The Gathering Dark (28 page)

“Walker, it’s not that I don’t want to help you, but my mom would kill me.”

“She’d kill you if she knew about Susan, too.”

Smith stiffened and crossed his arms. “This is bigger than
me seeing a human and you know it. I’m not worried about getting grounded. The
Reformers
want you. I can’t fix that.”

Walker put his hands on the desk, carefully avoiding the boxes of needles, and leaned toward Smith. Keira crossed her arms, watching as a thread of darkness snaked into view under her skin and slithered around her wrist. Walker’s voice jerked her attention back to Darkside. “The Reformers need me. They’re not happy, I get that, but I’m too valuable to lose. Unless, of course, there was a replacement at the ready?” The threat was sharp. It pierced Smith and the sneer slid off his face.

“You wouldn’t.” His eyes went round and sad as an abandoned puppy’s.

“I don’t want to, but I’m telling you that right now, there’s
nothing
I wouldn’t do to get what I need. Come on, Smith. You’ve been risking your life for years. What’s one more time?”

The resignation that dropped onto Smith’s face was a relief to see, but something else lurked behind his slumped shoulders and defeated-looking mouth.

Right then, he hated Walker.

But he owed him more.

Keira could see it, clear as day, in the way he grunted at Walker and offered him his choice of needles with a wave of his hand.

“What do you need?” Smith asked. “I’m assuming it’s restricted, or you would have pulled your little appearing-out-of-the-ether act in front of the records you wanted.”

“Your powers of observation are sharp today,” Walker said. There was an edge of irritation in his voice. His calm veneer was wearing thin. “I can see why they put you in here with the needles.”

“Ha.” There was no laughter in the word.

Walker picked up two boxes and checked the sides. A series of crosshatched lines were etched there, and he scanned them like he was reading.

“I need to see the records from the Experimental Breeding Program,” Walker said, like it was a completely normal request.

Smith recoiled. “Why? You already saw them during your training. What
is
going on, Walker?”

Walker shrugged. “I need to see the records. And I need you to keep your mouth shut about it. If you don’t, I won’t be the only one the Reformers are disappointed in. I’ll have you signed, sealed, and delivered to them before you can say
harmony.
”

Smith’s face twisted unpleasantly as he weighed the seriousness of Walker’s threat. Whatever secret Walker held over Smith, it was big enough to make Smith give him what he wanted.

With far more force than necessary, Smith bent and opened a small door in the side of the desk. Keira stretched up on tiptoe to see over the desk, and nearly lost her balance when she reached for Walker’s shoulder to steady herself. For a moment, she’d forgotten that they weren’t together, in spite of being right next to each other.

Stupid.

She laughed to herself, and Walker’s head whipped around in her direction, his eyes wide.

Smith looked up at Walker with a vinegary expression on his face. “What’s funny?”

Keira froze.
Oh, shit. Oh,
shit.
Had he heard her?
She hadn’t slipped over, had she? She glanced down at the mud beneath her shoes. Shimmering over it was a gleaming floor that looked like a single, enormous slab of stone. She curled her hands into fists. It was getting too easy to see Darkside.

“Easy, there. I only cleared my throat,” Walker said.

Smith’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, but he went back to hunting through the desk’s contents. Behind the desk door hung a series of small black discs, each the size of a quarter. They all looked identical to Keira, but Smith grabbed one and rubbed it between his fingers. Smith glanced up at Walker’s hands, wrapped around the small boxes he’d selected.

“One needle per patron,” Smith scolded.

Walker hesitated. “I know,” he said slowly. “I hadn’t decided which one would work better for this. Don’t want to have to come back and
bother
you again if I need a different depth.”

Keira shuddered. She didn’t exactly know what the needles had to do with getting the information they needed, but she had a sneaking suspicion she should have brought some Band-Aids. Big ones.

“Fine,” Smith snapped. “But you bring them all back in
perfect
condition, and if you tell anyone—”

“I wouldn’t tell anyone, Smith. You should know that by now. I’m
excellent
at keeping secrets,” Walker spat back. “Speaking of which, how are things going with Susan? Have you told her everything? Bared your soul? Or are you just trying to get her to bare her ass?”

“There’s nothing ‘going’ with me and Susan. Not anymore.”

Walker snickered, but the set of his shoulders tightened. “Wow. She dropped you already. Exactly how bad a kisser are you?”

Keira automatically reached for her phone, wondering why Susan hadn’t called again. What exactly had happened between her and Smith? But her pockets were empty. She’d left her phone in the car.

“That’s none of your fucking business. Let’s go,” Smith said. The tips of his ears turned red.

He and Walker strode across the smooth floor and Keira hurried to keep up. The guys crossed the large, open main room. They passed straight through the Reynoldses’ chain-link fence, but Keira had to struggle over it, then run to catch up to them.

Which she did.

Just before they disappeared into a little hallway. A hallway that was
inside
Jeremy Reynolds’s house.

Chapter Thirty-Six

K
EIRA CURSED AT THE
wall of vinyl siding. She focused, seeing Darkside. Walker and Smith were at the entrance of a small room lined with what looked like glass-fronted cases, only the glass shone in the same light-absorbing way as the lamps. Keira couldn’t look directly at them without the ache behind her eyes becoming unbearable.

She was going to have to break into Jeremy’s house. Fabulous. He’d practically begged her to come over, and now she was sneaking in like a criminal.

Thank God it was Monday. His parents would be at work and he’d be at school.

She hurried around to the Reynoldses’ back door. It was locked. Of course.

She glanced around frantically, knowing that Walker couldn’t see her and wouldn’t know she was stuck. That’s when she saw the dog door.

The Reynolds had an ancient golden retriever, and if the door was big enough for him, just maybe . . . Keira knelt down, wondering if she were really desperate enough to try it. She looked Darkside again and saw Smith and Walker standing in front of one of the cases.

She didn’t have any other choice.

With a last glance around to make sure none of the neighbors had spotted her, Keira shimmied into the house. Her shoulders stuck in the small opening and Keira panicked. The Reynoldses’ dog, Buddy, came bouncing around the corner, barking. He stopped in the kitchen door, his tail wagging as he saw Keira. In three bounds, he’d crossed the linoleum floor and started licking her face enthusiastically.

Keira twisted and squirmed, trying to avoid his slobbery greeting. In the process, one of her shoulders popped into the house. She slithered through as fast as she could, landing in a heap on the dirty floor.

She ran to the back of the house, into the cluttered spare bedroom. She stopped with her nose inches from Walker’s back. The dog bounced around excitedly, distracting her and making it hard to hear Walker and Smith.

“—not like you’d ever let me forget,” Smith said.

“Just unlock it,” Walker said, his frustration showing.

Smith spun to face the cabinet and pressed the small disc he’d taken from the desk against the glassy front. Keira watched, stunned, as the surface disappeared like clearing smoke. On the newly visible shelf stood a row of what looked like wafer-thin books, their impossibly skinny spines etched with the same sort of crosshatch symbols that decorated the needle boxes.

Smith leaned against the other cabinet with his arms crossed. Waiting.

Walker mirrored his posture. “This might take a while.”

“I can wait,” Smith said.

Walker dropped his arms, carefully setting the needles on a small, circular table that stood near the doorway. “You’re allowed to unlock the doors, but that doesn’t mean you’re allowed access to the information in here. You know that.”

“Oh, come on. I’m curious. We’re already breaking the rules, so what’s one more? No one has to know,” Smith half challenged and half begged.

Walker stared at him until Smith’s shoulders fell. He edged back toward the main hall.

“Fine. I’ve gotta get back to my desk, anyway. I have a bad feeling about all of this, Walker. You need to be careful.”

“Now you sound like your mom,” Walker said lightly. “But I appreciate your concern.” He reached for the door, which looked solid but fell into place with the same rustle and shimmy
as a curtain being pulled closed. When it had settled, shutting Smith out, Walker turned to face the room.

“Okay, Keira,” he whispered. “Time to go hunting.”

•  •  •

Keira watched Walker rifle through the books on the shelf. The double vision of the Hall of Records and the junk-filled spare room throbbed against the backs of her eyes. Walker finally found what he wanted, and when he pulled out a large, square case, Keira realized that the books in the case weren’t books at all. Walker carefully shook a flat circle, the size of a large plate, out of the protective square sleeve.

Oh, my God, it’s actually a record.

Keira hadn’t seen one in ages. Mr. Palmer had a stack of them in the back room of Take Note, but she never paid any attention to them. Walker put the record into a round depression on the tabletop. It had been carved into the surface of the table and it fit the record exactly.

Walker selected the smaller of the two needles he’d taken from Smith and held it above the record.

At least no one’s stabbing themselves,
Keira thought with relief.

Walker looked up at her. “It’s really weird, not being able to hear you,” he whispered. She was uncomfortably aware that he was supposed to be alone in the little room. If someone heard him talking, that was bound to draw suspicion. “You can hear okay?”

She nodded.

“Okay, here we go.” He lowered the needle, tracing the irregular grooves in the surface of the record. “You have to feel the bumps to know what it says—it’s like . . . what do they call it? What blind people use to read in your world?”

“Braille,” Keira answered, even though he couldn’t hear her reply.

“Anyway, I’ll read it to you.” He cleared his throat.

Walker scrolled the needle around and around the record, reciting snippets of sentences as he looked for information.

“ . . . six two six, parentage Poppy Gates and human Mike Hannaford . . . ”

“ . . . discord apparent, combined with lack . . . ”

“ . . . failure of musicality . . . ”

“ . . . four seven declared insufficient . . . ”

“ . . . experiment officially at an end, the subjects are being eliminated in order of birth date, beginning with the eldest.” Walker slowed the needle and Keira guessed, from the mix of anticipation and dread on his face, that he’d found what they’d been looking for.

His voice got quieter. “After the integrity of the records was compromised by the program’s head, Dr.—”

The thump-swish of a door crashing open echoed through the Reynoldses’ house, breaking Keira’s concentration. The dog raced out of the bedroom, his tail wagging furiously.

“Hey, Buddy!” Jeremy’s voice bellowed in the kitchen.

Panic spread through Keira. What was he doing home? Why wasn’t Jeremy at
school
? She had to get out before he found her. The room’s only window was blocked by a dresser. The sound of paws racing down the hall made her spin back to face the door. Buddy the dog stood in the doorway and woofed at her.

“Buddy?” Jeremy called, concern tingeing his voice.

Keira looked over at Walker, who was bent low over the record, frowning in concentration. She waved her arm, hating the swishing noise the fabric of her shirt made. It sounded impossibly loud.

Buddy galumphed back down the hall. Keira heard his nails clicking against the linoleum back in the kitchen. He woofed again, and she could hear him racing back and forth between the kitchen and the bedroom. She was trapped. The closet was open, stuffed to bursting with shoeboxes. All the hiding places in the room were already full.

“What’s your problem, ya dumb dog?” Jeremy sounded irritated. She heard him start down the hall, as Buddy burst into the room dancing around her excitedly.

“Sssh,” she hissed, shooing him toward the other bedrooms. Her skin prickled with fear and she ducked behind the open door, pressing herself flat against the wall.

Jeremy’s footsteps stopped.

“Hello?” Jeremy called as he came down the hallway. The question had a lot of threat and no welcome in it. Buddy whined
and darted back into the hall, twisting around to look at Keira. She glanced behind her.

Walker was still in the Hall of Records, tracing the patterns in the record, oblivious.

“Sonofabitch.” Jeremy stomped away for a moment. “If there’s someone back there,” he called, over the sound of a door swinging open, “you’re gonna be sorry. You picked the wrong house.”

The ringing
thunk
of something heavy and metal dinging against the doorjamb echoed down the hall. A crowbar? A baseball bat?

Keira looked at the protected little room in the Hall of Records. There was no time to make a good decision. Jeremy would be swinging something heavy at her head in a matter of seconds. She wished she’d had more practice going Darkside on her own, but it was too late for that now. Crossing over was the only way she could save herself.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

K
EIRA SQUEEZED HER EYES
shut and focused on Walker. She felt for the hard floor of the Hall of Records, the scratching sound of the needle against the record.