Escape (7 page)

Spinning

SHE DIDN'T EVEN KNOW WHERE TO
begin. She didn't want to scare Sam senseless or break his spirit, which seemed to be improving every day. But he had to know. He had to know just how big this was. He had to know that it was all connected, just as they had both speculated. He had to know that the people who wanted him dead were still out there—maybe right outside the door. They were still watching. And most of all, she needed to make him understand that, all things considered, they only had one lead now.

That compound. Loki's compound in the Berkshires that Sam had somehow managed to escape. If Loki or his people were somehow behind her father's disappearance, then the compound was definitely their best shot for clues. But even if Loki had absolutely nothing to do with the disappearance, Gaia was willing to bet that he might have had some information on the person who did. And that information might still be hidden away somewhere in that compound.

The timing was perfect. With Loki out of commission, his operations had come to a complete standstill there—at least that was how it seemed. And if Sam had managed to find his way out, Gaia was clinging to the hope that he just might be able to help her find her way back in.

But how could she ask him to do such a thing? How could she even break the news about the kind of danger he was obviously still in?

“Sam, listen to me for just a second, okay?”

His eyes widened slightly. He could obviously tell that this was serious. “I'm listening. . . .”

“I saw some things today. . . ,” she began slowly. “I had a run-in with a few people, and. . . I'm not even sure what to make of all of it yet, but—”

“People—what people?” he snapped.

“I had a little. . . altercation with that man. The man from the West Side Highway. The one who was trying to—”

“
457?
” Sam squawked. “You saw 457? Did he. . . What did he do to you? Tell me what he did to you.”

Sam looked like his head was about to
start spinning with anger.
Gaia did her best to keep him calm. She would offer him the facts because he needed to know them, but she was desperate to keep the emotions to a minimum if that were at all possible.

Sam began to get ahold of himself, and Gaia
brought him up to speed. She told him about the connection between Pockmark and 457 and thus the connection between both her father's kidnapping and Sam's. Obviously all evidence pointed to Loki, but Gaia still wasn't absolutely sure. His coma was an unequivocal reality, which meant that even if he was behind all this, there was still some other enemy somewhere out there in the dark making it all happen.

“But I have a plan,” she finally forced herself to say. “A crappy plan, but still a plan. And I hate it so much, I don't even want to tell you.”

“Try me,” he insisted.

“Okay. . .” Gaia's chest tightened as she began to feel the painful weight of what she was about to ask Sam to do. “S-Sam. . . ,” she stammered uncomfortably, “if I could do this alone, I swear to God, I'd be gone already. . . and the thought of you in any more danger makes me physically sick. And the thought of you having to revisit that horrible place makes me even sicker, but. . . if we want to solve this thing. . . if we want to find out where the hell my father is and who it is we're trying so hard to hide you from. . . I think that compound is our only lead right now. And you're the only person who has any idea where it is, Sam. You're the only one who can help get me in there and—”

“Us,”
Sam interrupted. “I'm the only one who can help get
us
in there.”

Gaia wasn't sure how to respond. But Sam was way ahead of her.

“We can use my car,” he said. “I hardly ever use the thing. I let this guy Todd Cooper drive it and he pays for the garage.”

“Sam. . .”

“We've hardly even talked for the last year unless it's about the car. He already graduated. He probably hasn't even noticed I've been gone. But if I call him tonight, then I can get the car for sure, first thing in the morning. That's our deal.”

“Sam, you don't have to do this,” Gaia offered, backpedaling in spite of everything she'd just said. “If you can try and remember how you got out of there and how you got to the city, I can just retrace—”

“We
are going first thing in the morning,” he declared, leaning his face closer to hers. “If you think I'm going to let you go alone, you're crazy. Besides, I need to get to the bottom of this just as badly as you do, Gaia. I'm not going to live out the rest of my life in this room. If that's our only lead, then that's our only lead. I can get us there.”

Gaia nodded her solemn thanks. If he was truly willing to take the risk, then she was currently in no position to argue.

“So perfect,” Sam said with a resigned smile. “That leaves us the rest of tonight to go over strategy.” He moved back toward the chair and picked up the pad
and pencil he'd gotten for their strategy session. “I have a couple of ideas. . . . I was thinking we could even—”

“Sam, wait,” Gaia interrupted. “I. . . I can't.”

“Gaia, it's already been decided. I'm going with you, that's—”

“No, that's not what I'm talking about now.”

Sam looked up from his pad and stared at her, confused. “Well, what are you talking about? You can't what?”

Gaia's stomach began to
roll and twist and spasm.
Was she
still
going to try to keep that date after everything she'd been through? Was she still going to take this moment—the moment right after Sam had agreed to risk his life—to tell him about Ed?

Remember that look in Ed's eyes,
she reminded herself. She was hanging on by a thread with him and she knew it.
You're not leaving until the morning. You can still pull it off. The world's shortest date. For Ed. Jesus, think about everything he's done for you. You're going. No matter what you want right now, you're going.

She looked back in Sam's eyes and then she dropped her head. She was frozen. Paralyzed from the head down.
You have to tell him now. At some point he's going to have to know.

It was time. It was time for all her stupid choices to blow right up in her face. That must have been why she was hiding behind her hair.

Tragically Uncomfortable Smile

HE COULDN'T UNDERSTAND WHAT HAD
gone wrong. He'd just done the right thing. He'd insisted on taking her back to that compound. So why had she moved beyond quiet into a state of almost complete paralysis? Her hair fell over her eyes as she gazed at the floor. Finally she tried to look up at him.

“Sam. . . I can't. . . go over strategy with you tonight.”

“Why not?”

“Because. . .”

That couldn't possibly be her entire answer. Though knowing Gaia. . . Was she really going to make him say it? Yes, as the seconds ticked by, it seemed she was.

“Okay.” He sighed. “Because
why?”

“You're angry already,” she complained.

“No, don't be ridiculous. I'm not angry. You just need to talk to me.”

“I'm
trying.”

“You can tell me anything, Gaia. I promise you, you can tell me whatever you're feeling. Whatever is going on. Believe me. There are things I want to tell you, too. Things I need to tell you. . .”

“What?” she asked. “What's wrong?”

“No, you have to talk first, okay? Believe me, you have to talk first. So tell me. Tell me why we can't do this tonight and then I'll talk, okay?”

Gaia took a deep breath, met Sam's eyes with her own, and
then dropped her head again.
“I can't go over strategy tonight. . . because I have a date.” She finally turned her face up and looked Sam dead in the eye. “I have a date with my boyfriend. And I have to keep it. I have to.”

The silence in the room was impenetrable. But it wasn't silent in Sam's head. In Sam's head, all he could hear was Gaia's statement, echoing again and again, until it blurred into
one loud, muddy noise
that rattled his eardrums and left his mouth and his throat bone-dry.

Sam fell back onto his butt and crossed his legs.

“Sam—”

“Shhh.” He smiled and placed his finger to his lips, desperately trying to regain his faculties.
Talk, Sam. Talk now.
He was struck by a number of urges. The urge to destroy every piece of furniture within a ten-foot radius, the urge to leave this stupid little room and never come back, the urge to cry like that pathetic newborn. But he discarded all those urges one by one, employing herculean amounts of self-discipline.
You know what you have to do. You know what you're going to do now, so do it. Honesty is not an option. It's not fair to her. So talk, you idiot. Start lying.

“God,” Sam squeezed out of his throat. “Is
that
what you were so worried about?” He could feel
his heart literally shriveling.
“God, you had me so scared after everything we were just talking about. Don't scare me like that again, okay?”

Gaia looked into his eyes and gave him the sweetest, most loving stare she'd given him since his resurrection. He'd finally seen the look in her eyes he'd been dreaming about, and now it was for all the wrong reasons. “I just don't want to hurt you, Sam. Seeing you again is one of the best things that's ever happened to me. You have no idea—”

“Gaia,” he said, forcing the corners of his mouth to maintain a smile, “you don't need to be so worried about me getting hurt. I took two bullets in the back and I'm still here. Come
on.
We were already broken up. And, I mean. . .”
Go on. Keep going. You can pound your head through the wall once she's gone.
“I mean, I was dead to everyone. That's not your fault. That's no one's fault but your uncle's. No, I'm just. . . I'm glad you had someone to stick by you through this horror show.”
Deep breaths. Deep breaths.
“Wow. . . a boyfriend, huh? I guess I started a trend. Do I know him?”

Gaia's head dipped yet again. Sam was just starting to remember what a horrible sign it was when Gaia's head dipped. He wished he'd remembered that earlier. “Who is it?”

She didn't say a word. She didn't even move a muscle.
But somehow
Sam knew.
He knew already. Had he always sort of known? Maybe he had. In that totally useless way that people know things they don't know. But whether he'd always known or not didn't really matter much now, did it?

“It's Ed, isn't it?”

Her head shot up in surprise.

“It's okay,” he said gently. The gentle part, he wasn't faking. The smiles, maybe. The calm angelic acceptance, definitely. But he wasn't angry. There was no one to blame here, and he knew it.

“We've just gotten. . . really close. . . ,” Gaia began.

“Of course.” Sam nodded.

“He's back on his feet again, and he's been—”

“Wow, that's great,” Sam interrupted. He wasn't even sure which answers were sincere anymore.

“I know,” Gaia said. “And. . .” She trailed off with nothing left to say.

“So. . . okay. . . you have a date tonight. . . with Ed. Your boyfriend.”

Gaia barely nodded in the affirmative. “I do,” she croaked. “I tried to get out of it. I really tried, but—”

“It's
okay
,” he said for what felt like the two-thousandth time.
His brain was beginning to throb.
“You don't need to explain. I just wanted to figure out. . . a game plan for us, that's all. For tomorrow. But we can do it after your date—”

“Yes,”
Gaia agreed. “After the date. Definitely. We
need to do that, Sam. We need to figure out a game plan for tomorrow. That's really the only thing I should be doing now; I just. . . need to go out on this date.”

Sam could feel the conversation coming to a close and he got a bit lazy, actually letting his own head drop forward for a moment.

“But it's going to be the world's shortest date,” she assured him. “I swear. I'm going to tell Ed that we need to make it an early night. Okay?”

Please don't do that, Gaia. Please don't try to throw the dog a bone.

“Well, you'd better get going,” Sam said, trying to cut off her patronizing offer of an “early night” with Ed. The thought of an early night only made him imagine what the
late
nights must be like. “Keep the phone with you,” he added. “Just to be safe. . .”

“Okay . . .” She stood up tentatively from the bed. Sam immediately shot up with her to avoid feeling any more doglike than he already did.

“So I'll. . . see you later tonight, then,” she said.

With that, she leaned over and gave Sam an awkward peck on the cheek. She backed out of the room, wearing a
tragically uncomfortable smile,
and then she closed the door behind her.

It took Sam ten minutes to find the will to move. He managed to drag himself over to the chair, where he plopped himself down and then once again lost his will to move.

Freaking Whale Flippers

MISTAKE. THIS IS ALL A MISTAKE.
What am I doing? What the hell am I doing?

Gaia threw yet another one of Tatiana's lipsticks on the bathroom floor and washed her entire face again until it was practically raw. She looked back up at her chalky face in the mirror and
seriously considered spitting at it.
She pictured Sam's face again and the pain floating just behind that forced smile of his. Was this what he had come back from the dead for? To hide in the closet while Gaia went out with her new boyfriend? A
date?
A goddamn date? Was that really what she needed to be doing right now? A date while her father was out there somewhere with no one to protect him? A date to rub right in Sam's smiling face? A date that had compelled her to put on a freaking
dress?