Chapter 4
I can’t use her, Ariel thought as she meandered through the halls, taking her time to meet Agent Stone and Sparks at the interrogation room while she pondered why, after only two interactions, she was already fond of the porcupine shifter and couldn’t stomach betraying her by using her for information.
Was she becoming soft, spending so much time away from Dr. Grimm?
Or was this how normal people felt? She shook her head.
I’m just getting confused, she chided herself. They’re all just trying to get in my head. She thought back to therapy and shook her head. Ariel wouldn’t accept what the group members told her earlier. Dr. Grimm did not use her. He cared for her. He did what her family could not: he had cured her.
But just because she wasn’t changing her mind about Dr. Grimm didn’t mean she had to use Joline.
There was no harm in having a friend. Ariel could admit it would be nice to have one, and it seemed Joline might be in need of one, too.
Oh well, she’d have to find her fancy prosthetic on her own.
She could always explore other avenues, such as pretending to get close to her brother and get his help.
But why isn’t Grimm helping me? The thought that had consumed her for the past year resurfaced, seemingly stronger than ever, accompanied by ever-growing doubts.
Grimm had told her she was an invaluable member of his team, an integral part of his plan, yet where was he?
His continued absence worried her. If he did really care about her, would he so easily have cast her aside?
And even if that wasn’t what was happening, it sure felt like it.
It seemed the seeds of doubt that FUC had been attempting to plant had taken root, to some extent, especially after that day’s group therapy, and now, after talking to Joline and listening to her enthusiasm for the cadet program, Ariel couldn’t keep denying the questions that had been surfacing.
Joline’s view of FUC was so different than Ariel’s; the cadet was more than excited to be there.
But Dr. Grimm had told Ariel that FUC was the bad guy, holding him back from real scientific progress.
So who was right, and who was the deluded one?
Ariel was afraid it was her—and Dr. Grimm—and not Joline and the rest of FUCN’A.
She swallowed, trying to silence the tiny echoes in her brain that repeated, over and over, what the members of group therapy had said to her that day.
They finally quieted when she approached her destination.
She inhaled sharply at the sight of the interrogation room.
Though she’d taken her time getting there, it still appeared fast. She squared her shoulders and gathered her wits.
She’d been here so many times before that the door acted like a physical trigger, transforming her back into her old, Grimm-loyal self.
The door alone reminded her of all the arguments, all the pressure FUC tried to put on her to get her to break.
Any doubts about Grimm she might have had dissolved, and her resolve strengthened.
She remembered who she was: a Grimm loyalist, through and through.
She finally knocked, knowing that Agents Stone and Sparks waited inside—they always arrived before her.
She figured it must be some sort of interrogation tactic.
As time had gone on, she made a point of taking her sweet time getting there, just to piss them off.
Let them wait all evening for her. She hoped it ruined their dinner plans.
Agent Stone opened the doors to let her in.
Though he was dressed in normal casual attire of jeans, flannel shirt, and cowboy boots, he seemed more rigid than usual.
With a harumph, Ariel crossed her arms before sitting in the interrogation chair.
She glanced up at the one-way mirror, wondering who was on the other side of that glass today.
Could her dear brother, Anson, be watching?
Let him. It would be educational. She’d show him what a real supporter of Dr. Grimm would do under pressure.
Anson had cracked too quickly when he was apprehended.
Not Ariel. She knew where her loyalties lay.
Ariel glanced up at Agent Stone and his partner, Agent Sparks, to give them a sly grin, but their stony expressions stopped her.
Usually, aside from occasional cat-and-mouse banter, the agents appeared bored during the interrogations.
By this point, they knew they weren’t going to get any new information from Ariel, but until she was officially “de-brainwashed”—or whatever FUCN’A aimed to do—these sessions would continue to be a tedious task they had to check off their to-do list at least once a week.
But today their vibe was different. Something had happened to make both of them legitimately pissed off.
Agent Sparks drummed her long, pink acrylic nails on the table.
The rhinestones on her ring fingernail shimmered in the overhead lights.
The agent narrowed her hazel eyes on Ariel, as a blush flushed the agent’s brown skin.
Ariel’s heart began thumping. This was no ordinary interrogation, not one of their sessions where they asked her, yet again, if she remembered anything she could tell them that would help them find and apprehend Grimm.
Ariel would tell them no, and then they would go back and forth, with the agents asking mundane questions and Ariel claiming ignorance.
They didn’t seem like they were going to start playing that game again today, though.
Whatever was on their mind seemed personal.
Ariel nearly jumped out of her skin when Agent Stone started speaking. “Dr. Grimm raided a nearby human county jail this morning.”
They paused, giving her a chance to react.
She kept her face passive and her mouth shut, trying not to betray the fact that she’d been waiting for this announcement ever since she’d delivered the intel on the jail to Grimm—intel she’d gathered when she allowed herself to be arrested for a minor crime, just so she’d be able to get insider information.
When they were finally convinced she was refusing to comment, they continued. “Why didn’t you tell us about this plan, Miss Russo?” Agent Stone’s voice was rough around the edges, a departure from his usual relaxed tone. “We’ve asked you to tell us all you know, and you sat on this information.”
She’d honestly believed that there was nothing to tell about it.
Grimm had told her she was an important piece in the plan involving the jail, so the more time passed without him making a move, the more convinced she’d become that he needed her back before he’d be able to move forward with it.
“I don’t know what you think I would know about—” Ariel started to object, but Agent Stone cut her right off.
“We know you helped Dr. Grimm create the plan because we apprehended one of his goons at the scene.”
“You apprehended someone?” She wondered how someone could get themselves caught until she remembered her entire predicament.
“The bonehead locked himself in one of the cells by accident. His partner left him behind,” Agent Sparks explained dryly, still drumming her fingernails on the table. Ariel felt her heart beating in time with the rhythm.
“The henchman spilled the beans the second we had him in custody. Told us all about how you had gotten locked up just so you could give intel to Grimm. Guy we nabbed also mentioned that phase two of this plan was Grimm raiding a local shifter daycare. You care to finally let us in on these plans, or are you going to sit back and let Grimm keep attacking the innocent?”
“Children, Ariel,” Agent Sparks emphasized. “You’re really going to sit here in silence, protecting a man who is going to hurt children?”
“You’ve got it wrong.” Ariel shook her head.
“There is no daycare plan.” She didn’t know if the agents were just trying to bait her or not, but she did know that Grimm wouldn’t experiment on children.
While some of his test subjects took some…
creative convincing… they were always of consenting age.
“Why should we believe anything you say?” Stone countered.
Normally, she didn’t care if they believed what she said or not, but for once, it seemed to matter what they thought.
Maybe it was because she was finally starting to understand that Grimm didn’t need her to keep going with his plans.
Maybe it was because hearing that all her reconnaissance at the jail had helped him with his plan, but not enough for him to want to focus any time or energy on helping her escape.
The whole time she’d been waiting for a rescue, he’d been moving forward without her.
In any case, she wanted Stone and Sparks to believe her.
“Yes,” she admitted. “I knew about the jailbreak plan. Grimm had asked me to get arrested on a minor charge so I could scope the place out for him. I assumed he wanted to recruit new henchmen.” Or experiment on people Grimm though society wouldn’t miss, but she kept that part to herself.
“Is that all?” Sparks asked with a raised eyebrow. “Because, as your associate tells it, you were an integral part of the whole plan.”
“Apparently not enough for him to break me out of here before moving forward with it.” Part of her lit up with pride at the knowledge that she wasn’t forgotten—at least, the part she’d played in the plan.
But that didn’t change the fact that she hadn’t been important enough to extricate.
She swallowed, trying to clear her throat.
It felt like it was tightening, her breathing becoming more difficult. And shallow.
“Miss Russo, are you okay?” Agent Stone asked, his tone softening slightly, a gesture of compassion that somehow made Ariel feel even worse.