inDIVISIBLE (11 page)

Safety had already fled. I skipped to the next.
Tell Brynn about Sofi and her real mother.

I
turned the page, scanning frantically until I found what my father had never told me, that Sofi was not my mother. My mother had died while I was an infant. My mother had never known me, and I’d never known her. My hands shook, and I had to plant them on my thighs while I continued reading, my life unraveling, my entire childhood playing out as a sham. I shoved the books into my backpack and ran after T.

The two
had turned a corner, the very corner where I now stood, but neither the Alliance official or T were anywhere in sight. A man in a maintenance uniform got into an open service vehicle and buzzed away without a glance, but nothing hinted at T.

I ran forward, searching a small parking and shuttle area at the back of the building but found nothing. Both men were gone.

I ran back toward the front of the building, toward the tree where T had asked me to wait but security officers arrived, their little green cars humming to a stop outside the building. Men piled out, guns held ready in their arms, other guns strapped to their backs.

I eased back behind the building, pressed myself into it
as fear creep down my spine. How had they known we were here? Had someone inside the building recognized and reported us? I pushed from the building, determined to look as inconspicuous as possible and strolled to a side street. Without my PCA I had no way to communicate, no way to view the news updates that I was sure were flashing in bright red bars across the screen.

Something had happened
, and I hoped it did not involve T’s capture but what could I do without getting caught myself? I had to believe he was still out there and that he’d find me. For now though, there was nothing I could do but walk away.

Voices raised at the front of the building, a crowd gathered and I kept my pace even, turning another corner to disappear into a quiet neighborhood where
children rode their bicycles in front of their homes and laughed as they played a game of tag in the next.

CHAPTER 13

I hadn’t meant to walk home, but habit kicked in, and I found myself a block away before I realized where I’d gone. I stopped and stared, lights glowing from the circle of glass barely exposed above our yard.

She sat in there now, wa
iting for me to return or hoping I didn’t while tearing apart my room to figure out where I’d gone so she could report me—I wasn’t sure which.

I wa
nted to confront her but knew now more than ever that seeing my mother was suicide. Not my mother, I reminded myself, Sofi. My mother was dead—had been since before I could crawl. But how could my father not tell me? How could they play the parent role so convincingly that I had never even suspected?

And what of the neighbors, did they know Sofi had married my father when I’d been a baby or did they think she was truly my mother? Perhaps they’d even moved to this neighborhood after they’d married. I didn’t even know and that bothered me more, not knowing my parents, their history.

I stepped forward, no longer caring who heard or what they did to me—my mother needed to know how I felt, how she’d hurt me and my father. One more step and a hand clutched my forearm, bringing me to a stop before dragging me the other direction.

“It won’t help anything, Brynn,” T said.

I tried to shake him away but his grip felt like a vice around my arm. “She lied to me, T. She lied to my father and I’ll bet you anything it’s her fault my father’s dead.”

“Your father loved
Sofi,” T said.

I shook my head. “
She was a spy. They sent her into my life because of my father’s job so she could report back to the Alliance. She wasn’t my mother, just some Alliance official doing her job and pretending it was her life.”

T dragged me around the corner toward the
shopping district, walking so fast I couldn’t speak until he slowed.

“They had my freaking house bugged, T. They had me bugged. Why did they need to throw in a spy?”

T tried to hush me but I refused to listen. “I have to talk to her.”

He stopped me and pivoted so he could search my eyes. “She’s not there.”

A dog barked, and I flinched. “Then we wait until she gets home.”

T’s eyes softened, his eyebrows growing together as he scrambled for a way to explain.
“Your parents were in love, Brynn, but that conflicted with Sofi’s assignment. The Alliance suspected so they bugged you. They needed to make sure Sofi hadn’t gone rogue, and they needed to track the people your father had talked to at the office. His death has been in the planning stages for years now, and not Sofi or your father—or you for that matter—could have stopped it.”

“How do you know this?”

“It’s in the book.”

“I didn’t see all that.”

“I think you just quit reading before you got to the good part.”

“The good part?”

              He released my arm, and we walked beside one another now, our pace slow, ambling. “The part where he said he trusts her with his life, where he’s in love with her, where he explains that the reason she won’t talk about the Alliance is because she’s protecting you and your father—the part where Sofi’s scared about what will happen to you if they
do
go after your father, and he has convinced her to let you go on your own before they take you too.”

“My father knew they
were trying to kill him and did nothing about it?”

T reached for my hand
and pulled me toward a lilac bush, farther from the street and the sun and the other pedestrians. “He tried everything,” T whispered, “and he left you his notes so you could pick up where he left off.”

I turned
from him, the lilacs heaving their perfume into the air, adding to the illusion of utopia. Flowers bloomed as children picked at the petals, giddy from sunshine. Bicyclists pedaled past, and I prayed they wouldn’t recognize me, though that was doubtful as the Alliance went out of their way to discourage people from turning acquaintances into friends.

I
understood that process well enough, having been transferred from one school to the next like all the other kids, making new friends every few years and not having enough time outside of school to keep up the old friendships. It’s like they feared what people would begin to believe once they had time to sit and talk out their theories with others,
like Sofi had done
. Chills raced along my arms as I thought about the woman kissing my father passionately when she thought nobody was looking, her hand sneaking under the counter to squeeze my father’s knee, and that look she always gave him that had made my heart melt and me believe that I was the luckiest kid in the world. T was right. My father and Sofi had been in love.

But that didn’t mean it was right to keep secrets from me
, did it?

T took my hand and began walking again, slowly, to blend in. “What would you have done if you’d known?”

“I would have been upset but I’d have gotten over it.”

“And the Allian
ce in the meantime—as they sat listening into your rants against Sofi—would have realized that their spy had crossed boundaries. What do you think they would have done then?”

I wanted to be mad at him, just because he was here, trying to make me understand when I didn’t want to. But I couldn’t be. None of this was his fault
, and my gratitude for his help overwhelmed the anger, as did the music faintly hovering near the shopping center. Designed to relax and rejuvenate, the concoction of symphony and synthesizers now made me anxious. I didn’t want to think about logging today’s exercise in my PCA as I suddenly had the desire to do, and I didn’t want to look up a recipe for baked salmon just because the grocer had an abundance of them.

“Feeling fishy?” he asked and I knew he had caught the urge too.

I nodded and asked, “What about Sofi now?”

Citizens grew thicker now, more mothers pushing their children in s
trollers while others read from their PCAs near the fountains where their children played. Three women giggled over a light supper when one woman asked the others, “Did any of you jog this morning?”

We skirted the fountain
while T’s thumb stroked the back of my hand, his voice soft and caressing. “My guess is she’s being held in interrogation before being assigned to the Section Twelve factories.”

“What do you mean?”

He silenced me until we exited the shopping district, safe in meandering neighborhoods once again. “When I lost you at the Alliance building, I couldn’t think of anywhere else you’d go besides your home, so I’ve been waiting for you. I saw a blond man and a woman enter about an hour ago, carrying an infant. A young boy walked beside them.”

“My house has been reassigned?”

He shoved his fingertips into his pant pockets and shrugged. “That’s what it looks like.”

I sat heavily on the curb, my heart sinking.
“It’s been a day.”

H
e dropped down beside me, kicking his feet out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. “I doubt they’ve moved in yet. They were there ten minutes, maybe, and then left. But I think they like the place.”

“Then I really have nothing left, do I?”

T leaned into me. “It’s easier when you know there’s something familiar left behind, isn’t it?”

I nodded.

He tapped the backpack and said, “At least you still have a piece of your father with you.”

“While you have nothing,” I whispered, thinking of how selfish I’d been not to think of his losses.

“I’ve had more time to adjust than you.”

“Doesn’t make it any more right,” I mumbled.

T just said, “She still loved you, you know.”

“Yeah, I know
,” I said, thinking I should feel heartbroken but giving into anger instead. It would be easier to keep going if I clung to that instead of pity. “I hate them, T.”

He pulled his feet in close to the curb and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Hate who?”

“The Alliance. They’ve stolen everything from me that they’re going to. From now on, they’re going to have to fight me for anything else they want to steal away.”

T cleared his throat, clasped and unclasped his hands. “That’s how your father felt
… and you see where it got him.”

“I’d th
ink less of him if he’d given in.”

T stood and pulled me to my feet beside him. “Then it’s time to fight, Brynn. Are you sure you’re ready?”
              Chills struck and I shivered visibly. “Almost. First we have to find Cray.”

T grinned and the dimple in his right cheek made a rare appearance. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

I cocked my head and fell into step beside him. “Why does that grin look like trouble?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I lifted one eyebrow and cocked my head. He ignored the motion and said, “Someone broke into the Alliance offices today, broke the back door window out. There’s extra security at the doors but they didn’t notice the jimmied window in the back alley.”

I caught my lip between my teeth as the information processed. “
So we can get in?”

“We can get in.”

My heart tingled, and I gave a little squeal. “I honestly didn’t know if we’d make it this far. So, what happens once we’re in?”

“We find out where Cray lives.”

              I shoved T playfully, my arms wobbly. “How do we find
that
out?”

“Person
nel files.”

“
No details, huh? Just do it, and give me the good news afterward, will you?”

He took my hand, a crease of worry in his forehead before h
e turned it to a smile and said, “That’s how I do my best work.”

CHAPTER 14

I stopped T before he climbed through the window. His golden hair reflected the one security light at the back end of the parking lot and his brown eyes were nearly lost in the night. “I don’t want to do this anymore,” I said.

He grabbed my shoulders and whispered
fiercely, “What are you talking about?”

“Cray. We can’t involve him.”

T’s hands tightened on my shoulders. “Cray’s father is dead and Cray lied about his relationship with his father because he knew the Alliance was listening during the mourning. Don’t you think he has a right to be warned that they may be after him too?”

I didn’t want to live this way anymore, wondering who may be on a kill list and what my responsibility to them was
—and what if he wasn’t in danger. Was it fair to disturb his life for a hunch? “Do you really think he’s in danger?”