shadow. The cops had come to the house. Driven him to the hospital, even though there was nothing to see, or do. Dead on arrival. On impact, according to the doctor.

“I’m sorry, son,” said the cop.

God never gives us more than we can bear.

Eli laced his fingers, bowed his head.

It’s up to us to find the purpose in the pain.

“The driver didn’t survive,” continued the cop. “Toxicology’s still out but we think he was drunk.”