Chapter 4 #2
“Wait,” says Edgar, and I freeze. Somewhere behind me, I can hear voices. My heartbeat is a painful throb behind my ribs. “She’s letting other people inside. Several others. One is looking your way.”
I remain utterly still. Eames follows my lead, his eyes darting between me and the doors.
“Now,” says Edgar. “They’re distracted by the dead guard. Get to the stairs.”
I keep expecting to hear the bark of a gun. To feel a jolt of impact followed by pain and panic and the waiting cold.
I know what it feels like to die.
I don’t want to feel it again.
My breath is too dry in my throat and I swallow, hoping with every step that Goldie Glocks will not look back. Don’t look, just don’t look—
People react differently to mortal danger.
Some people freeze; others panic; some get violent. But for me, the world gets a little quiet. A little muffled. As if I’m underwater—
I reach the stairs.
The moment there is a wall between myself and Goldie Glocks, I breathe a little easier. Eames stops beside me, his back to the stairwell.
I flick my fingers, switching my visor’s view to Edgar’s perspective again. He has landed on one of the succulents, his bumblebee gaze fixed on the intruders.
I can see Goldie Glocks and her crew clearly for the first time.
Her blond hair is held at the nape of her neck in a simple braid. She has the striking cold beauty of an ice sculpture.
The others are dressed like shadows—grays and blacks and browns that will blend into darkness.
One pale, reedy man claps Goldie Glocks on the shoulder as he ambles by.
A Black woman has ringware on each hand and a slender visor over one eye.
Her fingers are a blur as she types commands that only she can see.
A second man—white, built like a workhorse with a golfer’s tan—gives the dead security guard a professional glance.
There’s a third woman I can only see from the back.
She has startlingly dyed red-orange hair and carries a golf bag—although I seriously doubt she came here to golf.
As I watch, the workhorse man pulls a backpack from his shoulders and unloads several chains and heavy padlocks.
He goes to the front doors and begins securing them.
The orange-haired woman takes more chains and heads toward the back of the building, presumably to do the same on the other entrances.
They’re locking down the building.
Which means whatever this is—a robbery, a kidnapping, something else entirely—it isn’t over. Not even close.
“Orders?” Edgar’s voice sounds in my ear.
“Follow them,” I whisper. “Then report back.”
“Acknowledged,” said Edgar. “Be safe.”
My throat tightens with unexpected emotion. It isn’t like Edgar to show concern.
Then he adds, “If you’re killed, I could be recycled by accident.”
Now that sounds more like Edgar.
Eames and his sister stare at me with increasing alarm, and I can’t blame them.
They just witnessed a murder and now they’re hiding in a stairwell with a pink-haired girl who talks to herself.
“Giving commands to a drone,” I whisper.
That’s as good an explanation as any. “What floor is your apartment on?”
I can see Eames doing some kind of mental math, probably deciding whether or not to trust me. “The eleventh.”
Eleven floors—and it’s not like they can use the elevator in the lobby. I can’t leave them like this, not with a kid dripping pool water and Eames looking as though he would take on the world for her.
My heart’s mostly machine, but even I’m not that cold.
“Mine’s on the third,” I say. “We should go there.”
Emotions flit across his face in quick succession. He clearly doesn’t like the suggestion, but his thoughts follow the same line as my own. We need to get to safety and then we can call for help.
He nods.
My heart throbs as we jog up the stairs. Every step is too slow with my adrenaline-sharp senses screaming at me to go faster, to just sprint and leave my charges behind. Instead, I try to focus on the rhythm of my breathing.
At 310, I hold up the back of my hand. The sensor wakes and scans my tattoo.
I duck inside, waiting for Eames and the kid to pass me before I shove the door shut.
I lean against the door, my breath coming in ragged little bursts.
Eames sinks to his knees. He squats in front of the girl, his hands on her shoulders. “Are you okay, P?”
“I’m fine,” she says, a stubborn edge to her voice. Her blond hair is darkened by the pool water, and she has icy blue eyes. She shoots a look at me. “Are we safe here?”
“As safe as anywhere right now,” I say. I walk to the small dining room table and pick up a chair to wedge against the door.
I’m grateful that my visor shrouds my gaze. It is far easier to lie with your mouth than your eyes. And I fear what mine might say.
One person is dead. There are five criminals in the building. My grandmother—who can’t know I’m here—is in the next apartment over. And now I’m responsible for two civilians.
This isn’t the worst situation I’ve ever been in, but it’s definitely in the top five.
I need to call Prefect. Preferably somewhere that the civilians can’t eavesdrop. But before I can slip into the bedroom, Eames takes a step toward me.
His expression is one of gratitude and wariness.
“Who are you?” he asks. He doesn’t trust me. Which makes him smart—I could be anyone. That’s the whole point. As a wraith, I can be anyone.
“My name is Augusta Pine.” Lie. “I don’t know what’s going on.” Truth. “Who are you?” I have to pretend not to know; civilian visors can’t scan electron-ink tattoos.
Eames’s dark eyes are ablaze with adrenaline, but his voice is steady and quiet when he answers. “Eames Ahlberg. This is my sister, Piper. We live with my aunt on the eleventh floor.”
I nod. “Okay. It’s probably safer for you to stay here. We can stay hidden and call for help. I don’t think they saw us—they don’t know anyone witnessed the murder.”
As I speak, I roll my fingers, activating my ringware.
In the corner of my visor, I swipe for my smart-dye app.
My pink hair is far too visible, far too memorable.
I should program it to a darker color, one that will blend in with the shadows.
I choose a burnt umber, then hit the command to switch the color.
The smart-dye begins to shift at the roots, dark brown swallowing up the pink.
The new color reaches the tips of my ears when a shrill noise screeches through the air.
We all flinch. It’s an alarm—a fire alarm. It screams through the building, then goes abruptly silent.
The smart-dye freezes in place. I look at myself in the glass door—the tips of my hair are still bright pink. That isn’t supposed to happen. The dye is connected to the app via the Wi-Fi. Nothing should disrupt the connection. Unless—
The apartment’s TV flickers on, but there’s only a dead blue screen. Then, a calm automated voice emanates through the apartment’s virtual assistant.
“ALERT,” the VA says. “THIS IS AN ALERT. A MANDATORY SHELTER IN PLACE HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED. PLEASE DO NOT LEAVE YOUR APARTMENTS.”
There is a quiet whisper of metal sliding into place. It takes me a moment to realize it came from the door—probably from all the apartment doors. Emergency dead bolts are locking us in.
“PLEASE REMAIN IN YOUR APARTMENTS,” says the VA’s pleasantly automated voice. “PLEASE REMAIN CALM.”
Eames and I look at each other.
And then we both go for the door.
I wave the back of my hand across the door’s sensor, waiting for the familiar play of light across my knuckles.
Nothing happens.
“Apartment,” I say, my voice fraying. “Open the front door.”
The VA speaks from its spot in the corner. “Apologies, I Wouldn’t. Request denied. Mandatory lockdown has been implemented. Please stay calm and remain indoors.”
“Does that mean someone called the cops?” asks Piper, sounding hopeful.
I consider that possibility for half a second. But then I shake my head. I look at myself in the small mirror hanging by the door. My hair is dark brown at the roots and bright pink at the tips. The connection between my ringware and the smart-dye went down at the same moment the lockdown did.
Which means it isn’t just the door.
“No,” I say. “I think the killers just hacked the building.”