The Treatment (The Program #2)(16)

“I don’t know,” I say. Panic begins to bubble up as James moves off me to get a better look at the paper. I start to unfold it, seeing through the sheet that there’s something written in ink—it’s a note. In Lacey’s perfect print, there is a single word that means nothing to me, and yet I hitch in a ragged breath.

Miller

“Sloane?” James’s voice is a million miles away as I drop the paper, my chest heavy with a grief I can’t understand. James grabs the note from my lap and reads it. He tosses it aside before taking my shoulders. “Who’s this from?” he asks.

My panicked eyes find his as I begin to shake all over.

“Lacey.” In my head I can think only Miller. My Miller. But I don’t know what it means.

“Goddamn it,” James says, jumping to grab his pants from the floor and pulling them on. He tosses his shirt in my direc-62

tion and then he’s out the door, running barefoot down the hallway. I slip on his shirt and chase after him.

Why would Lacey write that note? Why would she put it on my bed? Oh, God. I start running faster. Where’s Lacey?

I catch up with James just as he stops in front of Lacey’s door, not knocking before bursting though. The room is dark, and as I look in, he’s in the middle, swiping his hand through the air looking for the chain for the light.

“What’s happening?”

I turn and see Cas stalking toward us, pulling out his switchblade. His face is swollen with sleep, his clothes wrinkled, but he’s as alert as if he’d been waiting for handlers all night. Just then light floods the room, and my heart leaps with hope. The room is stark and the bed is empty. Lacey is gone.

Cas pushes past me into the room, pulling back the covers as if Lacey is somehow hiding. He spins to face James. “Where is she?” he demands accusingly.

James looks devastated, shocked. “I don’t know.” Cas yanks open the dresser drawers, cursing when he finds them empty. I’m still in the doorway and any trace of the drink at the Suicide Club is gone, replaced instead with disbelief and panic. Cas pulls his phone out of his pocket and begins to pace as he dials. James still stands under the swinging, naked bulb, his head lowered, his chest heaving.

“James?” I say weakly. He looks over, and I’m struck with an image so familiar, I’m not sure how to process it. James’s eyes are red, his skin blotchy, like he’s about to cry. I think Lacey is gone, and then mingling with that is the thought that “Miller” is gone too. James’s expression fits the thought somehow, like he’s replaying a memory from my head.

James coughs out the start of a cry but then crosses the room and gathers me into a hug. His lips press a hard kiss against my forehead, his muscles rigid as I grip his arm.

“Dallas,” Cas says into the phone. “You need to come back.” James and I both look at Cas as he continues to pace.

“I don’t give a shit,” he snaps into the receiver. “Lacey’s gone.

We’re compromised.” James and I exchange a glance, fear spik-ing within me. “I’m on my way,” Cas tells Dallas, and then hangs up.

“What’s going on?” James asks.

“Get your things,” Cas says, storming past us. “We’re leaving.” He pauses in the doorway and turns to look back at me. “I’m sorry about your friend,” he says. “I really am. But a returner is always a threat, and Lacey is gone. It’ll be only a matter of time before The Program comes for the rest of us.”

“Do you think they have Lacey?” I ask, frantic.

“Yes,” Cas says in a quiet voice. “I think Lacey is with The Program. Now get your things and meet me at the van.” Cas leaves, and I turn to James, waiting for him to tell me Cas is wrong. But James just stares after him. “I tried,” he whispers, mostly to himself. Then he lowers his eyes to meet mine.

“I tried to help Lacey, but it wasn’t enough.”

“We have to get her back,” I say, nodding to get James to understand. “We have to find her and get her back.”

James can only mumble his agreement, but he’s not here with me. His eyes look unfocused and he starts out of the room.

I follow, the floor cold on my feet, while I search my mind for other places Lacey could be. Maybe she decided to go to the Suicide Club after all. Maybe . . . anything. This can’t be the end.

Guilt attacks my conscious when I think about how Lacey acted just before we left for the Suicide Club. I should have done more, but I thought I’d see her tomorrow. I thought there was more time. I was so stupid. She recalled a memory she wasn’t supposed to—and I just left her.

James is already in the room when I walk in, stuffing clothes into the duffel bag. I grab a pair of jeans and pull them on before crossing to the dresser. I take out the pill, and at that moment James looks over. “If we find Lacey,” I say, my body trembling, “we could give her the pill. Maybe it could help.

Maybe it could cure here.”

James lowers his eyes. “It was her memories that hurt her, Sloane. I’m not sure giving her more of them is a good idea.” I look down at the pill, ready to debate the point, but Cas is yelling from the other room for us to hurry. I shove the pill into my pocket and finish packing up our stuff. Before I worry about what to do with the pill, we have to find Lacey.