The guard stomps forward, twisting his head right to left. He checks behind the row of groundwater pumps lining the reservoir’s edge first before moving onto two mixing tanks at the nearest corner of the chamber, and I’m grateful I didn’t go for the more obvious hiding spots.
His boots clang against the steel bridge, and my pulse grows so loud it’s practically shouting.
Clamping my lips together, I hold my breath until the guard is several feet past the ladder. Once there are nearly two dozen feet between us, Irelax into the support beam.
Something yanks on the shawl. The tear in the fabric has snagged on a protruding screw jutting from the ladder’s steel rung, unraveling most of my makeshift cast. Though my glowing fingers are still covered, one good nudge from the reservoir’s current might be enough to change that.
Slowly, I tug on the damp wool, hoping to unhook it from the screw. It doesn’t budge. I try again, giving it a better yank. The stitch relents, releasing the shawl—but the motion casts a ripple along the surface. I tense, attention flicking back to the guard, who’s halfway across the bridge. Unless he turns around, he won’t notice a couple tiny ripples.
The door swings wide a second time.
“No sign of her in the archive,” the newcomer calls across the chamber. “And the dayshift janitor swears she hasn’t seen anyone come through. Boss is heading to R1 to do a head count on the feeders, see if anyone’s missing from their cabin.”
My teeth grind at the mention of feeders.
Feeders. Rats. Bait. Nicknames given to those of us unfortunate enough to call the first residential level home.
“Maybe she’s in the greenhou . . .” The first guard trails off, his gaze homing in on the space to my left, where the dwindling ripples ebb across the water.
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Not for any good reason, really; it’s not like my inability to see the guard will prevent him from seeing me. But I’d rather not lock eyes with the man who’s about to drag me off to a cell in the Abyss, which is rumored to be kept in total blackness. Not even the dim bioluminescent sconces are allowed. Perhaps it’ll feel like floating. Or like a thick blanket. Or maybe, like the feeder rat that I am, I’ll develop enhanced night vision.
A rumble vibrates across the chamber, stirring up countless more ripples across the reservoir’s expanse and interrupting my feeble attempts at persuading myself that a life of imprisonment might not be as bad as itsounds. I brace for a repeat earthquake.
Though the aquifer above the reservoir groans, it holds steady against the tremors.
“Aftershock?” the second guard questions as the trembling subsides.
“Must be,” the first mumbles, then lifts his gaze from the water.
A minute later, I’m alone again. It’s another five before I dare to move. I lean my head back into the water and release my hold on the support beam. My legs rise to the surface as I sprawl out, eager to release the burden of my aching body and weighty worries.
Twelve years have passed since I last felt the chilled embrace of the reservoir cushioning my back. We were newlyweds, drunk on declarations of love and the endless possibilities of our future.
I’d wanted to stay in our cabin that night, but he’d insisted on sneaking up here.
“How perfect would it be if we conceived our firstborn son in the same spot I proposed?”
“Or daughter.”I’d smacked my palms against his chest.“And you’re not playing fair.”
He’d given me a dimpled smirk.“Life’s not fair, Elle. But you certainly are.”
Water trickles down my throat as my fingertips follow the phantom trail of kisses he’d once traced down my neck. Kisses that had crumbled my shaky resolve on more than one occasion. Kisses from a man I’d given everything to—my heart, my body, even my last name—only to be cast out like a shredded rag for the one thing I couldn’t give him: an heir.
I spin onto my stomach and sink beneath the reservoir’s surface, letting the current carry away the chafing memories of his haunting touch.
When I come back up, my ex-husband’s name is long gone from my mind. And when I ascend back onto the steel bridge, I don’t recall the time he gripped my waist and yanked me back into the water with a hungry gleam in his midnight-blue eyes.
The last of the soot stain drips from my drenched locks onto the steel bridge as I aim for the secondary utility stairwell. I shouldn’t go home, not when I have no way of knowing how fast the mutation will spread through my veins. My very presence could put Taurance and Gem in danger. But I have to check on Gem. And I’m so damn tired. So, I resign myself to getting some rest in our cabin before saying goodbye.
By the time I arrive at our dented steel door, it’s all I can do to lift my arm and knock.
Taurance grabs me by my sopping chambray shift, and I vaguely register her mentioning something about a half-naked man carrying her half-dead sister before I collapse in her arms.
CHAPTER FIVE
“He saidnothing else before he left?”
