BECKETT
Jack was annoying me, big time. He cared about no one. No feelings, no pain. It was always about the ultimate goal: keeping on the mask. I knew he felt something about losing Sage in that helicopter, and yet he wouldn’t say two words to acknowledge it. Well forget it then, forget him.
We stepped inside the conference room. Dr. Cunningham sat down across from us at a dented, metal table. Cracks in the concrete walls ran from floor to ceiling.
Jack and I lowered ourselves into seats. Jack leaned forward toward the table top; I slouched back against the chair.
“I’ll get straight to the point,” Dr. Cunningham said. “They’ve taken Sage to the mansion, and because she knows and trusts you both, I need you boys to be the ones to retrieve her. It’s the only way I think our plan will work. Are you open to the idea?”
“We’re open,” Jack said. “Go on.”
“There’s a gala happening there tomorrow night. It’s a good time to attempt a breach; there’s so much happening with the festivities. I’m sure you understand we don’t have much time. She’s not safe with your father. We need to get to her as quickly as possible. I have someone on the inside, Sven is his name, but he’ll need your help getting her out. Do you remember him, Jack? He’s been a recruit trainer for the last half-decade, stationed overseas for the past couple of years, and has recently returned to the New York headquarters.”
Jack critiqued Cunningham’s every word, not so much as nodding at Cunningham’s question.
I settled my gaze on the tabletop, to Cunningham’s hands, wondering how we got here, at this moment, at this time, everything so convoluted. I pretended to be positive about getting to Sage, but inside, my stomach twisted with doubt and fear.
“Sven will help you get Sage out; he’ll help with whatever you need. We’ll leave the details up to you and Beckett. I assume you still have connections to various necessities in New York, but you are welcome to any of my own belongings if you need. Transportation, most certainly. I have motorcycles here, a car, a van, and various guns.”
“Guns?” I looked up from the table. Dr. Cunningham had never been the aggressive type. Strictly a scientist, and docile, from what my dad had said of him.
“Only in case of necessary protection, of course.” He smiled tightly. “I’ve been tracked and hunted by Vasterias, you know. Twenty years of that can wear on a man.”
A heavy silence blanketed the air.
Cunningham eyed us, seeming uncomfortable with the quiet. His eyes lingered on Jack’s arm muscles, no doubt assessing Jack’s general physique. I could tell Jack noticed, and he crossed his arms to accentuate his biceps further. I’d seen this before—Jack did it all the time, both to impress girls or to intimidate, based on the conditions of the situation. It usually ticked me off, but this time I felt silently satisfied by the maneuver.
Dr. Cunningham cleared his throat. His voice grew more emphatic. “Bring her to me. Please. They want her eggs. We can’t let that happen ….”
I frowned at Cunningham, and he quickly added, “I want to see her again, too, of course. The last time I saw my little girl, she wasn’t even two years old.”
Sage. So young, so innocent. And myself, too, before … everything. Back before our mom died, before Jack stopped talking about Mom, before our dad turned into a man I didn’t recognize ….
Enough.
I knew Jack wanted us to stay relaxed, but something about the tone of Cunningham’s voice when he talked about Sage, or maybe the unfeeling look on Jack’s face, set me off. I pushed away from the table and stood up. Next to me, Jack’s eyes closed slowly, like he knew what was coming and tried to contain his irritation.
I pressed my fingertips to the cold table and leaned in toward Dr. Cunningham.
“Bring Sage here to you? For what? So you talk her into letting you use her body for science instead of Vasterias? Because you think whatever is inside her is going to help the world? Sorry, I don’t think so. You’ve created enough pain for her.”
I shoved my chair under the table. “You know, after not hearing from you for all these years, she actually hoped you might want to save her just because she’s your daughter. Imagine such a juvenile thought.”
I thought of Sage, on the farm, innocently going about the business of her life—feeding cattle, managing the wheat harvest, attending high school. Specific moments flashed across my mind like a video reel: Sage riding her horse across the pasture; Sage leaning against the giant oak tree in her side yard, holding a glass of lemonade; Sage, lying in the barn loft, her hair splayed out, pieces of straw caught in her ponytail. These images, they were of a real life—Sage’s life. And my life, too, for three years. Wrapped up in those memories was the girl I loved, but it was also the me I loved. The best of me came out with her.
Cunningham spoke so lightly of her, like her life before didn’t even exist. I felt the sudden urge to reach across the table and wrap my hands around his neck.
He must have sensed it. “But I want to save her for that very reason,” said Dr. Cunningham. “I never intended for her to get dragged into this mess. I just want her to be safe.”
My voice raised. “And what makes you think we believe any of that?”
Jack rubbed his forehead, saying nothing, attempting to offset my intensity, but I wasn’t stopping now.
“Your daughter doesn’t hear from you for fifteen years, and you say nothing when she and Finn are kidnapped. You contact Jack to say you want him to bring her to you, but you don’t respond when they threaten to inject Finn and change him into a modwrog. You don’t respond after they do it, or even when they threaten to do the same to your daughter. You only call my father after you know, without a doubt, that they’re about to find out your secret—that you stored the code directly inside of her. So, just answer this question, Cunningham. Do you, or do you not, want the code inside her?”
Dr. Cunningham straightened in his chair and looked calmly at Jack, not me.
“I believe in my work. Whether you two believe me or not, I’ve devoted myself to helping humanity. That is why I hid the code in the first place. There were no other options.”
I snorted.
“So that’s a yes, then? You only want her for the code. You’re sick. Sick and twisted, just like the rest of them. I don’t want to hear your excuses and your reasons, or your plan to make the world a better place. Your equation doesn’t work when you’re screwing with lives along the way. So here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to help Finn get better, and then you’re going to leave us all the hell alone.”
Dr. Cunningham focused his gaze on his hands resting on the table, fingers interwoven with one another. “I can’t do that. I will help my son, but I’m not leaving it all alone.” He cleared his throat and shifted his hands a bit. “I think you’re both missing the bigger picture, here. I think that—”
“There is no bigger picture!” I shoved my chair again, and when it hit the ground, it made a clanging sound that echoed through the room. “At least not a bigger picture that’s good for her! And screw all of you who think you can control us like circus puppets. Your daughter and son—they’re human beings, Dr. Cunningham, in case you forgot.”
I strode out the door. Jack’s gaze and Cunningham’s bore into my back.
If I had it my way, we’d get Sage and never come back here again. She didn’t need to meet this man. She’d only be disappointed, and she didn’t need more heartbreak. I was trying to help patch up her heart, not tear it to pieces again by introducing her to a father who cared nothing for the person she was outside of the code. But Finn was part of this equation, and as long as Finn was here, we would be returning, for better or worse.
But that didn’t mean I had to like it.
And screw Jack for saying I had to stay calm about any of it.