Entanglement (YA Dystopian Romance) (30 page)

Thwack—
Clive’s
body convulsed and went limp.

Aaron
lowered the car door. He coughed for breath, and mucous frothed in his throat.
The sea’s salt tore into his lungs. He glanced behind him, at Amber.

And
the door slipped from his fingers, toppling with a clang. She was keeled over
and wincing in pain, shivering—because every blow into Clive had been a blow
into her.

She
was still Clive’s half
.

Aaron
stumbled forward and skidded to his knees. “No—”

“Aaron,
you have to go,” she moaned. “Before he finds you.”

Aaron
was only half-aware of the groans behind him, the wheezing, the sound of a body
scraping across pavement.

“I
can’t leave you here,” he said.

“Just
go!
” she said.

But
it was too late. Clive wheezed into Aaron’s ear, his breath damp with blood.
His finger landed on the back of Aaron’s scalp.

When
he pulled it away, an entire ocean poured out the back of Aaron’s skull. Aaron
crumpled to the ground. Stars spiraled above him. 

Clive
leaned over him, blotting out the sky. “You can’t win, Harper,” he said, shredded
skin flapping on his lip. He gurgled blood and spat to the side. “I deserve
her. You don’t.”

He
limped around to the Mazda’s passenger seat and smashed in the window, and he
lifted Amber out of her seat. She no longer had the strength to resist. Aaron
had taken that from her.

Then
the very last drop of his consciousness slipped away.

***

Daylight
dribbled between Aaron’s eyelids and lured them apart. He stared at a ceiling,
at flakes of plaster.
His
ceiling. He was in his bedroom, tucked into
his own bed. Outside, the morning sun glittered through lime-green sycamores,
glossy with dew. He watched their shadows thrust across his floor, wash up his
walls, then recede like surf.

Aaron
fingered the back of his skull. He had been somewhere. Not asleep, somewhere
else. An abyss.

He
heard voices from the other room. His mom and dad—and a third voice.

Aaron
closed his eyes again, and his heart gave a sickening lurch.
Amber
.

She
was someone else’s half; her back was already scarred, yet she had risked everything
for him. Just to see him. And all he’d managed to do was drain what little
strength she had left.

Now
Clive had her.

Aaron
traced the cracks on his ceiling, and his lungs caved in a little more with
each breath. Clive would never let her go. He would never give her back what
had been cut out of her, the piece that now made them halves.

In
fact, he wanted to take more out of her.

Aaron
sat up and threw off his comforter. Plumes of lint ignited in the sun’s beams,
flared white-hot, then extinguished.
No
. Amber was supposed to be
Aaron’s half, not Clive’s.

He
had to find a way to switch her back before they strapped her into the machine
and drained out the rest of her clairvoyance.

It
was Tuesday morning, April 2
^nd
, three days after their birthday. He
heard voices from the other room. His mom and dad.

But
there had also been a third voice.

At
that moment, a man stepped into Aaron’s room. A man who had to duck to get
through the doorway, a man whose white lab coat drifted, cape-like, behind him.

Dr.
Casler Selavio.

***

“
No!
”
Aaron jumped off his bed and backed to the wall as the blood recoiled from his
skin.

Casler
waved him back down. “Sit, sit.”

“
You
—”
Aaron groped behind him for his bedside lamp, but only grasped air. The lamp
lay on the floor at Casler’s feet.

“Clive
told me what happened,” said Casler, pulling up Aaron’s desk chair and sitting.
He slid a folder out of his briefcase—Aaron’s medical record. “This is all my
fault.”

“Where
is she?” Aaron whispered.

“May
I see the arm?” said Casler, glancing up at him with watery eyes. His ashy
cologne filled the room.

When
Aaron didn’t move, Casler wheeled the chair forward and reached for his hand.

Aaron
yanked it out of reach. “What did you do to her?” he said.

“We
weren’t sure you were going to make it last night,” said Casler, craning his
neck to examine the inflamed skin around Aaron’s knife wound. He pulled out a
pen. “The arm’s healing nicely.”

“Is
she okay?” said Aaron.

“Since
your channel is unconnected, your clairvoyance is especially vulnerable to
disturbance,” said Casler, scribbling something in Aaron’s file. “That’s why
you lost consciousness when Clive touched your head. In fact, now that you’re
eighteen and your channel’s grasping for your half, I wouldn’t be surprised if
just being in the same room as him would irritate the back of head.”

“Just
tell me if she’s okay,” said Aaron.

“She
demanded the same about you,” said Casler.

“Yeah.
Because she’s my half,” said Aaron.

Casler
stopped writing, and Aaron could see the muscles working inside his temples.
“Yes . . . yes she is,” he said, as if only now realizing this was true. He glanced
up, “which is why I’m going to make you halves
again.”

Aaron
blinked. “What?”

“This
wasn’t supposed to happen,” he said.

“And
what was?” said Aaron. “You severed our channel and gave her
to Clive.”

“We
didn’t fully understand the machine,” said Casler. “We thought if we severed an
infant’s channel during her birth, her would-be half would just connect to
someone else . . . not that he would be born halfless. After Clive lost his half, we
had to act fast.”

“And
how did he lose his half?”

Dr.
Selavio stiffened. “It happened when they were four,” he said. “Their juvengamy
backfired. They were playing by an old well, and Clive just lost it all of a
sudden and pushed her in. By the time we fished her out, it was too late.”

“You
mean he murdered his half?”

“It
was an accident,” said Casler. “He was too young to realize the consequences.”

“So
you severed his channel and rerouted it to another girl,” said Aaron, his jaw
twitching, “and
that
didn’t have consequences?”

“I’m
sorry, but I wasn’t about to watch my only son die . . . not when I believed I could
safely give him a new half.”

“But
why Amber?”

“I
didn’t choose her, Aaron. The potentate did. Probably because the Lilians and
the Selavios are the only pure bloodlines left, and t
ogether, Clive and
Amber are the perfect heir and heiress to inherit the Brotherhood. I didn’t care,
though. I would have taken anybody. When I heard you didn’t have a half,
though, I realized I’d done something terrible.” Casler
reached forward and touched Aaron’s forearm. “Let me switch you back.”

Aaron’s
skin prickled. There were too many reasons not to trust him. “You murdered
Emma’s half,” he said. “I saw the body.”

“I
meant to explain that earlier,” said Casler smoothly. “The boy died
mysteriously. The cause of death was clairvoyant in nature, so the coroner
requested me for the autopsy.”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m
the best there is, Aaron.”

“Then
why’d you bury the body?”

Casler
smiled and squeezed his wrist. “You and Amber love each other. You deserve to
be halves.”

“Last
time, when you and that priest were talking, you wanted to drain her,” said
Aaron.

“No,
she offered that herself,” said Casler.

“She
didn’t,” said Aaron.

“Yes,
I believe she wanted to donate her clairvoyance to less fortunate victims of
juvengamy, but Clive wouldn’t let her.”

“She
didn’t
.”

“Maybe
you don’t know her as well as you thought,” said Casler, his eyes twinkling.

“Well,
that’s because you didn’t tell her the consequences,” said Aaron.

“No,
she knew,” said Casler.

“And
she still wanted to?” said Aaron.

“Apparently,
until she discovered you.”

Aaron
stared at him, and then he shook his head. “You’re not going to switch us back.
You’d have to sever Clive’s channel. He would die.”

Casler
smiled. “That’s why I need something from you, Aaron. You survived eighteen
years with a severed channel . . . and I think I know why. Since you and Amber were
severed at birth, your channel retained its malleability, allowing it to heal
despite incredible trauma. Amber’s too, hence the scar tissue near the entrance
of her channel—”

“Wait,
she has the same scar tissue?”

“She
didn’t know until recently. It’s where the wound healed after you two were
split apart, and yes, it matches yours. You see, the machine is useless on
adult patients. It’s like cutting through glass and trying to press the pieces
back together; it won’t seal. However, your clairvoyance acts like glue. With a
tiny sample, I could reseal Clive’s severed channel. He wouldn’t have a half,
but at least he would be alive, and that’s all I ask for. Before we do it, I
just need a tiny sample.”

“Of
my clairvoyance?”

“Just
a thimbleful. You won’t notice it’s gone. If you prefer, I could take out a bit
of Amber’s—”

“You’re
not taking anyone’s clairvoyance.” Aaron narrowed his eyes, but it was Casler’s
hypnotic voice, the way the man’s eyes bored gently into him. Aaron wasn’t sure
he wouldn’t do anything the man asked. “But hypothetically, you
could
switch us back? Would you use the machine?”

“I
have to bend space a bit to reach the opening,” said Casler. “It’s nothing to
worry about.”

“What
about the part of her Clive has?” said
A
aron.

“Which
part?”

“The
stuff you took out when she was born.”

“Amber
will get it all back,” said Casler. “Actually,
you’ll
get it.”

Aaron’s
heart slowed, skipped beats, then slammed double-time inside his chest to make
them up. “Will it hurt her?”

“Only
a prick.”

Casler
was lying, obviously. Yet as Aaron peered into the depths of his calm eyes, he
wondered again if he had gotten Casler wrong from day one. When he said it, it
felt so real, so tantalizingly close; Aaron and Amber could be halves again.
All Aaron had to do was give in, believe. Trust—just for a moment.

Aaron
took a deep breath. The man was a doctor, after all. Trust was easy.

“When
I look through an aitherscope,” said Aaron, “I want to see her eyes. I don’t
want any of Clive left inside her—not a trace. And no drilling through
anybody’s skull.”

“It’s
a deal.” Casler returned the folder to his briefcase and rose to his full
height. “Come as soon as you’re ready. She’ll be waiting.”

***

Casler’s
explanation was plausible. His reasoning made sense. His facts agreed with what
Aaron already knew; there were no contradictions. Maybe he could
put
Aaron and Amber back together again.

Maybe
every last stinking word was a lie.

But
Aaron also realized how much danger she was in. Amber was Clive’s second half.
Clive had already killed his first.

In
the middle of pacing, his phone rang. The same number Amber texted him from the
night before.

“Hello?”
he said, and even though it probably wasn’t her, his heart quivered with
anticipation. Just the thought of hearing her voice. Suddenly, his doubts
vanished, replaced by a dizzying euphoria. He was about to blurt out that
Casler was a hero, that he was going to make them halves again, when she spoke.

“I
know about the deal you made with Casler,” she said, her voice biting.

Aaron
could tell something was off, and his heart chilled. He answered carefully. “He
said he could reconnect us.”

“I
don’t care,” she said. “We’re not supposed to be halves.”

“What?”

She
sighed. “You were just a fling, Aaron. It’s not like I wanted you to be my
half
.
I wasn’t thinking last night; I’m sorry.”

“But
we talked about this,” said Aaron. “Casler severed us—”

“Casler
lied to you,” she said. “All he wants is your scar tissue, and even if he could
make us halves, I wouldn’t want him to. I know I said things before, but I
don’t actually want to be your half, Aaron . . . I’m happy with Clive.” She paused,
waiting for him to answer.

But
he couldn’t.

“Are
you even going to acknowledge me?” she said.

“
Amber
 . . . I . . . ”
His voice choked up.