Nate could rewire an entire power intake in less than an hour, but he wasn’t any good at being stern with Pixel. Especially when she turned her big, dark eyes on him. Pixel was an uncommonly pretty little girl. Even Reed’s strong will couldn’t withstand her gap-toothed, sunny smile when she wanted something.
“My head’s mended now,” he said, showing her the line of fresh stitches.
“Did the Servants fix it?”
“No.” Nate touched his cheek, struck by the shadow of a memory that faded into the fuzziness of his lingering headache. “They were busy helping the people at the train wreck.”
“Reed said you needed lots of sleep.”
“I slept all day. I don’t need rest now. You do. That’s how you grow.”
But Nate didn’t stop her when she followed him around instead of burrowing in her bunk. He straightened up the hideout to the sound of distant shouting. Late in the night, it was usually quiet outside. Uneasy, Nate recalled the tension on the street on his walk home. It had felt like the staticky air before a lightning storm. Something was happening.
He shook the dirt out of Reed’s tattered blankets. The patched-up fabric smelled sweet and warm, and he spent more time than he needed dusting the blanket off and folding it up.
Pixel leaned against the scaffolding and watched Nate. The mismatched button-eyes of her rag doll watched him too. He imagined the doll knowing, somehow, that Reed meant more to him than he let on.
Reed laughed too loud and endured the stinking heat of summer and the barren depths of winter without a complaint. He sat down to meager meals with a smile on his face, like he was the luckiest man in the Withers.
And he made Nate feel useful.
But Nate wanted more of the warm feeling he got when Reed was close. It was different than the sensation of a full belly. It was better.
It was more than he should want from Reed.
Reed had grown up in an ugly place where people traded their bodies away to stay alive. “My ma didn’t have a choice,” Reed had explained once, tripping over the words. “The trappers, they’ll take anyone alone. Get back before it’s dark.” Trappers sold their victims’ freedom to the pleasure dealers. And pleasure dealers handed out chem to make the long nights easier to bear.
Now that the Breakers had taken over most of the pleasure houses, the trappers were more relentless than ever. Fired up on good chem and desperate for more.
Nate shivered. Their quiet hideout offered a little bit of peace from the horrors of the streets of the Withers, but it wasn’t escape. Everything terrible was still out there, where his gang dodged from shadow to shadow.
A low hum of anxiety weaved through Nate’s ribs.
He sat in Reed’s bed and pulled Pixel down to sit beside him. “If you’re not going to sleep, you have to stop playing.” After a brief tug of war with the rag doll, she let go and put her head down in his lap with a huff.
“Sparks said the people on the train caught on fire,” she said.
“Not all of them did.”
“Why’d you save them?” She rolled onto her back to look up at him, wrinkling her brow.
“Because I could help. I knew how to open the doors.”
She bit her lip for a long moment and nodded once.
A bang at the hatch startled them both. Pixel rolled out of his lap as he leapt up. The password sounded in code, each knock louder and more frantic. Nate rushed to unlock the hatch and wrenched it open.
“You just left,” he blurted out.
“We’re moving.” Reed grit the words out like a curse.
“What?” Nate staggered back, clumsy with dread, as Reed climbed out and reached down to offer Sparks a hand. “But we’re settled. The shutters. . .”
“You heard me. Start packing everything you can carry. Bring all the food you can.” Without another glance at Nate, Reed climbed up the row of bunks and began tearing down the concealed bags and boxes that contained their few belongings.
Brick struggled through the hatch after them, wild-eyed and winded. She took Nate by the arm and spoke in low tones. “Trappers. Reed thinks they followed you back from Alden’s. We can’t risk it if they saw us. Gotta take cover.”
The floor seemed to drop out from under Nate.
