“The rehabilitation program takes about eight weeks altogether. As her sponsor, you would spend most days with her, and you would oversee all her progress, convening with her doctors and so on. You’ll report everything, of course, directly to me.”
“It might be useless,” I say. “We might not get anything out of her.”
“It’s a risk,” Warner acknowledges. “Regardless, it’s a psychological move to buy us time. We want to wear her down. Give her the illusion of freedom. Allow The Reestablishment to believe we’re stupid enough to have taken the bait, and that she’s still on course to complete the mission she’s been assigned. While you’re with her, you’ll have the opportunity to coax information out of her with plausible deniability; she’ll find herself forced to play along in order to placate you, which means she’ll have to give up some truths in order to survive. Glean what you can about who she is. Right now, you don’t even know her last name.”
I make a sound of disbelief. “How am I supposed to know her last name?”
“You claim to have possessed her alleged wedding invitation—”
“Oh.”
“—and instead of keeping it as evidence, or, at minimum, memorizing its details, you decided to toss it into a fire.”
“Okay, wait a second, that’s not fair—”
Kenji lets out a low whistle, shaking his head at me in something like amazement. “You’re really lowering the bar for the rest of us, man. I appreciate it.” He glances surreptitiously at Warner. “Now maybe someone will finally cut me some slack for failing to file a report on time.”
“You filed the reportincorrectly,” Warner says, turning sharply to Kenji. “And the oversight cost us three months of chaos—”
“Come on,” Kenji groans. “You’ve got to let this go. That was two years ago—”
“Look,” I say desperately. “I didn’t think Rosabelle would end up being so important. I didn’t think I’d ever see her again, and at the time I was a little distracted by what I thought were much bigger issues—”
“I don’t care.” Warner returns his eyes to me. “You’re going to make up for it. I want to know her family history. I want to know what she’s capable of. I want to know about those bruises on her body and the scar inside her wrist. I want to know more about her sister. And obviously I want to know what she’s really doing here. We’re trying to slow down their plans, James. What we need is time. Time, and enough information to prepare a counterattack.”
“Fine,” I sigh, crossing my arms. “I hate it, but fine. When do I have to start?”
“Tomorrow,” Kenji says, throwing a piece of popcorn at my head.“Obviously.”
Warner nods. “Ten a.m.”
“Fine,” I say again.
“One last thing, James.”
I glare at the ceiling. “What?”
“You are not to put a hand on her unless it’s to kill her. Do you understand?”
My head snaps forward. “Excuse me?”
“You heard what I said. Don’t touch her. Ever. Not unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
Juliette and Kenji are looking at me with renewed interest, exchanging glances.
“Oh shit,twist,” Kenji whispers loudly.
He rips open a familiar bag of jelly beans, offers the bag to Juliette, and then dumps a fistful of beans into his own mouth. Chewing, he says, “This might be better than movie night.”
My jaw clenches. “What makes you think I’m going to touch her?”
“I don’t think you have plans to,” Warner says. “I’m only advising you not to do it when, inevitably, you want to.”
“I just gasped,” says Kenji, not gasping.
“Me too,” says Juliette, also not gasping.
“This is genuinely insulting,” I say to Warner. “You think I don’t know how to handle myself? I’m twenty-one years old. You were two years younger than me when you led a fucking revolution—”
