Perfect Lies
Page 9
"And they were?"
"Lerner. That's the one I told them. She also thought about James."
I frown. "Well, she knows him, obviously."
"It didn't feel like that kind of thinking about him. But I didn't mention that."
"You didn't?" She isn't totally loyal, then? Does she keep things from Keane?
"Of course I don't tell them everything," she says. The tears pooling in her eyes catch the light, glinting more than the studs in her eyebrow. "Is it our fault? That she's going to die?"
I shake my head. Then I shrug. "Her fault. She got caught."
"Because of us." Pixie looks like her heart is breaking, and I know what that feels like, how deep those fissures go, how much of your soul cracks off and disappears.
"No. Look at me. Look at me, Pixie. You wouldn't have caught her. I did. You have no blame in this. Understand?"
She shakes her head, so I grab her chin and force her face up, right next to mine. "This is not your fault. Say it."
She hiccups a sob, then nods. "This is not my fault."
"Good." I lean back against the bench, pull her so her head is nestled between my neck and my shoulder. She's so young. So young.
"I'm only two years younger than you. You can trust me, you know."
I laugh. I trust no one and no one trusts me. Not even James. I know he hides things from me, but I let him, because it's the only way to make things work.
"There was another name the woman thought. I didn't tell them."
"What?" I whisper, my stomach clenching with that roller-coaster anticipation of falling. Bad. This is bad.
"Annie."
No. No no no no. NO NO NO NO. ANNIE IS DEAD. ANNIE IS DEAD. ANNIE IS DEAD I KILLED HER I KILLED HER I KILLED HER SHE'S DEAD.
Pixie sits up and looks at me, trying to smile, but holding her head like it's in pain. "It's okay. I met her a couple months ago. She's okay, Fia. No one knows. She asked me to keep an eye out for you."
My thoughts are frozen with shock. Pixie met Annie. And she's never let it slip. "Because Annie is dead. No one knows because she is dead." I watch Pixie, every sense trained on her for her reaction.
She nods, slowly, solemnly. "Yes. I know. Annie is dead."
"And she stays dead." Or I'll kill you. I will, I will. You wouldn't be the first person I killed to protect her. Or even the second.
Her shoulders fall and she looks hurt. "You don't have to do that. I wouldn't. We're friends. Aren't we?" She stands and stumbles away from me.
I swear under my breath. How can I keep her quiet? She can't know about Annie. That isn't safe. I have to keep Annie safe.
Whatever it takes.
I chase after her, grabbing her arm, my beer bottle still clutched in my other hand. "Listen, Pixie, I'm sorry. You have to understand-"
"Run," she says.
"What?"
"Run! They're thinking your name! All of them! Too many of them!"
I look up, around the room, dark and filled with bodies, packed with them. And then I realize that the fear I felt, still feel, the warning, had nothing to do with Pixie. I have no weapons on me, and I lost my security tail on the way here as a matter of habit.
"He wants you unharmed," Pixie whispers, her lips against my ear. I have my arm around her waist as I steer her toward the main exit. Our best bet is a crowd. They've already seen us, so sneaking out the back would only work to their advantage. "Do you know someone named Rafael?"
I clench my jaw against the flood of memories. Rafael on a beach in Greece. Rafael's lips on mine in my first kiss. Rafael's hands all over me. Rafael's unknown score to settle with James. This is bad.
Then again, I still owe him for that kiss. I smash the bottom off my bottle to leave a jagged edge.
Time to meet an old friend.
Chapter Ten
ANNIE
Nine Weeks Before
I SLAM THE DOOR, SLUMPING IN THE PASSENGER SEAT while Cole loads the grocery bags.
When he gets in, he doesn't start the car. "What's wrong?"
"What do you think?" I fold my arms, scowling.
"Look, you did your best. No reason to feel sorry."
"Really? Then why is it that in the last week since I failed with Mae, I've done nothing except sit around the house? Adam's off to do fancy research, Sarah's in and out, Rafael's gone, you're not here most of the time. Everyone else is busy, and I'm lucky if I get to make a grocery run."
"What do you want to do?"
"Help!"
"Annie, no one else would have recognized that man as being from Keane. If anyone else had been sent to contact Mae, they would have been caught. Probably killed. If you hadn't been paying attention, you would have been snatched. And Fia would have been in trouble, too, for lying about killing you. It's not worth risking that."
"Fia would be fine," I mutter, putting my feet up on the dash. "She always figures it out."
"I don't blame you for what happened with Mae."
"Really? Because I blame me."
"She had a choice, and she made the wrong one. But you gave her options. No one did that for you."
"That's not true. Fia told me not to go to the school, and I didn't listen."
"Again, not your fault."
I rub my forehead, the beginnings of a headache pulsing behind my eyes. I haven't had so much as a hint of a vision since the one with Mae. Maybe my own brain has decided I'm worthless, too.
"I was thinking," he says. "If you wanted to learn some self-defense, I'd be happy to teach you."
"What good will that do?"
"More than you think. We'd play to your strengths."
"In case you haven't been paying attention, I'm a scrawny blind girl."
"Exactly. Let other people underestimate you, and then use that to your advantage."
"So basically you're saying my strength is that I have no strengths."
His staccato laugh rings through the car and I smile in spite of myself.
"Okay, fine," I say. "You can teach me some things. After tea. I need some tea like nobody's business."
He pulls to a stop. I get out of the car and try to decide what kind of tea day today is while he gets the bags.
"Looks like Rafael is here," Cole says, not sounding particularly enthused. I, on the other hand, have missed the sexy sounds of Rafael's voice. Nobody reads a menu like him. I can't help but feel a little giddy knowing I'll get to hang out with him. It's just mindless flirting-curse his not-right hands-but a little mindless flirting makes me feel real and normal in the most comforting way.
"I hope he brought Sarah!" I hurry up the stairs and throw open the door. "Hey," I call. "Who's back?"
I take a few steps, then the groceries drop to the floor with a shattering of glass jars as Cole grabs me and shoves me to the closed door. His back presses against me, blocking my whole body. "What the-"
That's when the unfamiliar but instantly recognizable sound of a gun being cocked fills the air. "Well now," says a voice I never expected to hear again. The phantom smell of mustard and the memory of a thousand times walking past him overcomes me. Hallway Darren. "You look good for being dead, Annie. Come on in."
Cole takes my arm, keeping me behind him as we walk forward slowly. Then Cole is roughly pulled away. I hear him pushed to the floor, a low grunt his only protest.
"Don't bother with this one." Hallway Darren shoves me onto the couch. "She's not any trouble without her sister. Finish tying him up and put him next to the other guy." He must be talking about Rafael.
"I got it," another man says.
"Anyone else in the house? I'll know if you're lying." A woman, speaking from across the room. I don't know if she's a Reader or a Feeler, but either way, we're screwed.
My heart races and I'm overcome with despair. This was all for nothing. If I go back, I am as good as dead. I hang my head, letting the fear wash over me, radiate out. I concentrate on feeling that, and that alone. I don't let myself think anything.
"There's no one else," Sarah says. She sounds like she's on the couch, too. Darren and the other man are directly in front of me. The woman is near the kitchen. Cole is . . .
"Don't move," the other man says, and I hear someone get pushed against the wall. Okay. Cole and Rafael must be near the sliding glass door to the patio.
I am worthless. I am less than worthless. I can't do anything.
"She's not lying," the woman says. "This is everyone. Want me to figure out who those two are?"
"Nah, only the girls matter." Darren sounds positively gleeful. "I can't believe Annie's alive. I'd better call this one in right now."
Without thinking, I lunge forward, head ducked. My shoulder slams into Darren's stomach and I throw my arms around his waist and push. We fall to the ground together; I sink my teeth into his bicep and scramble to find his hand.
The side of the gun connects with my head, and everything explodes in brilliant pain. Dazed, I grab for his gun, but he flips me off and onto my stomach, his knee digging into my back.
A loud pop, followed by another.
I brace myself for the pain, but it doesn't come. Instead the pressure on my back disappears and Darren falls onto my arm. I jerk it out from under him and scramble away.
"It's all right," Cole says, putting his tied-together hands on my shoulder. "They're down."
Rafael speaks for the first time. "Are you okay, Casey?"
The woman takes a shuddering breath. "Yeah. Thanks."
"What just happened?" Sarah asks. "Who are you?"
"I'm sorry," Casey says. "I tried to warn you we were coming, but I was never alone."
"Casey's been working with me for months," Rafael explains. "She's in deep at Keane."
I try to stand but am shaking too much, so I sit where I am.
Cole talks from the kitchen, where I hear a soft snicking sound that I assume is him, cutting his wrists free. "How did they find us?"
I am sitting in a room with two dead men. I hate this. I want to be anywhere else.
The woman, Casey, sits on the couch. "Keane's got a Seer trained on you, Rafael. You've got to be more careful."
Rafael sounds tired. "Okay. Does James know his father sent them after me?"
"I don't think so. This one was secret. That's why I couldn't contact you-they took my cell away and didn't even tell me where we were going until we were here."
"But no one knows Annie is alive, right?" Sarah asks.
"Besides her." I nod in Casey's general direction.
"Secret is safe with me. The Seer only saw Rafael-good thing you weren't together at the time. Well, I'm gonna have to request someone shoot me."
"What?" Sarah asks, her voice strangled.
"I can't lose their trust now. The story is, we were ambushed, Darren and Mark were fatally shot, and I got away after being shot in the arm." She takes a deep breath, whispering either a prayer or a curse to God.
I shake my head. "This is ridiculous. You don't have to get shot. You were waiting outside in the car while they cleared the house. You heard the shots, saw someone run out with a gun, and drove away. All we have to do is shoot a couple of holes in the car."
"Oh, I like that idea so much better," Casey says.
"On it." Cole walks out the front door.
"What about the bodies?" Sarah whispers, and I am so glad I can't see what she can. I crawl across the floor to the couch, then sit and put my arm around her shoulder. She leans into me. My head still hurts where Darren hit it with the gun.
"Lerner. That's the one I told them. She also thought about James."
I frown. "Well, she knows him, obviously."
"It didn't feel like that kind of thinking about him. But I didn't mention that."
"You didn't?" She isn't totally loyal, then? Does she keep things from Keane?
"Of course I don't tell them everything," she says. The tears pooling in her eyes catch the light, glinting more than the studs in her eyebrow. "Is it our fault? That she's going to die?"
I shake my head. Then I shrug. "Her fault. She got caught."
"Because of us." Pixie looks like her heart is breaking, and I know what that feels like, how deep those fissures go, how much of your soul cracks off and disappears.
"No. Look at me. Look at me, Pixie. You wouldn't have caught her. I did. You have no blame in this. Understand?"
She shakes her head, so I grab her chin and force her face up, right next to mine. "This is not your fault. Say it."
She hiccups a sob, then nods. "This is not my fault."
"Good." I lean back against the bench, pull her so her head is nestled between my neck and my shoulder. She's so young. So young.
"I'm only two years younger than you. You can trust me, you know."
I laugh. I trust no one and no one trusts me. Not even James. I know he hides things from me, but I let him, because it's the only way to make things work.
"There was another name the woman thought. I didn't tell them."
"What?" I whisper, my stomach clenching with that roller-coaster anticipation of falling. Bad. This is bad.
"Annie."
No. No no no no. NO NO NO NO. ANNIE IS DEAD. ANNIE IS DEAD. ANNIE IS DEAD I KILLED HER I KILLED HER I KILLED HER SHE'S DEAD.
Pixie sits up and looks at me, trying to smile, but holding her head like it's in pain. "It's okay. I met her a couple months ago. She's okay, Fia. No one knows. She asked me to keep an eye out for you."
My thoughts are frozen with shock. Pixie met Annie. And she's never let it slip. "Because Annie is dead. No one knows because she is dead." I watch Pixie, every sense trained on her for her reaction.
She nods, slowly, solemnly. "Yes. I know. Annie is dead."
"And she stays dead." Or I'll kill you. I will, I will. You wouldn't be the first person I killed to protect her. Or even the second.
Her shoulders fall and she looks hurt. "You don't have to do that. I wouldn't. We're friends. Aren't we?" She stands and stumbles away from me.
I swear under my breath. How can I keep her quiet? She can't know about Annie. That isn't safe. I have to keep Annie safe.
Whatever it takes.
I chase after her, grabbing her arm, my beer bottle still clutched in my other hand. "Listen, Pixie, I'm sorry. You have to understand-"
"Run," she says.
"What?"
"Run! They're thinking your name! All of them! Too many of them!"
I look up, around the room, dark and filled with bodies, packed with them. And then I realize that the fear I felt, still feel, the warning, had nothing to do with Pixie. I have no weapons on me, and I lost my security tail on the way here as a matter of habit.
"He wants you unharmed," Pixie whispers, her lips against my ear. I have my arm around her waist as I steer her toward the main exit. Our best bet is a crowd. They've already seen us, so sneaking out the back would only work to their advantage. "Do you know someone named Rafael?"
I clench my jaw against the flood of memories. Rafael on a beach in Greece. Rafael's lips on mine in my first kiss. Rafael's hands all over me. Rafael's unknown score to settle with James. This is bad.
Then again, I still owe him for that kiss. I smash the bottom off my bottle to leave a jagged edge.
Time to meet an old friend.
Chapter Ten
ANNIE
Nine Weeks Before
I SLAM THE DOOR, SLUMPING IN THE PASSENGER SEAT while Cole loads the grocery bags.
When he gets in, he doesn't start the car. "What's wrong?"
"What do you think?" I fold my arms, scowling.
"Look, you did your best. No reason to feel sorry."
"Really? Then why is it that in the last week since I failed with Mae, I've done nothing except sit around the house? Adam's off to do fancy research, Sarah's in and out, Rafael's gone, you're not here most of the time. Everyone else is busy, and I'm lucky if I get to make a grocery run."
"What do you want to do?"
"Help!"
"Annie, no one else would have recognized that man as being from Keane. If anyone else had been sent to contact Mae, they would have been caught. Probably killed. If you hadn't been paying attention, you would have been snatched. And Fia would have been in trouble, too, for lying about killing you. It's not worth risking that."
"Fia would be fine," I mutter, putting my feet up on the dash. "She always figures it out."
"I don't blame you for what happened with Mae."
"Really? Because I blame me."
"She had a choice, and she made the wrong one. But you gave her options. No one did that for you."
"That's not true. Fia told me not to go to the school, and I didn't listen."
"Again, not your fault."
I rub my forehead, the beginnings of a headache pulsing behind my eyes. I haven't had so much as a hint of a vision since the one with Mae. Maybe my own brain has decided I'm worthless, too.
"I was thinking," he says. "If you wanted to learn some self-defense, I'd be happy to teach you."
"What good will that do?"
"More than you think. We'd play to your strengths."
"In case you haven't been paying attention, I'm a scrawny blind girl."
"Exactly. Let other people underestimate you, and then use that to your advantage."
"So basically you're saying my strength is that I have no strengths."
His staccato laugh rings through the car and I smile in spite of myself.
"Okay, fine," I say. "You can teach me some things. After tea. I need some tea like nobody's business."
He pulls to a stop. I get out of the car and try to decide what kind of tea day today is while he gets the bags.
"Looks like Rafael is here," Cole says, not sounding particularly enthused. I, on the other hand, have missed the sexy sounds of Rafael's voice. Nobody reads a menu like him. I can't help but feel a little giddy knowing I'll get to hang out with him. It's just mindless flirting-curse his not-right hands-but a little mindless flirting makes me feel real and normal in the most comforting way.
"I hope he brought Sarah!" I hurry up the stairs and throw open the door. "Hey," I call. "Who's back?"
I take a few steps, then the groceries drop to the floor with a shattering of glass jars as Cole grabs me and shoves me to the closed door. His back presses against me, blocking my whole body. "What the-"
That's when the unfamiliar but instantly recognizable sound of a gun being cocked fills the air. "Well now," says a voice I never expected to hear again. The phantom smell of mustard and the memory of a thousand times walking past him overcomes me. Hallway Darren. "You look good for being dead, Annie. Come on in."
Cole takes my arm, keeping me behind him as we walk forward slowly. Then Cole is roughly pulled away. I hear him pushed to the floor, a low grunt his only protest.
"Don't bother with this one." Hallway Darren shoves me onto the couch. "She's not any trouble without her sister. Finish tying him up and put him next to the other guy." He must be talking about Rafael.
"I got it," another man says.
"Anyone else in the house? I'll know if you're lying." A woman, speaking from across the room. I don't know if she's a Reader or a Feeler, but either way, we're screwed.
My heart races and I'm overcome with despair. This was all for nothing. If I go back, I am as good as dead. I hang my head, letting the fear wash over me, radiate out. I concentrate on feeling that, and that alone. I don't let myself think anything.
"There's no one else," Sarah says. She sounds like she's on the couch, too. Darren and the other man are directly in front of me. The woman is near the kitchen. Cole is . . .
"Don't move," the other man says, and I hear someone get pushed against the wall. Okay. Cole and Rafael must be near the sliding glass door to the patio.
I am worthless. I am less than worthless. I can't do anything.
"She's not lying," the woman says. "This is everyone. Want me to figure out who those two are?"
"Nah, only the girls matter." Darren sounds positively gleeful. "I can't believe Annie's alive. I'd better call this one in right now."
Without thinking, I lunge forward, head ducked. My shoulder slams into Darren's stomach and I throw my arms around his waist and push. We fall to the ground together; I sink my teeth into his bicep and scramble to find his hand.
The side of the gun connects with my head, and everything explodes in brilliant pain. Dazed, I grab for his gun, but he flips me off and onto my stomach, his knee digging into my back.
A loud pop, followed by another.
I brace myself for the pain, but it doesn't come. Instead the pressure on my back disappears and Darren falls onto my arm. I jerk it out from under him and scramble away.
"It's all right," Cole says, putting his tied-together hands on my shoulder. "They're down."
Rafael speaks for the first time. "Are you okay, Casey?"
The woman takes a shuddering breath. "Yeah. Thanks."
"What just happened?" Sarah asks. "Who are you?"
"I'm sorry," Casey says. "I tried to warn you we were coming, but I was never alone."
"Casey's been working with me for months," Rafael explains. "She's in deep at Keane."
I try to stand but am shaking too much, so I sit where I am.
Cole talks from the kitchen, where I hear a soft snicking sound that I assume is him, cutting his wrists free. "How did they find us?"
I am sitting in a room with two dead men. I hate this. I want to be anywhere else.
The woman, Casey, sits on the couch. "Keane's got a Seer trained on you, Rafael. You've got to be more careful."
Rafael sounds tired. "Okay. Does James know his father sent them after me?"
"I don't think so. This one was secret. That's why I couldn't contact you-they took my cell away and didn't even tell me where we were going until we were here."
"But no one knows Annie is alive, right?" Sarah asks.
"Besides her." I nod in Casey's general direction.
"Secret is safe with me. The Seer only saw Rafael-good thing you weren't together at the time. Well, I'm gonna have to request someone shoot me."
"What?" Sarah asks, her voice strangled.
"I can't lose their trust now. The story is, we were ambushed, Darren and Mark were fatally shot, and I got away after being shot in the arm." She takes a deep breath, whispering either a prayer or a curse to God.
I shake my head. "This is ridiculous. You don't have to get shot. You were waiting outside in the car while they cleared the house. You heard the shots, saw someone run out with a gun, and drove away. All we have to do is shoot a couple of holes in the car."
"Oh, I like that idea so much better," Casey says.
"On it." Cole walks out the front door.
"What about the bodies?" Sarah whispers, and I am so glad I can't see what she can. I crawl across the floor to the couch, then sit and put my arm around her shoulder. She leans into me. My head still hurts where Darren hit it with the gun.
