Soulprint (14 page)

“Okay,” he says. “Okay. Do this with us, help us, and you'll get a share of the money one way or the other, and Casey can work you up a new identity.”

Cameron scoffs, and we all turn to look at him. “Everyone knows her face. She'll never be free.” It's like he doesn't want me to agree. Doesn't want me to tell them what the numbers of my inheritance mean.

Dominic shakes his head. “The world is big, Alina.”

It's just me. I am alone, like always. They want something from me, and now I want something from them.

Like the terrifying ocean, the only way to get past it is to go through it.

“The deposits,” I say. “They're coordinates.”

And just like that, I trade everything I have to bargain with for the tiniest sliver of hope.

Dominic tears through his things like a kid on Christmas, desperately searching for his GPS. I recite the coordinates for him from memory, and he plugs them in. “This is nearby,” he says. Of course it is. This is where June disappeared for so long. “A day's hike. We go tomorrow. Bring food and a tent, we may need to stay the night.”

I'm still clutching the glass, but only Cameron seems to notice. He waits for Dominic and Casey to disappear into the computer room, on some mission to look into different variations of a place that may be called Duérmete, or something similar. They won't find anything. It doesn't exist. I've looked.

I stand, spinning away from his gaze, from what I might see in it.

“What were you planning to do?” he asks.

I take a deep breath and turn to face him, but he's staring at my clenched fists, at the shard of glass sticking out.

“I don't know,” I say. It's the truth if he's asking what I
intended to do
after
I got out of his grip. I hadn't thought that far ahead. Step One: Break the hold. Step Two: To be determined. I'm losing a grip on myself the longer I spend away from the island. I swallow dry air and meet his eyes. “I don't feel safe here.”

He looks at me like he knows, of course he knows, that I was going to cut him. He who has done nothing but help me. Who risked his life to remove the tracker from my rib, who dove into the ocean after me so I wouldn't drown, who shared my air tank, my fear, my secrets. I betrayed him. I was planning to slice my way out of his hold, before I even thought of trying to ask him to stop. I am impulsive. I am driven by rage. I am nothing more than the person they believe me to be. Selfish and self-righteous. I am.

I want to apologize, to ask forgiveness, to take it back, as impossible as that seems. But words mean nothing. Action, everything.

I let the pieces fall to the floor in a tiny melody, in surrender, and all he does is bend down to clean them up, making me feel even worse.

“Why didn't you tell?” I ask. It's obvious that Casey wanted any information I had, and it's obvious that he knew about the coordinates. I wonder if Dominic is right, if they really do care about what I say. But I think that was just Dom, twisting words, twisting
me
, to get the information he needed.

“Wasn't mine to tell,” he says, still looking at the floor.

“What does she want from me?” I ask.

He pauses, the glass half in his palm, half on the wood floor. “Also not mine to tell,” he says.

He continues to pick up the pieces. “Then why are
you
here? What do
you
want?”

He doesn't answer at first, staring at the floor, at the pieces of glass. And then at me. “I'm here because she'd do this anyway. I'm here because I'm scared to lose her.” He stands with the glass, and then he shocks me by coming closer. “I'm here because I have nowhere else to go.”

Closer still, and I feel a hand on my waist again. “I'm here because I would do anything for my sister,” he says, and now he's whispering. “And I'm
still
here because I don't see any other option.” I feel his fingers along the side of my pants, and I don't know what to do. His fingers find the pocket, and I'm holding my breath, and I feel the shards of glass drop back inside my pocket. “This really wouldn't have done anything to me. There were two other people in the room. You get that?” I nod, because I'm out of words. “I'd do anything for her. Do you understand?”

He backs away, and his words echo in a pattern in my head.

His sister
.

Other option
.

Do you understand?

He leaves me in the main room with the glass in my pocket, and he disappears into the bathroom.

Yes
, I think.
I understand
.

People do stupid things for the people they love. My parents went to jail for me. Cameron is here, giving up his freedom, a dead man walking, as he said, for Casey. And I don't even know
what June did for Liam White, or what he did for her. But I do know it was stupid, since they both ended up dead.

I understand Cameron, and my body thrums with anticipation.

He's handing me a code. Like the lines of DNA:
Hi, Alina Chase
.

I was always looking for messages. For code. I was always sending them out, waiting for someone to respond. So when Cameron tells me these things, with his careful, deliberate words, I understand. When he leaves the glass in my pocket, I understand.

He's saying I may need it—I don't feel safe, and I may need it. He's not sure Dom will let me go after this. Use it wisely, he's saying. Use it
better
.

I'm not sure if I should trust him. But there's a chance that I can. When the time comes, the chance will have to be enough, because it's all I have.

There's a list in my head, a list I start making for when it's time: a GPS, food, water, blankets … and then I stop myself. I amend it.
You. Just you. You and
out there,
you will make it
.

Of course you will
.

Cameron makes a fire in the wood-burning stove, but it's not for cooking. It's for the heat. The mountains are cold at night, even in the summer. It crackles, and the heat comes off it in waves. I've never been so close to a fire this size, and the smell of it sets my nerves on edge. Everything has changed.

We eat directly from containers—dried, salted meat, trail mix, lukewarm beans. I'm not going to lie: it's disgusting.

“This is gross,” Casey mumbles, and even Cameron seems to gag as he chews.

“It's just temporary,” Dominic says, yet again.

The temporariness of this situation goes unspoken—it lasts until I lead them to the way to access the information inside the database again, and we each get what we came for.

“I'm just saying it wouldn't have killed you to get some chips or bread or something …” She's looking at Cameron when she says it, but Dominic is the one to slam the container he's been eating from onto the ground.

He fixes his eyes on her. “Do you have any idea how many trips the equipment alone took me? Cameron and I had to carry it all in here. Piece by bulky freaking piece. For
weeks
. While you were getting fed in training and on duty, standing around, watching
her
. Did you see a grocery store on the hike in? Excuse me if I picked efficient.”

My spoon scrapes against the metal can. This is the first moment we've had to pause and catch our breath. The plan is fluid, and developing as we speak, and it's finally something other than the steps they had laid out in front of them. This is the leap of faith they were taking: that they'd find something in me. And now they have, only it's vague and insubstantial with no end point in sight. The tension crackles through the room along with the fire.

Cameron cracks his knuckles.

“Efficient,” Casey says. Then she laughs. “My appetite is efficiently gone,” she says, slamming the half-empty can on the ground and heading to the bathroom.

I finish my portion. I finish hers, too.

I'm not used to the sounds in here—the crackle of the fire and the humming of the computers. But the fire dies down and the computers are shut off as we move to the bedroom, and I'm not used to the sounds that remain either. The crickets. The wind. The way you can hear it coming through the trees before it reaches the house, pushing against the door and the mesh-wired windows.

The sleeping arrangements are much like the night before. Except now we're in thick sleeping bags on the hard floor. We're all piled in one room together again—the difference this time is that somebody stays up at all times. I'm not sure what it is they're worried I might do, whether I'll claw my way through the wood walls, whether I'll smother them in their sleep, but it makes me think that this place isn't as secure as the locked basement we were last in. Maybe they're right to be cautious—I already have glass resting in my pocket. I'm unable to move because of it, but I feel safer keeping it there.

I hate June Calahan for what she allowed to happen back then and for what she allowed to happen to me now. This is what June wanted, after all. It's what she believed. A dangerous soul is dangerous. It's funny, I think, that she didn't realize she'd be lumped into that category when all was said and done.

I want to stay up. I want to whisper to Cameron and listen,
I want to watch Dominic and Casey and learn more. But mostly, I want to be ready. And so I sleep.

I wake up once, during Cameron's shift, because I feel a body standing nearby, and my senses are on high alert. But he's not looking at me. He crouches beside Casey, and I can't hear them exactly, but I can tell they're disagreeing. I hear someone say, “This is completely screwed up,” and I know it's Cameron, because his shadow clenches its fists at the same time the words carry through the room.

Then Casey pushes herself upright, and she sticks her finger at him, saying, “I need to do it,
we
need to do it.”

“No, we don't,” he says.

It feels as if they've repeated these words to each other over and over again, because Casey just lies back and says, “We're already doing it.”

“It won't change anything,” he says.

“It changes
everything
,” Casey says. I don't even have to strain to hear her, and Dominic's sleeping bag rustles.

The shadow retreats to the door, Casey rolls over, the conversation is done.

The next time I wake, there's just the faintest color to the sky, so I can see the mesh wires crisscrossing the solitary window. Casey is sitting with her back against the door with her eyes closed. But I can tell from the tension in her jaw that she's not asleep. Light snoring comes from the other two sleeping bags. “Hey,” I whisper, and her eyes flutter open, focusing on me. “Can I use the bathroom?”

She checks her watch and stands. Then she looks beyond me. “Dom,” she says. “Time to wake up.”

She waits for them to stir, then leads me out of the room without touching me. Whatever sort of camaraderie we shared yesterday is gone now. We're all playing our hands. There's no point pretending anymore.

I have decided the most essential item for survival is a pair of shoes that fit. Blisters are the devil. At this point, I'd rather have Cameron cut a tracker out of my rib again. Okay, maybe not. But still. I slide the shoes onto my feet and already feel the chafing on my heel, my ankle. Dominic is packing an insane amount of material into a tiny knapsack, like a magic trick. And Casey makes a trip out back where there's allegedly a well for fresh water.

I stare at the front door, open just a crack, calling to me like a magnet.

“Alina,” Cameron says, like he's already said it. I shift my gaze to him, and he shakes his head, just once. “Heads up.” He tosses me a roll of beige tape from the first-aid kit on the counter. “Wrap your ankles. It helps.”

I do, and he's right. I end up binding the sneakers as well, tightening them even more, securing them in place. “Thank you,” I say. Then I take another strip and place it in my pocket, folding the pieces of glass inside.

Casey comes back with several canteens. Dominic can barely keep the smile from his face. Casey is anxious as well, checking the lids, lining everything up in neat rows.

Cameron watches her with his breath held.

“Okay, everyone,” Dominic says, scanning all our faces. “Breathe. It's just a hike.”

Casey laughs, and Cameron relaxes, and even I feel something unfurl inside me.

Because as much as I would like to think about running—as much as I think about the door open a crack and the glass in my pocket—I hear those numbers whispered into my ear, and I want to know. God, I want to know. They're meant for me, and I want to know what's waiting there.

I feel like June must've felt, in the moments before she got inside the database. All the information, just waiting to be seen. I'm like her after all—truth at any price. No matter what it says about me, about me and June in the same sentence, it's true.

Dom shrugs the largest pack onto his shoulders and waits for us to do the same. We walk in a single-file line out into the sunlight. Dom, then Casey, then me, then Cameron.

I picture June's mouth reciting the coordinates to me, and I want to grab her. I want to shake her, and ask her why, and then I want to see what she has left for me.

I guess we're about to find out.

We're mostly silent for the hike. Mostly, I think we're all lost in our own thoughts, because whenever somebody does speak, it takes the others a moment to catch up. Which is what's happening right now.

“I mean, it's been seventeen years, it's not just going to be sitting somewhere in the middle of the woods, right?” Casey
asks like she's been mentally talking to herself. “We're looking for some instructions she's left behind, right? It can't be this easy, can it?” Her voice is breathy and hopeful.

“I wouldn't call this easy,” Cameron mumbles.