I was sick of being sick of it.
Sucking my bloody finger into my mouth, I turned away from the mirror and walked out of the bathroom.
Tiptoeing back through the room, I slipped out into the dimly lit hall and pulled the door shut behind me.
Expecting everyone else in the compound to be asleep at such a late hour, I immediately headed in the direction of whispering voices. The closer I got, the clearer they became. Rounding a corner, I came to a stop in the doorway of the lounge room.
Tito and Grady stood over a table with their heads bowed together. I watched them for a few minutes, wondering if they would notice me standing there, waiting to be acknowledged. There was a mass of papers between them that I couldn’t see clearly from my vantage point. It was glaringly obvious they were up to something, just like they had been every other night for the past few months. Their stealth level was shit.
“We have to do this on the low. No one else can know,” Tito whispered.
“No one else can know what?” I asked, strolling into the room.
They jumped apart, both spinning around to face me. Tito’s brown eyes met mine, and as always, I was reminded of Tilly, his twin. They had the same Polynesian features: shoulder-length curls and flawless brown skin. The only difference between them was that one was alive and the other was dead.
“How long have you been standing there?” Grady asked.
“Long enough.” Forcing myself to look away from Tito, I focused on the table they seemed a little too determined to block from me.
“What the hell are you two doing in here?”
They stood rigid and silent, prompting me to walk around them to see whatever they were trying to hide for myself. “What is this?”
“Research,” Tito answered, turning back around to watch me.
“Research, huh?” I looked down at the tabletop that was littered with notes, article clippings, and polaroid pictures.
“You’re full of shit, and you’re lying to my face. Why would you be researching them?”
I snatched up one of the many sheets of paper that had‘Savages’scrawled across it.
“I told you we shouldn’t have done this here,” Grady spat at Tito before turning his attention to me. “Cali, this isn’t what it looks like.”
“So, I’m just dreaming that you two assholes are meeting in secret to plan something that involves them?” I grabbed another sheet of paper, letting it flutter to the floor when I couldn’t decipher the sloppy handwriting scribbled all over it.
One picture in particular caught my attention. It wasn’t like any of my others.
I reached for it at the same time as Tito, slapping his hand away before he could pick it up. He wasn’t in color, the man in the photo. Whoever took the shot snapped it without his knowledge.
There was a scowl on his face as he looked at something not visible to the lens. Tattoos covered every visible inch of skin.‘Savages’was inked over his right temple, and directly beneath the corner of his eye was a tiny but noticeable inverted cross. I absentmindedly stroked my necklace, unable to look away from him.
“He might know where David is,” Tito eventually said.
“Might?” Suddenly, he had my full attention.
He sighed. “They’ve been abnormally quiet for the last few weeks. They could be working together. Ithinkthey might be about to do something big.
“My paranoia needs to know what the fuck is going on so I can be prepared if a shit storm is coming, and we don’t get caught in the middle.
“I need someone on the inside. It was either Simon or Grady, so I’m sending him.” He hitched a thumb in Grady’s direction.
“I get why you would keep this from everyone else, but why me? Why would you hide this fromme?”
I was pissed and he knew it. I had been searching for David—my sperm donor—for years. It was damn near impossible to find him because he never stayed in one spot for longer than a few months.I’d heard through the grapevine that The Order was growing and his mindless followers seemed to be increasing with it.
“The fewer people who knew, the better. This isn’t a personal conspiracy against you.”
“This could all be a bunch of bullshit; like he said, it’s just paranoia,” Grady added, backing him up.
