The Calling

SIXTEEN

“CAN WE WALK ON ahead?” Daniel whispered after we’d set out.

I nodded and told the others we were going to scout a little and to just keep us in sight.

He moved to the side to let Kenjii take the lead. “So what did you read in that cabin?”

I told him what I’d deciphered from the handful of memos I’d found. And “deciphered” was the right word. While they weren’t written in secret code, they were intended to be read by people who already knew what was going on. There was no overt mention of benandanti or skin-walkers or supernatural powers of any kind. That meant I had to combine what I already knew with lots of guesswork.

The St. Clouds were a real corporation—I’d seen its subsidiary names on products and heard their corporation mentioned in the news. The same seemed to be true for the company that was after us—the Nasts. Piecing that together with the cryptic messages we’d found on Mina Lee’s answering machine, I deduced that these were two rival corporations: the Nasts and the St. Clouds.

It seemed that these companies were both staffed by supernaturals. A progress memo had said things like “Working on getting the Enwrights flown up. Their unique skills could be helpful in this search” and “A scent tracker would be a huge benefit. Would love to hire a ww on contract but company policy forbids. Meeting with Josef Nast today to discuss.”

Call me crazy, but I was going to bet the Enwrights’ unique skills weren’t an astounding ability to read wilderness signs. As for a supernatural scent tracker, I suspected “ww” meant werewolf—Sam had said such things really existed.

When Daniel and I had hacked onto his mother’s old computer, we’d found references to an experiment in Buffalo that had gone wrong. We’d thought it was another drug-testing venture. From another memo I’d read in the cabin, I now suspected something very different.

“Project Genesis,” Daniel said. “There was a Delaney on that list, too. And an Enwright, I think. Was it another branch of our experiment?”

“No, ours was referred to as Project Phoenix. Meaning they’re resurrecting extinct supernatural types, like Rafe said. It looked like the Nasts were concentrating on our group. The memo said they were leaving cleanup on Project Genesis to the St. Clouds, and they’d get involved later if it looked ‘profitable.’”

“Cleanup?” Daniel swore. “Not liking the sound of that.”

“Apparently the St. Clouds ‘lost control’ of some ‘assets’ and were searching for them.”

“In other words, the subjects took off.”

I nodded. “I think so. The only other thing I got from the memo was the name of the guy in charge of the Edison Group. Dr. Davidoff.”

“Davidoff…?” He swore again. Dr. Davidoff was the guy the St. Clouds sent for our annual checkup.

“He’s dead,” I said. “Like a bunch of other members of this Edison Group. Killed in an ‘incident’ last spring.”

“So I guess we know why he skipped the summer teleconference.”

I nodded. We walked in silence for a few minutes, then fell back in with the group.

We’d been walking for about thirty minutes when Daniel asked me to do another treetop check. I’d been avoiding it—really couldn’t afford to stumble into another pit of grief and regret right now—but that bird’s-eye view of the region was invaluable. Also, while I could gauge our direction by the sun and the foliage the others felt better if I climbed to “check.”

So I found a tree and scaled it. Yes, I thought about Rafe, but after that cabin visit there was so much else swirling around my head that I could push it aside.

Kenjii took up position at the bottom. A few minutes later, she stood and gave a chuff, meaning someone was coming. I peered down to see Sam approaching Kenjii warily, looking around for me. I considered ignoring her, but when Kenjii glanced up, Sam spotted me.

I climbed down to the lowest branch. She waited for me to jump to the ground. I didn’t, just said, “What’s up?”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“Okay, talk.”

I settled on the branch, feet dangling. She stood there, looking up at my feet, then pointed at my legs. I’d taken off my socks after the crash—they’d been soaked—and hadn’t replaced them. When I sat, a few inches of bare shin were exposed.

“Those scratches,” she said. “They’re from when you got dragged underwater, aren’t they?”

“Yep.”

“They’re fingernail gouges. You didn’t get caught on anything. You were pulled down. By a person.” She held up her hands, nails bitten to the quick. “It wasn’t me. And if that’s not enough proof, you can ask Corey. I was in front of him when Nicole went under. I wanted to help, but he told me to stay put. I did until he had her.”

“Okay.”

“You’re speculating that Hayley, Nicole, and Serena are the same supernatural type, right? Something to do with water. Which explains how they can swim so well and hold their breath so long. You think someone drowned Serena, someone who could stay under even longer than her. Someone who also tried to drown you.”

I slid from the tree. “Where’s Hayley?”

“She’s not the one who drugged you.”

“What?”

“At your party. Hayley didn’t dose your drink. It was the person who accused her. The one who worked with her at the clinic and had access to the drugs, too.”

“Nicole?”

Sam nodded. “I found the pills in her room afterward. She tried to say Hayley had planted them. I didn’t believe her. She finally broke down, sobbing, saying she hadn’t meant for anyone to get hurt, just that it was her big chance with Daniel and she knew you kind of liked Rafe, and he was coming to the party. She just wanted to give you and Rafe a push, so you wouldn’t interfere with her and Daniel.”

“I’ve never interfered—”

“Yeah, I know. But when it comes to Daniel, Nicole is…” She took a deep breath. “Anyway, I told her that she screwed up and if she ever went after you again, she’d be dealing with me.”

“And you didn’t think to tell us?”

She met my gaze. “The wrong decision. I see that now.”

“So Nicole dosed my drink.” I tried to process that, but my brain refused. Sam was lying. Covering up something when Nicole wasn’t here to defend herself.

Then I realized where this was heading. “You think Nic… Nicole drowned Serena? Tried to drown me? No, that’s not—She was almost drowned herself this time.”

“Was she? Or was that a diversion? She pulls you down, thinks she’s drowned you, then pops up, screaming for help and no one notices you’re gone until it’s too late.”

“No. Not Nicole. Why would she—?”

“Daniel. She’s obsessed with him. She didn’t think Serena treated him right and—”

“So she killed her for it?” I said.

“I don’t think she meant to. Or maybe she did. I don’t know.”

“Nicole never had a problem with Serena and Daniel. From what I heard, you did, though.”

“What?”

“Serena told me you caught her flirting with summer boys. At the diner, just before she died. You told her off.”

“Sure, I told her off. She was being disrespectful. If you’ve got a boyfriend, you don’t flirt with other guys. Daniel didn’t deserve that.”

“What did Daniel deserve?”

“Huh?”

I gave her a hard look, but she didn’t seem to get it.

“You like Daniel,” I said.

“Um, yeah. He’s a great guy. Which is why he didn’t deserve to be treated—” She stopped and stared at me, then choked on a laugh. “You mean—Are you asking—? You think I’ve got a crush on Daniel?”

“Don’t you?”

She laughed harder. “Oh my God, you guys really are as naive as you seem.” She looked at me. “I don’t like guys, Maya. As friends, yes. As dating material? Wrong gender.”

“Wrong—? Oh.”

She shook her head. “I kept telling myself you guys had figured it out. I mean, come on. I’m a walking stereotype. I even use a guy’s nickname. I was twelve when the kids at my old school figured it out, so I stopped trying to be girlie. Then I come here, and no one says anything, so I figure you all know and you’re just pretending otherwise, which pisses me off, but it’s better than getting Playboy stuffed in my locker. Apparently, I was wrong. It’s not an option in your cozy little world.”

“Right. So the kids who are out at Salmon Creek are only figments of my imagination?”

“Huh?”

“Maybe if you paid a little more attention to your classmates, you’d have realized that we don’t care. But we don’t jump to conclusions either. We figure if someone wants to be open about it, she’ll tell us.”

Now it was her turn to say “Oh.” Then, “Well, anyway, I don’t like Daniel. Not that way. I just think he’s a really good guy. I didn’t like seeing him disrespected, but not because I wanted him for myself. If I gave off that vibe, I sure as hell didn’t mean it.”

She hadn’t. Daniel didn’t think she had a crush on him. Even I’d always felt it was platonic, until Rafe suggested it wasn’t. But Rafe hadn’t known Sam well.

“Okay,” I said. “I guess I can believe that Nicole doped me, if she just thought it would ‘encourage’ me to get with Rafe. But killing Serena? Trying to kill me? Over a guy?”

“Have you forgotten how she acted after the crash? How she ranted about you and Daniel?”

“Her father had just died.”

“So it did seem out of character to you. Right? Not a side of Nicole you’ve ever seen? Well, I’ve seen it. I saw it when I first moved in with the Tillsons. She was used to being an only child and all of a sudden, she wasn’t. She started stealing things and blaming me. Spiked my orange juice once, hoping I’d go to school drunk. I couldn’t prove any of it until I found her planting clinic meds in my room. I caught her off guard and she lashed out and it was just the kind of paranoid talk you heard after the crash—how I was stealing her parents, how I’d probably killed mine. Ugly, crazy talk. Then, a couple of hours later, she came into my room crying, saying she was stressed out over exams and she’d been taking cold medicine and she didn’t know what happened to make her act like that, but she was really, really sorry.”

“And you believed her.”

“Of course I did. She was totally freaked out. I started thinking she wasn’t responsible for the missing stuff, that I’d made a mistake about vodka in my OJ. Sure, she’d planted the drugs, but you know how stressed she got over exams. Add cold medicine and it could push her over the edge. So I let it go. But I’ve caught glimpses of that Nicole a few times since. I don’t know what’s wrong with her, Maya. Maybe it’s mental illness. Maybe it’s whatever drugs they have her on. Maybe it’s a side effect of the experimental stuff. But she’s not stable. That’s why…”

She took a deep breath. “That’s why I didn’t want to go back for her. I feel bad about it, but … we can’t. She’s dangerous.”

Kenjii perked up. She looked to the left, then tore off.

“Daniel’s coming,” I said. I thought fast. “We can’t tell him.”

“He should know.”

“What? That we suspect Nicole killed Serena? That she tried to kill me? Over him? She’s gone, so I’m safe. He’s safe. And if he thinks Serena died because of an accidental drug side effect, then I’m going to let him keep thinking that as long as possible.”

She paused, then nodded. “Okay, you’re right.”

Daniel appeared, Kenjii at his side. He looked from me to Sam.

“All clear,” I said. “Sam and I were just discussing what her parents told her. About everything.”

I looked at Sam. She hesitated, then nodded. “Right. You should know, too. It’s not much but … you should know.”

Daniel nodded, then said to me, “Did you see anything?”

I shook my head. “I could see a lot better from the hilltop. We’re still heading in the right direction, but I couldn’t spot the road.”

“Let’s keep going then. Sam? Talk and walk.”

Sam’s story was similar to Rafe’s. Like his mother, her parents had left the experiment. In her case, though, that had always been the plan. Many of the parents hadn’t been real couples. To ensure the best results, the scientists had performed in vitro fertilization using men and women who both carried the latent genes. But Sam’s parents met during the initial screening process, and fell in love. Neither of them had any interest in living as experimental subjects—they just wanted their child to be a benandanti. So they played along up to the point where Sam was conceived and her DNA was modified to reactivate the gene. Then they bailed.

As Rafe’s mom and mine found out, though, the St. Clouds weren’t willing to let them go.

“Resurrecting extinct supernatural types isn’t a public service,” Sam said. “The St. Clouds run a business. They hire supernaturals and that’s how they get the advantage on human corporations, though they still have to compete with the other Cabals.”

Daniel nodded. “The guy who left a message on Mina Lee’s answering machine said something about double-crossing a Cabal and paying the price. So that’s what these corporations are called?”

Sam didn’t respond.

“Right,” I said. “So it’s a big secret and you’re not going to confirm. Now move on.”

“There’s no secret, I guess,” Sam said slowly. “Only…” She turned to face us. “You guys probably feel like you got ripped off. Lied to. Betrayed. But I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing. Imagine being four years old and moving to a new town, being told that now you have a new last name and you can’t tell anyone the old one. Then you’re five and you’re moving again, and you have another name, and the other kids go to school, but you can’t. Then you’re six and you move, and you’re talking to a nice lady at the park and she calls you by your old name and you forget you aren’t supposed to answer to it. She tries to take you, but your parents stop her, then your dad goes after her, and you aren’t sure what he did to her, but you’re pretty sure it was bad. And that night you’re in a hotel, with all your toys left behind, and you hear your mom crying about how they almost lost you, and you know you can’t ever, ever slip up again.”

She surveyed our faces. “Try living like that, and I bet you’d become really careful about everything you say, too. I bet you’ll think that maybe, just maybe, growing up in a nice town, with everything you ever wanted, isn’t such a terrible thing. Maybe you’ll think the lies weren’t so bad.”

She stalked off ahead. Daniel shrugged at me, then went back to collect Corey and Hayley. I caught up to Sam.

“Don’t,” she said. “Just don’t, okay?”

“I was only going to say that we need to head that way.” I pointed.

“Right.” A soft, choked laugh. “Kind of ruins the dramatic effect if I’m storming off in the wrong direction, doesn’t it?” She shook her head, then waited with me for the others to reach us.