Unbreakable (Unraveling) (17 page)

Fear kills swifter than bullets
.

I repeat it to myself like some kind of mantra. Because I need to stay strong to get through this. We have so many plans riding on what happens right now.

The elevator dings again at the twenty-seventh floor and the doors open. The armed guards exit first and wait for us, then the four of us walk down the hallway.

I can do this. Not just because I have to but because I am my father’s daughter, and I’m not going to give up on the people I care about.

We pass three offices before we reach the double doors at the end. One of the guards opens them, and all four of us move inside. The carpet is gray and looks relatively new, maybe only a year old.

I look up.

And say out loud, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Barclay coughs and then says, “Deputy Director, I have an eleven-nineteen. This is Janelle Tenner, subject 2348739 from Earth 23984. She’s surrendered herself to IA custody in connection with case BM132.”

That’s not really who I am, subject whatever from Earth 23984, but we’re still playing the game that’s supposed to keep my family safe.

“Also,” Barclay adds, “she’s familiar with your double in her world.”

I look at Barclay—I don’t care where we are. I can’t believe he managed to leave out this detail. But he’s looking straight ahead, eyes on the deputy director.

Who is none other than Struz.

I
’ve known Ryan Struzinski, aka Struz, for as long as I can remember. He grew up in Orange County, went to school at USC, then put in for the FBI as soon as he graduated. He passed the tests with flying colors and went to work as an analyst for my dad in San Diego.

I think it took a week before my dad brought him home and adopted him as part of the family.

When I was fourteen Struz and my dad were part of a Joint Terrorism Task Force going after a group of extremists who were suspected of terrorist activity. I only know some of the details because Struz took a bullet and was laid up and out of the field for a few weeks. He spent those weeks on my living-room couch babysitting Jared and me while our dad was undercover. We ate ice cream for dinner, watched R-rated movies, and stayed up until two in the morning debating who was the best supervillain.

In the end, my dad got the bad guy, came home, and told Struz he was a terrible babysitter, then we all went out for pizza.

Struz is six feet seven and lanky, with a superhero complex. He’s the kind of guy who dresses up as Superman for Halloween every year and wears the costume with the foam stomach muscles built in. He’s also the kind of guy who can manage to hold the world together when earthquakes, a tsunami, and a rash of wildfires take out electricity, running water, and any semblance of civilization.

He’s the best guy I know.

S
truz 2.0, the Prima version, is apparently the deputy director of IA, and after listening to Barclay, he nods at the armed guards. As they leave, he points to the chairs and gestures for us to sit down. There’s a suaveness to the gesture that’s completely alien on his body.

I can’t take my eyes off him. His hair is shorter. He obviously cuts it himself or has someone keep up with it regularly. He’s clean-shaven, and his clothes fit. The shoulders are the right width, the arms the right length, the material something expensive. He looks really good.

If I get home, I’m making it a mission to buy my Struz some nice clothes. We might manage to find him a girlfriend yet.

“Good to see you, Barclay,” he says as soon as the door shuts and we’re alone. He smiles as I sit down in my chair. It’s a smile that’s a little too big for his face, and it’s never looked so good on him. “Glad you’re back.”

“Thank you, sir,” Barclay says with a polite smile.

I feel a little like I just fell into
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
.

“Now, forgive me, but how is Miss Tenner connected to case BM132?” Struz 2.0 asks. He’s all business, which shouldn’t surprise me. But this guy is so important to me in my life, it’s hard to process and accept that I’m so absent in his.

Barclay gives a rundown of my involvement with Ben. It’s weird to hear someone reduce the intensity of what I feel to just a few sentences. Where we met, the days and times we interacted, the things we told each other—it sounds sterile.

There’s nothing in his report that’s wrong, it’s just that there’s nothing in there that’s right either, nothing that suggests he’s talking about
my
Ben, the guy who fixed my schedule, pressed his finger to mine and healed a paper cut, inserted himself in two of my classes, brought my favorite food to a picnic dinner at Sunset Cliffs—the guy who saved me from death. Nothing that says since the day he left, I’ve been daydreaming about his face, his dark brown eyes, his lips, the way his hair falls in his face, the way he reached out, touched my cheek, and pulled me into one last kiss, the way he took slow steps backward toward the portal, as if he didn’t really want to leave, the way he said my name and told me he loved me, and the way the portal swallowed him up and he disappeared. The way he said,
I’ll come back for you
.

When Barclay finishes, Struz 2.0 looks at me and then touches his computer screen. “Good work bringing her in, Barclay.” He frowns, and the emotion that flickers over his face suggests he’s not happy about something. “It looks like the director wants her questioned and detained.”

Maybe he doesn’t want to send me to prison to await my execution. Or maybe that’s me and my wishful thinking again.

“Yes, sir,” Barclay says.

“I can take it from here. You’ll file your report?”

“Yes, sir,” Barclay says, then gets up and leaves the room without so much as looking at me. As he’s leaving I have a moment of panic. What if this has all been some elaborate trick and there isn’t going to be any escape? What if this is it—if I just turned myself in to the enemy?

But I swallow any hysteria down and remind myself that Barclay didn’t need to convince me to come, insert a microchip in my arm, make me memorize prison blueprints—he could have just portaled in and grabbed me when I was sleeping.

It’s not exactly comforting, but it’s all I’ve got right now.

I’m alone with Struz 2.0. When I look at him straight on, that’s when I realize deep down that this isn’t Struz at all There’s something about Struz 2.0, the fact that he’s so similar, yet just slightly different, that’s alarming. He has the same face, the same eyes, the same voice, the same everything. But there’s so much that
feels
different. And it’s more than just the way he’s sitting with his legs crossed, the matching socks, the polished shoes.

It’s like whatever made the Ryan Struzinski in my world into a guy that would go by “Struz,” this guy doesn’t have it. And I don’t know what that means.

The realization has a sinking effect on my heart, my eyes get a little watery, and an overwhelming feeling of desperation wells up inside me. More than anything I just want to go home—I want to hug my brother and tell Struz I’m sorry for all the stress I cause him. I want to see them again before it’s too late.

“This should go relatively quickly, Miss Tenner,” this guy who’s not Struz says. “We just have a few questions.”

I look around the room, at the wall behind him, the door, the ceiling, anywhere but at the man in front of me, and I try to concentrate on my breathing. I take long, decisive breaths, inhale for a full five seconds, exhale for another five.

“I’ve met a few doubles in my time,” he says, his voice even and soft, and I can’t help looking at him. “It’s unnerving at first, but you just have to keep reminding yourself I’m not the man you know. We might look a lot alike, and we maybe have a lot of similarities, but we are completely different people with different experiences that caused us to lead different lives.”

I nod as my eyes fall on a picture frame on his desk. It’s next to his monitor, a thick silver frame, well polished and dust free. Inside it are two smiling faces, a boy and a girl with bright blond hair, deep blue eyes, fair skin, and wide smiles. The resemblance is undeniable.

They must be his children.

I shift my eyes to this Ryan Struzinski, and he’s looking at me expectantly.

I think about what Barclay told me—I should answer truthfully as much as I can. Short, concise answers.

My breathing has slowed, and I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.

“Okay,” I say, keeping it brief.

“Excellent. Now, when’s the last time you had contact with Ben Michaels?” he says, sliding a picture of Ben in my direction.

F
or a second, I can’t breathe. I just stare at the picture.

It’s a candid shot, taken without Ben’s knowledge. He’s wearing a faded blue grease-stained button-down shirt that says
WAKEFIELD AUTO
over one breast pocket and
BEN
over the other. He’s not looking at the camera, he’s looking somewhere off to the side, his eyes down, his mouth parted slightly as if he’s talking to someone. His hair is slightly longer than when he lived in my world, and it flops over his face, partially obscuring his expression.

“Miss Tenner?”

I look up. Deputy Director Ryan Struzinski is sitting with some kind of clear glass iPad and pen. He’s not looking at me.

This man is not the Struz I know. And it’s not just that he’s more put together. Despite the fact that he seems to have wayward morals, he works for the IA and they are threatening people’s lives—Ben’s, his family’s, and mine. He’s either okay with that or he’s okay with the fact that it’s just the way things are done.

I breathe out. “About four months ago, that’s the last time I saw him.”

He nods and presumably jots down what I just said. “And what was the circumstance?”

“We drove to an abandoned house and confronted two of his friends,” I say. “We knew one of them was opening unstable portals. Agents Barclay and Brandt arrived shortly after us. They sent Ben back to his world.”

“And by his friends, you mean Reid Suitor, now deceased, and Elijah Palma,” he says.

I answer, even though it’s not a question. “Yes.”

His eyes flick toward mine. “And you haven’t seen Ben Michaels since that day?”

I hate that this answer is the truth. “No.”

“Have you had any contact with him?”

I shake my head. “No.”

“No emails, letters, texts, nothing?”

“Is that even possible?” I ask, because if it is, I’d like to know for future reference.

He leans back. “I just need you to answer the questions.”

I roll my eyes. So much for trying to be nervous and diminutive. “No, I haven’t heard from him at all.”

“Well, thank you for answering my questions. We’re going to need to detain you until this matter is settled,” he says, looking down at his paperwork, and I don’t know why I can’t follow directions, but something in this moment makes me have to say it. Because it’s the truth, and this man right here, wearing the same face as the man I trust and love more than anyone, he should believe me.

“Whatever you think he’s done, Ben is innocent. He would never hurt anyone.”

Deputy Director Struzinski looks at me, with the corners of his mouth downturned, his chin tucked in, and his eyes soft—full of pity. And he says, “There’s a lot of evidence against him, but when we bring him in, we’ll make sure he gets the chance to prove himself innocent.”

I almost say, “What about me?”

Because I’m innocent—though I won’t be at this time tomorrow. But right now I am, and yet he’s willing to detain me and file the paperwork for my execution in less than four days.

T
wo armed security guards pick me up from the deputy director’s office and take me to a back exit where a van is waiting. They load me in and strap me down. If there’s paperwork to be done or any kind of processing for prisoner transfer, it doesn’t require my involvement.

The windows are blacked out, and I can’t tell if it’s night or day.

I think about Ben. Wherever he is, he must have some sort of plan—to save his family, to prove his innocence. I just hope we can find him in time.

And I think about Cecily and where she might be. If it’s somewhere without any light, if she’s been bound with restraints this whole time, if she had to be sedated after going through the portal, if she cursed and screamed at whoever took her, if she’s hurt and scared.

I try not to question if she’s already a slave—or if she’s still alive.

My breaths are shaky and my eyes burn. None of this is right. Cecily should be at Qualcomm, planning the next movie night and organizing more team-building exercises. And IA should be trying to find her. Instead they’re threatening my life, locking me in prison, and throwing away the key.

This isn’t just about the traffickers anymore. Because there’s a deeper problem in the fabric of IA, and we need to fix it.

I understand that people in law enforcement sometimes make hard decisions in order to get the bad guy and save the day. I understand that sometimes the greater good requires sacrifices. I even understood four months ago why Barclay’s orders were to sacrifice my entire world—to blow it up, demolish it—before Wave Function Collapse destroyed two worlds and adversely affected a number of others.

I didn’t like it, but it made sense.

But what the IA is doing right now—detaining people Ben cares about and planning to execute them if he doesn’t turn himself in—it’s not right.

Even if Ben really was the bad guy, it still wouldn’t be right.

And it doesn’t necessarily mean everyone in the IA is evil, or that everyone there is involved in the trafficking ring. It takes a different kind of corruption to actually get involved with a criminal organization as opposed to going along with something that’s not a good policy. But it means the underlying morals of the IA, as an organization, have gone astray.

Somewhere in its history, someone crossed a line and other people went along with it. And now, instead of using resources to find the bad guy, they’re threatening him to get him to come to them. And they’re willing to throw away innocent lives to do it.