Unbreakable (Unraveling) (12 page)

“What’s your problem now?” Barclay asks.

I’m about to respond with something caustic when there are two soft beeps. They could be anything—the microwave, some kind of electronics, even Barclay’s cell phone. But instantly I know they’re not.

They’re something worse.

Because Barclay freezes for a split second, his lips slightly parted with surprise, and then his eyes, wide with fear, flick to me.

“What is it?” I whisper. I’m aware of my pulse in my ears, the dryness in my mouth, and the fact that I don’t know what to do with my hands. Because fear is contagious, and I can’t think of a single instance I’ve ever seen Barclay afraid.

He doesn’t answer me. Instead, he bolts up and with one hand grabs the blueprints, with the other grabs me, and before I have a chance to understand what’s happening, he’s pulling me into his bedroom.

“It’s an alarm. Someone is coming,” he says, shoving me into the walk-in closet.

“Who?” I ask, my voice breathless.

Barclay’s eyes meet mine. “IA.”

M
aybe Barclay is paranoid. Maybe it’s a UPS guy or something.

Or maybe that’s my own wishful thinking.

Whatever’s been going on with him lately, clearly something made him set this up. He’s not exactly an alarmist. And if he was, he’d have a right to be. If IA is after me, it’s only a matter of time until they’re after him, too.

Or it might not be IA. It might be worse—it could be the traffickers.

I don’t have time to say anything anyway because Barclay presses down on two of the floorboards until there’s a click, and they pop loose. He pulls them up to reveal a hidden compartment about two feet deep.

“Here, get in.” He steps down into the hole in his closet. The floor comes up to his knees.

Looking at it, I’m confused. I don’t know how I’m going to fit in here. Even if I crouch down, he won’t be able to get the floorboard over my head, and he certainly won’t be able to get in there with me.

“Hurry up, Tenner!” Barclay takes my hand and pulls me toward him.

I step in, even though I’m not sure where I’m going to go, only once I put my foot down, I realize it extends underneath the floor. I can lie down flat and the board will be able to go over my head. My body flushes with heat as Barclay pushes me down. I stretch my body out the length of the compartment.

As I lie down, my hands quiver against the wood. My chest is tight, my breaths shallow.

The compartment is the size of a coffin.

“I can’t do it,” I say, pushing against Barclay and trying to get back up. I’m not claustrophobic, but I’ve never had to fit into such a small tight space. A space that will effectively trap us here.

“You have to,” Barclay says.

“We should run.” My legs twitch at the thought.

“There’s nowhere to go,” he says. “Just for once, do what I tell you.”

He knows this apartment—and this world—better than I do. I suck in a deep breath, my lungs burning.

I’m almost completely prone when I pause and sit back up. I brought more evidence of my existence here than just myself. “My backpack, the coats!”

“Fuck!” Barclay says, jumping out of the hole. “Lie down and leave as much room as you can. I have to get in there with you.”

He rushes out of the closet, and I lie down, flat on my back. I cross my hands over my chest, like a dead body, but I can’t breathe right in that position. I switch to my side, and even though I don’t know where to put my arms, I tell myself this is better. If I press my back up against the side of the compartment, we’ll have more room for him to be in here with me, though not much.

I hear two more beeps, and Barclay is back. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him put my backpack up on the top shelf, then throw both our coats in the hamper. Then he’s climbing into the hole with me.

He pulls a string connected to the floorboards, and they fall over us, snapping back into place. We’re lost in almost complete darkness, and Barclay lies down on his side facing me. I put my hands against his chest, and he drapes an arm over me and turns my face into his collarbone.

“Don’t make a sound,” he whispers. “Don’t even move. If they find us here, we’re as good as dead.”

I don’t know what I’d say to that if I had the chance, but it doesn’t matter, because at that moment, I hear the front door click open and someone says, “Hey, anybody home?” followed by a thick chuckle. Like this is some kind of game, like it’s funny.

The door slams.

A different voice says, “You want his neighbors to narc on us when he gets home?” It’s gruff. Annoyed, even.

There’s an exchange of words, but they’ve lowered their voices and it’s too muffled to hear over the pounding of my heart.

I need an escape strategy. That will calm me down. How will we get out of here if we’re caught? Maybe there’s just two of them. I hope. Maybe Barclay has his gun on him and another one nearby. If they do find us down here, we’ll have to come out swinging. So far they’re at least both male—I can come up with a strike to the balls and maybe somehow get the upper hand and get away.

At least that’s my plan right now.

If these guys are IA like Barclay thinks, and they find us, there’s only one place I’m going—prison, to be detained and then executed. Barclay would be going there too, and since we’re hiding with the blueprints to the prison, there’s no way we’d be able to escape.

I remember what Barclay said about Elijah.
I don’t know how injured he is
. I wonder what they did to him, and what they’re likely to do to both of us, if they find us now. Maybe being executed in four days wouldn’t even be the worst of it.

“Let’s just hurry up and get this done,” someone says. I think it’s a different voice than the first two, but I can’t be sure.

I close my eyes. My left leg twitches again, and I can feel my calf starting to cramp up. Barclay shifts slightly next to me and my left knee slides in between his. I can feel the soft cotton threads of his shirt under my fingertips, the tense muscles tight underneath the fabric. And I can feel his heartbeat thumping in his chest.

Outside dishes clatter in the kitchen, drawers open and slam shut.

I wonder if the IA will trump up fake charges to put on my execution papers or if they’ll be honest and cite that I’m a means to an end, something that doesn’t matter. I wonder if they’re allowed to just dispose of me since I don’t live here.

In the living room, I hear books being pulled off shelves and dumped onto the floor, while Chuckles gives a soft running commentary of what he thinks of Barclay’s reading selection and laughs at his own jokes.

“Don’t dump them on the floor,” Gruff Guy says. “Check the pages.”

My hands curl into fists and I hold on to Barclay’s shirt so tightly, they start to shake. I want to let go of him, but my brain doesn’t seem to be listening. I try to take a deep breath, inhale from my mouth, but I hear myself wheeze.

“Relax,” Barclay whispers into my hair. He rubs a circle on my back, but then he stops because the fabric of my shirt rustles against his hand.

I try to count his heartbeats. Eighteen beats in the span of six seconds. It means his heart rate is 180. I used to finish ocean swims with a lower pulse.

Paper crackles, and fabric tears. They’re looking for something, something Barclay has hidden and doesn’t want them to find. I wonder what’s so important that they’d break into his apartment, that he’d hide us under the floor of his closet in order to keep it from them. I wonder what’s turned them against him and what they would do if they found us.

“Got it,” the third voice says, and fingers clack against a keyboard.

Beneath my hands, Barclay’s chest expands and his pulse speeds up. He’s holding his breath.

The noise goes on—the rustling of paper, the books thumping against the ground, the drawers opening and shutting, things being moved around, the shuffling of footsteps, the murmur of voices—I’m not sure how long. Sweat beads on my skin, and droplets slide from my neck down the curve of my shoulder.

It feels like we’ve already been here forever. I try to count the seconds, but Barclay’s pulse against my skin keeps messing me up, and I keep losing count somewhere in the forties.

Heavy footsteps enter the bedroom.

Another set follows.

“Check the drawers, I’ll look in the closet,” Gruff Guy says.

My breathing comes too fast and too loud, and it doesn’t matter how much I tell myself to calm down and
shut up
, I’m not seeing any results. Barclay’s arm tightens around me, and he pulls me closer to him.

The bulb in the closet flicks on and threads of light shine through the floorboard.

Heavy footsteps thump right above us—military style boots. They step into the closet, and I’m paralyzed, waiting for him to notice the difference in sound from where he steps. Wire hangers scrape against metal as he moves Barclay’s clothes around.

There’s a thud, like he just dropped to his knees. I hold my breath and refuse to breathe. His hands slide around the floor right above us.

I wonder if the heat of our bodies will tell him where we are.

“Yo, I found something in here,” Chuckles calls, and Gruff Guy stands up.

I
feel like I’m made of liquid, or like I’m melting somehow.

Another set of footsteps comes into the bedroom. “That’s just an old charger,” Third Guy says.

“You don’t think we could trace where he’s been?” Chuckles asks.

“What good is that going to do if he hasn’t used it in months?”

There’s movement and rustling, and someone comes back to the closet. He reaches up and feels around the top shelf, pulling things down. My backpack falls heavily to the floor and I flinch from the sound.

“I don’t think there’s anything in here,” Third Guy says, stepping out of the closet.

“We can’t go back empty-handed,” Gruff Guy says. Something in the way he says it catches my attention. There’s an undercurrent of fear in his voice, like he’s a little afraid of whoever sent him here.

All three sets of steps come to the edge of the closet. They’re so close, I can smell the polished leather of their boots.

“If it was my house, I’d have hidden it under the floor in my kitchen,” Chuckles says. “There’s a tile that comes up easy. That’s where I keep all the good stuff.”

“What have you got to hide?” Third Guy says. “You don’t even have enough cash to do laundry.”

There’s a sweeping sound, like fingers sliding against the floor.

They’re so close. We’re only separated by thin pieces of plywood.

“There’s something weird about this floor,” Gruff Guy says. His fingers feel along the edges of each of the floorboards, and he grunts as he tries to pull them up.

Any second now, they’re going to realize we’re underneath them. Barclay presses his lips down into the top of my head, his arm around me tightening even more.

I taste salt on my lips. I hadn’t realized I was crying.

“Hey, is that a safe?” Third Guy asks.

Gruff Guy stands up and shuffles something around in the closet.

“Oh hell yeah,” Chuckles says.

“Get me something to get it open,” Gruff Guy says.

They move around, someone says something I don’t hear, the floor above us shifts. Through it all, I try to hold my breath.

After what feels like an eternity, there are several beeps and a click, and Chuckles laughs in celebration of whatever they’ve got. More shuffling, as all three of them crowd into the closet.

“Is that it?” Third Guy says.

“Of course it is, what else would it be? And there’s at least twenty grand in here.”

“Let me see it,” Third Guy says. “Not the money.”

I hear pages flipping against each other, and then there’s a pause. I can hear someone, probably Chuckles, shuffling through the closet still. And there’s a sharp intake of breath as Third Guy confirms, “This is it.”

“Good,” Gruff Guy says, taking a step back. His heel comes down right above us, and the floor gives in slightly and clicks. “Take the gun and the money too,” he adds, as Barclay’s hand shoots up and grabs the string.

“And grab anything valuable on the way out. If we’re lucky, when he gets back, he’ll think it was random.”

They shuffle around, the closet light flicks off, and the door shuts behind them. Still holding on to the string, Barclay’s arm starts to shake under the stress.

“Think Wonder Boy will come back empty-handed?” Chuckles asks with his signature laugh.

“Doesn’t matter,” Gruff Guy says. “We know where to find her.”

A
fter the front door closes, Barclay lets go of the string and the floorboards pop up. A rush of cool air hits my face as I sit up and scramble out of the compartment. I can’t get out of there fast enough. And I can’t seem to get enough air. My breaths are harsh and loud.

“Are you okay?” Barclay asks as he sits up and cracks his knuckles.

“What were they looking for?”

“I don’t—”

“Don’t give me that, what was in your safe?”

“Tenner, it’s not important,” he says, pulling himself out. “It’s all over, we’ll—”

I shake my head and slide back as he approaches me. “What was the mission IA gave you, the one you ignored?” My voice rises. “What were they looking for, what did they find in your safe, and if you come back empty-handed, what does ‘we know where to find her’ mean?”

I push backward with my feet again, and this time my back hits the wall.

On his knees Barclay crawls toward me, reaching his hands around mine. His eyes are closed. “Janelle,” he says quietly. My first name sounds strange on his lips. “IA sent me to your world, to bring you back here. That was the mission.”

“Because of Ben?”

Barclay’s hands squeeze mine. He nods. “It was also a test, for me. To see how dedicated I still was after Eric’s death.”

They sent him after me. I don’t know why, but I can’t believe it. Even knowing that they were looking for me, knowing that Ben’s family is in prison, it’s like I can’t reconcile my notion of law enforcement with the truth. “So why—”

“I deleted all the files,” he says.