Chapter 18
Almost exactly seven years ago, after I’d walked out on Chad and said goodbye to Teresa, I ran away with Ben to the wilderness.
He’d come to the Capitol of the Central Cities to observe.
Out in the wilderness where he was raised and where his family still lives, they’d regularly get scattered reports on the largest established government in the known world.
The story that the wilderness is filled with nothing but violent, uncivilized barbarians is false, made up to scare citizens into staying inside safe borders.
In reality, the people in the wilderness mostly live in secure, orderly communities, regularly moving in and out of their towns and the independent city-states on the border—Saint Louis being the closest—and so it’s not like they’re unaware of the larger world or completely isolated.
Rumors would always come thick and fast, but rumors can’t always be relied on.
The communities in the wilderness were all much smaller—locally governed and less developed—but they’ve been safe and stable for decades, life passing in slow, peaceful seasons.
But the more news trickled out from President Vincent’s actions in the Capitol, the more worried the leaders of the wilderness communities became.
From the beginning of history, rulers like Vincent remain hungry no matter how much land and power they gobble up.
There have already been some skirmishes between the Capitol and some of the border city-states, usually ending in tenuous truces, and there’s nothing to say Vincent won’t one day decide he wants to sweep out to the east and invade territory that’s been self-governing since the asteroid hit.
Ben, after working through his twenties in security and protection in his family’s community, got restless and volunteered to live and work in the Capitol for a year to get a better sense of life and sensibilities there in the hopes of understanding and predicting future actions.
I knew none of this when I first met him. I only knew him as the bodyguard Chad hired to keep me safe and also keep me in line. But when Ben decided it was time to go home, he told me the truth of his purpose in the Capitol and invited me to travel with him as a means of escaping my husband.
I wanted an escape desperately, and although I didn’t know him well, I trusted Ben a lot more than Chad. So I went with him, deeply relieved by the chance to get away from a life that had never done anything but chain me down.
On the night I said goodbye to Teresa, Ben had arranged a transport to get us past the border undetected. Huddled next to Ben in the dark, tight back of the transport, I asked him why he invited me to come with him.
“I’m not looking for another man,” I told him, hoping he wouldn’t be hurt or disappointed.
“I know that. That’s not why I asked.”
“Then why? I’m just a random, regular woman who made a bad choice in a husband.”
“That’d be reason enough for me to help you. No one should be trapped in a situation like that. But there’s nothin’ regular ’bout you. Been watchin’ you for months now. And, in some people, you just see it.”
“See what?”
“That… that spark.”
The word startled and unsettled me at the same time they washed me with pleasure. “What spark?”
“Don’t really know. Just somethin’ that says you’re not done yet.” Sitting in the dark, I couldn’t see his face. I had no idea what he was feeling beyond his laid-back, conversational tone.
I snorted softly, thinking about what I’d just told my sister about wanting to change things, make the world better the way our father always tried to do. “Done? I’m not sure I’ve even started yet.”
“You will.”
I don’t know why I’m thinking about that particular memory a few mornings after I fucked Ben in the storage room.
I woke up with it filling my head, and my mind keeps turning the scene over and over again as I eat breakfast and get reports on the night that just passed.
You will.
He sounded so confident. Not pushy or arrogant. Just certain. Like he knew me back then better than I knew myself, and he had no doubts about what I was capable of accomplishing.
Recalling it now, I realize he’s been doing the same thing for seven years. Standing behind me, gently pushing me forward, keeping me from falling, holding me upright when I might have otherwise collapsed.
Some have said it’s a miracle—that I’ve successfully acted so often and effectively against a government so oppressive, so all-pervasive. But it hasn’t been a miracle.
It’s been Ben.
Two hours after this confounding realization, I’m staring down at a sheet of paper on which is scrawled a note in slanted handwriting.
After the first two lines, I suck in a sharp breath and jerk my head up, catching Ben’s eyes.
“What is it?” he asks, getting impatient and leaning so he can read over my shoulder. After a few seconds, he breathes out, “Shit.”
“It can’t be real. It’s like before—just a ruse to catch us at a disadvantage. It can’t be the real Robin.”
The note says Robin and his people are interested in joining up with us.
That he wasn’t involved in the previous scheme, and he’s furious his name was used “in vain” that way.
He gives coordinates where he’d like to meet with me, but if we don’t trust him, he’s also giving me the location of his current camp.
That fact, if true, makes him entirely vulnerable, so maybe it’s reason to trust him. But it’s too convenient, too tempting, too similar to the ambush last week.
There’s no one in the Central Cities I’d rather partner up with than Robin and his crew, but that’s why it’s the obvious lure to dangle.
I’m holding the note loosely, and Ben takes it from my hand, turning it over although Robin’s showy signature is at the bottom of the front side.
Ben stiffens beside me so dramatically that I jerk my eyes down to the writing on the back of the note.
I know you won’t trust me, but you should. I have friends with a dog named Bill.
I freeze. The entire world freezes. The paper flutters slightly in Ben’s grip.
“He can’t… He can’t… No one knows Teresa is my sister.”
“He says he’s friends with Teresa and Mason. Maybe he is.” Ben’s voice is hoarse and soft.
“But… But Teresa never said anything. She would… she would have. Surely she would have mentioned it.”
“Maybe she doesn’t know he’s Robin. They could believe he’s just a guy and not know his real identity.”
“That’s true.” I suck in several long, intentional breaths until I’ve pulled myself together. “Fuck. Now I don’t know what to do.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I want to work with Robin if we can trust him.”
“Then we should see if this is real and go from there.”
“Right. Right.” I rub my face rather violently to get my brain to start functioning again.
“Okay. Let’s send out some scouts. We can see if they’re camped where he says they are and then check to make sure there are no guards anywhere around waiting to ambush us.
If it’s clear, we’ll go talk to him. We’ll be careful, but I think the chance to have him on our side will be worth a small degree of risk. ”
“Why don’t you send me?” Ben asks. “If it’s clear, I’ll talk to him. That way, if it’s a trap, they’ll get me and not you.”
“No fucking way.” I give him a cold look. “You’re not expendable. Besides, he’ll want to talk to me.”
“I know. But I don’t like taking this kind of risk right now. We’re only a couple of weeks out from taking the Arsenal.” He’s starting to feel bristly. Protective.
“But it’s going to be a hell of a lot easier to take the Arsenal if Robin is on our side. We’ll be careful. You can check things out as closely as you want before I make an appearance. But the talk itself has to be with me.”
It’s late that same afternoon when I walk beside a still bristly Ben, surrounded by six of my people, down a hill into Robin’s camp.
We scouted out the area for miles around, and there’s no sign of any hidden guards. If it’s an ambush, it’s either a very bad one or one so clever there’s no predicting it.
His group is bigger than I thought it would be.
There are several tents and a few dozen people who all stop what they’re doing at our approach.
They’re ready for action if it comes to that.
They look competent—hardened by the fight in the way my own people are—and every single one of them is holding a weapon.
But they don’t advance, and as instructed, none of my people make an aggressive move. It’s tense, but that’s to be expected.
My heart is racing as much with excitement as with nerves. If this works, it could change everything.
But I still don’t know if this is real or another trap.
A man comes out of the largest tent just then, ducking under the flap and straightening up to his full height. It’s considerable. He’s not as big as Ben, but his height is close. His build is leaner, and his chin-length hair is a dark gold that glints in the sun.
He’s dressed in standard work clothes—boots, a worn long-sleeved shirt, and brown trousers—but he has an air of something that immediately draws attention.
It’s not that he’s unnaturally handsome, although he’s definitely good to look at. It’s more of an innate confidence that rightly knows everyone else will fall in line.
I’ve never been inclined to fall in line. Not with anyone. So I’m intrigued but not particularly daunted as I draw to a stop and wait for him to approach.
It’s then—only then—that I realize I’ve seen this man before.
He’s the ragged driver who gave us a ride on the way to my mother’s village.
I suck in a sharp breath. “Ben—”
“I know,” Ben murmurs. “I recognize him too.”
“Fuck,” the man says, his face breaking out in a smile.
“They said you were gorgeous, but I figured they must be exaggerating.” He comes to stand directly in front of me, his blue eyes running up and down my body in an appreciative but not overtly sexual once-over. “If anything, they understated it.”
I shake my head. “This is how you greet me?”
He laughs, as warm and relaxed as if we were at a social gathering rather than a military parley. “I’m only a man after all. You’re not what anyone would expect.”
“And you’re exactly what I expected.” I should be annoyed or offended by his approach, but he can somehow make the teasing amusing rather than obnoxious. “Did you know who we were when you gave us a ride?”
“I suspected, but I wasn’t sure. I’m glad to see I was right.”
“I bet you are. Anyway, you wanted to talk, so I’m here. Let’s talk.”
Robin shakes his head. “Right down to business. If that’s what you want, that’s what you get.” He winks before he gestures toward the large tent he just emerged from. “I’m at your service.”
Ben stiffens again. I feel it rather than see it. And this time it’s paired with a soft, guttural sound. Almost like a growl.
Of course I’m focused on what’s important. The stakes here are life and death, and I’m the last person in the world not to take that seriously.
But still… that small growl of a sound is (just a little bit) thrilling.