The Child Thief 4: Little Lies Read online

  “To go to Alexy’s,” Jace said, breaking in. “And if you knew we’d been at your house, surely you could have guessed where we’d go next.” His voice held a world of suspicion and blame, and I nodded in agreement.

  Zion nodded as well, but it was Alexy who answered. “We tried,” she said, her voice a groan. “You’re right. It made sense you’d go to my apartment next, especially if you’d been to Zion’s. And we sent a group after you. Hell, I led the group myself! But we got caught up in some sort of crowd and couldn’t get through. The moment we realized they were checking IDs, we got out of there. At that point you still had the tracer on your phone, so we thought we’d be able to track you through the city and pick you up somewhere else. But then…”

  “Then we almost got caught ourselves and ended up on scooters and getting out of there as quickly as possible,” I carried on, remembering the wild dash from Jace’s apartment. “Not long after that we were at my house, but we weren’t there long before we were getting chased by the Authority again. And your phone was destroyed.” I turned to Jace, realizing how close we’d come to being rescued; we’d probably only missed it by minutes.

  Minutes. That was all it had taken to put us out in the wilderness, living with wolves and praying we would find a way through the traps the Authority was setting up for us. All while our friends were safe, or at least off the streets, having been rescued by Little John.

  “Why exactly did you drop us off in that meadow in the first place?” Ant asked. “Obviously you’d been planning to bring us in, and you started searching for us almost immediately. So why let us go at all?”

  The airship took an abrupt turn to the left. Alexy yelped and jumped up, then turned and dashed toward the cockpit.

  I watched, suddenly terrified the Authority had found us. What if the ship was turning in response to a missile they’d shot?

  Just as panic was starting to crush me, Alexy returned, her short bangs now spiked up around her head from her having run her hands through them.

  “Fine,” she muttered. “It’s all fine. Just the idiot I left in the co-pilot’s seat deciding we needed to steer as dramatically as possible around a piece of cloud.”

  The look on her face made me put upsetting Alexy on my list of things to never do.

  “So?” Ant said, drawing us back to the questions at hand. “Leaving us in the meadow?”

  There was a long silence, during which Alexy and Zion shared a long, tense look. It seemed we weren’t going to get the truth here, either.

  Oh, for goodness’ sake.

  It was Alexy who finally turned to us, her delicate features screwed up in frustration. “Look,” she said, “Zion’s right. There’s an awful lot we can’t tell you, and an awful lot I would tell you, except Zion would try to stop me. He’d fail, but he’d try.”

  Zion swung a soft punch at her side, although I swore I saw his mouth twitch into a ghost of a smile.

  Alexy dodged it easily. “The real problem is we don’t know the answers to some of the things you’re going to ask. So, I’m afraid you’re just going to have to sit tight for a bit until we get you to the person who can tell you.”

  “That’s a whole lot of unhelpful, Alexy,” Ant said. “I never took you as a girl who would beat around the bush.”

  She shot him a narrow-eyed glare, but then broke into a charming grin. “Well, if it’s information you’re in search of, Ant, here’s some for you to chew on. The truth, and this is the whole truth, is that Little John is short on people. They’ve been short on people for years. And they’ve been running some campaigns to alleviate that situation. You’re the newest recruits, and you’re here just in time. The problem is, there’s not going to be a lot of time to train you, because we’re in the middle of something big. In fact, you’re coming into the organization just when things are getting interesting. So, I suggest you all close your eyes and get some rest while we get to Edgewood, because once we get there, you’re going to be running on high twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.”

  She gave him another grin, then jumped out of her seat, followed closely, and a lot less gracefully, by Zion. The two of them disappeared into the cockpit, and we were suddenly alone in the passenger area.

  I exchanged a long look with Jace, biting my lip and letting my mind slow as it tried to hash through the info dump we’d just been given.

  Recruits? Training? Those were familiar words. And if what I was thinking was correct, it meant we’d landed in something a lot bigger than we’d realized.

  4

  During the rest of the trip to the mysterious Edgewood, I could feel the swell of nervous energy in my team. Ant was back and forth between Jackie’s stretcher and various different seats so many times I was certain he must have burnt off what little food we’d managed to eat that morning, which was feeling like a very long time ago. We’d had nothing since, and my stomach was starting to protest in a manner strongly reminiscent of an angry grizzly bear. And I wasn’t the one running across the plane every thirty seconds to check on my girlfriend.

  No, I was the one now stuck in a seat between Jace and Henry, trying to figure out how to condense nearly three years of haphazard events into a neat timeline. But most importantly, how to explain how and why we found ourselves in this particular situation. He was firing off so many questions that I was beginning to understand Zion’s frustration with me. His brown eyes wide with just a hint of hysteria, he’d finally paused and was now anxiously awaiting some sort of response.

  Still, I was hesitant to give him much information. We didn’t really know who he was, or who he might be working for. It was a thought that made my love-blind seventeen-year-old self wince, but it was a valid concern. He’d shown up at the right time to save us, and I knew him from my life before, but what did either of those things ultimately prove? So much had changed about me and my life since we last saw one another; it was likely the same for him.

  What did I really know about Henry now?

  “He could be a plant,” Jace said, his mouth against my ear, the back of his hand barely brushing the back of mine.

  I took a moment to revel in the chills his breath sent across the shell of my ear, and the feel of his fingers on mine. The rush of fire flew up my arm and down through my body, lighting smaller fires on its way, in my heart, my lungs, my belly… and lower.

  I allowed myself a moment—just a moment—to give my inner self a small grin, my eyes closed as I savored the feeling.

  Then, I opened them and got back to business. Jace might be making me feel things that encouraged me to roll up into a tiny ball and do nothing but dream of him, but now was not the time. I wasn’t sure he knew what he did to me when he touched me like that, but if he did know, he’d probably stop immediately. Tell me how important it was to keep our eyes on the prize, here, and our minds on our business.

  “I can’t imagine why they would do that, though,” I said, turning my face toward Jace and lowering my voice so Henry would have to work hard to hear me. He’d likely be expecting us to talk about him, but that didn’t mean I wanted him hearing what we were saying. “How would they know to put someone at that specific truck stop at that specific time?”

  “He could have been following us,” Jace answered. “They could have turned him a long time ago, and only just set him loose to find you. They’re eager to catch you now, and they know who you are, but who knows how long they’ve been keeping tabs on you, on any of us? They knew we were in the area. They knew we were looking for a way out. I wouldn’t put it past them to have found someone they assumed you’d care about, and put him to their own uses, in a place where they thought you might find him.”

  I didn’t miss the cracked voice on the word “care,” and I glanced up at him, wondering.

  He gave me a bashful look in return. “I just don’t want to see him hurt you. I don’t trust him, Robin.”

  My inner self gave a much larger grin at that, and the warmth rushed through my body again.
It wasn’t exactly a full confession of love, but it was something.

  I really needed to focus. This was ridiculous.

  Jace was talking about a plan that would have taken a lot of time to put together, and one the Authority would have had to come up with months ago. The chances of it being true were… minimal. Almost unbelievable. It made me think Jace was speaking out of jealousy more than anything else.

  Still, there was a chance—a small chance—Henry was an Authority plant. I didn’t know how they would have managed it or why, but his sudden appearance felt a little too convenient. My gut told me I could trust him, but was that just an old, stale allegiance? Something I should have outgrown?

  After all, he’d left me before. Just up and walked out of my life. Was that really someone I wanted to trust again?

  I turned to the person in question, finding his face full of expectations.

  “Willing to fill me in now that you’ve conferred with your cohort?” he asked.

  “Look,” I said, still not sure what I wanted to say. “There’s a lot of stuff I can’t tell you, so I’ll give you the version that is… safe.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “You sound an awful lot like those two characters flying the ship. I don’t want half-truths, Robin. Surely you can trust me enough to tell me the whole story.”

  “Can I trust you, though, Henry?” I asked, the words falling out before I could stop them. “Three years is a long time, and from my experience, loyalty was not your strongest suit.”

  He looked as if he was going to say something in response, color flooding his face, but then he stopped. He broke eye contact, looking away as if to check whether anyone was listening to our conversation, but I saw the flash of shame in his eyes.

  I pressed my lips together. “If it was just me, I might, but there are a lot of people at risk, people I care about, and I… we… well…”

  “Can’t decide whether I’m a good guy or not,” he guessed, giving me a sideways glance up through his lashes.

  I’d forgotten just how dark and thick they were, and I remembered, in an uncomfortable flash, how he used to flutter them against my bare skin, making me laugh and squirm away.

  Jace snorted on my other side, pulling me back. Okay, so maybe Henry was saying that to specifically tug on my heartstrings; I knew Jace was thinking it.

  The thing was, Henry was right. We didn’t know whether he was a good guy or not.

  “Honestly, yeah,” I said with a shrug. “You show up at exactly the right moment, with exactly the thing we need, and then help us escape the Authority. Then you help Jace blow up your truck to save us and get on our airship with the statement that we’re not leaving you behind.” I gestured to the group. “We’ve been sort of short on allies of late, so to have one show up like that… what are we supposed to think?”

  He gave me a sly grin and cocked his head. “I don’t know, you could think how much of a hero I am, flying in to rescue you when you needed it most and had no one else on your side.”

  I’d forgotten about the sass. I was attempting to formulate a civil response when a large, heavily furred arm reached across me from the other side and Jace grabbed Henry’s forearm.

  “She wasn’t in need of a hero,” Jace said bluntly. “We were, however, in need of a friend, and you showed up at exactly the right time. I think I speak for all of us when I say we’re willing to give you a chance. As you heard Alexy say, we need as many friends as we can get. But we’ve been through a hell of a lot the last couple weeks. Our friends have been arrested. We’ve caught the eye of the Authority. We’ve been labeled terrorists for attempting to right the wrongs in this country. We’re on the run from the government, and we’ll pay with our lives if they catch us. So, you can understand our… concern.”

  The sly, flirty expression disappeared from Henry’s face at Jace’s words, and he glanced down at the hand engulfing his arm, pressed his lips together, and then looked back up at Jace’s face.

  “Fair,” he said quietly. “And”—his eyes flicked back down to Jace’s hand, and up again—“noted. You’ll find I’m a loyal friend, Jace, despite the mistakes I made in the past. Mistakes I deeply regret, Robin.” He looked at me again, serious. “I’ve grown up a lot since you saw me last. Whatever this is, whatever we’re walking into, I’m in. Count on it.”

  I kept my mouth shut, staring from one to the other of them, suddenly aware of how ridiculous this was.

  But like Jace said, we needed all the friends we could get. And evidently Little John did, too. I just wondered what on earth Nathan would say when he realized we’d picked up a stray.

  When Alexy next appeared at the dividing line between the cockpit and the passenger area of the ship, she was practically vibrating with excitement. The fact that her hair was still sticking up in all directions made it even more amusing.

  “You look like you stuck your finger into a light socket,” Ant observed from his position next to Jackie’s stretcher. “I hope it means you have good news for us. Real news. Not the non-answers you guys seem to specialize in.”

  Alexy blew a kiss in his direction in response and grinned at him. I chuckled at the deep blush that spread across his face, but turned quickly back to Alexy, full of questions.

  “Ant’s right,” I said. “A little warning about what we’re walking into would be terrific, Alexy. Being kept in the dark is getting kind of old.”

  I didn’t bother trying to hide the sarcasm, and her expression told me she’d heard it loud and clear. Her eyes shifted back and forth across the passenger area for a moment, and then she was sliding quickly toward me.

  “Everyone to me,” she said.

  Her voice was low and intense, and carried across the entire area. She dropped to a kneeling position in front of me, and in no time our entire crew was at her side. I leaned forward in my seat, flanked by Jace and Henry, and got ready to hear some secrets.

  I wasn’t disappointed.

  “I can’t tell you much, and Zion would likely skin me alive if he knew I was even telling you this much,” she said in that same tone, so unlike anything I’d heard from her before. “Luckily, Zion’s not the one in charge here, as much as that may pain him. I know you guys are going to be hearing this sooner or later, so I don’t think Nathan will be too upset about me giving you some hints—and I know Corona would encourage it.”

  “Corona?” I had forgotten our would-be rescuer and provider of motorcycles who had disappeared when she was supposed to rescue us. “Is she still alive? Is she okay? What happened to her back at Samsfield? She was supposed to get us out and—”

  Alexy put up an imperious hand, and my questions skidded to a halt.

  “Robin, we don’t have a ton of time, so stop interrupting me.”

  I shut my mouth and shrank back a little bit, feeling like a ten-year-old who’d just been reprimanded by her older sister. It made me wonder abruptly how old Alexy was, and how long she’d been involved in this whole thing.

  “What do you mean, Corona would encourage it?” Jace asked, ignoring the instruction about not asking questions. “I thought Nathan was the one in charge. Does her opinion matter that much to him?”

  Now Alexy’s face went through a complete transformation, and she gave him one of her incredibly charming grins with a side of what looked like pride, and possibly gloating.

  “The person in charge isn’t always who it appears to be. Now, if we’re done with the questions, here are some facts for you. Fact one.” She held up a single pointer finger. “Little John has been fighting various branches of the government, and the system as a whole, for years. Though I presume you guys have already figured that out from the timeline you found. Two.” Another finger rose to join the first. “Nathan is the visible head of LJ, but Corona is his equal in every way. Don’t disrespect her.” A third finger. “Three. The government is getting close. They’ve been hunting us since LJ’s inception, but something happened recently that made them up the ante. No, I don’t have m
ore information than that, but it’s got Nathan and his… allies, I guess you could call them, incredibly worried. Our timeline has been stepped up considerably. Four.” She spread the four fingers wide. “We’ve got plans. But they require a lot of people, and we don’t have the resources. Hence the recruiting missions. Hence Operation Hood, and OH+, and…” She bit her lip as if she’d come to the end of the information she was willing to give us. “Well, we’ll say the recruiting missions, and leave it at that. You were all handpicked. That’s what OH+ was.”

  “So, you’re saying Operation Hood was the first step. A recruitment pool and nothing more?” Nelson asked, her tone harsh.

  It seemed Nathan had been grooming us for a lot longer than I had realized.

  “Exactly,” Alexy answered seriously. Then she cocked her head. “I know you’re going to say that’s insulting, Robin, because I can see it written all over your face. And I know you’re going to say that Nathan could have just told you, Jace, because it’s written all over your face. But you have to understand, what we’re doing here is important. We needed to know you had what it takes. We needed to know you were willing to go to the ends of the earth if you found something worth fighting for.”

  “You guys threw us into a gladiators’ arena,” I said slowly, speaking my conclusions as I came to them, “to see whether we had what it took to move up. That’s…”

  “Incredibly manipulative,” Alexy said, nodding. “I totally agree. And I’d be angry as hell if I were you. But it was all for a good reason, I promise, and if you guys just give us the time to explain—”

  “What’s going on in here?”

  We all jumped like we’d been caught doing something wrong—which we kind of had.