Okay: so I was chained up, in the dark, with no idea of where I was. I shifted a little, feeling loose fabric around me, and added “wearing a bathrobe instead of real clothing” to my list of problems. The material was rough enough to be cheap, meaning it had probably been purchased from a gift shop, not stolen from one of Sarah’s high-end hotels. My feet were bare. If they’d taken my clothes, they’d taken my weapons. I was as close to helpless as I was ever going to get, and that pissed me off.
Taking another slow breath, I closed my eyes and thought, as hard as I could, Sarah? Can you hear me?
There was no response, and I realized that even the low-grade telepathic static of her presence was gone. I pushed back a surge of panic. There was no reason to suspect that they’d managed to track Sarah down while I was unconscious, and that meant one of two things. Either I was still under the influence of Margaret’s telepathy-blocking charm, or the Covenant had already moved me out of New York, and I was outside Sarah’s normal broadcast range. She’d be looking for me—they all would—but if I was too far for her to find telepathically, she wouldn’t know what to do. She wouldn’t have another way to start looking. If she was smart (and Uncle Mike would make her be smart, if he had to), she was already on a plane back to Ohio to hole up with her parents. Two cuckoos in one house meant the Covenant would never find them, no matter how hard they were looking. Sarah and Angela have been the family escape plan for a generation now.
I realized I was thinking like I was already lost, and I embraced it. It wasn’t the same as giving up; I didn’t expect the Covenant to kill me fast, and the longer they kept me alive, the better my chances became. But if my family thought I was out of reach, they might give up on me, and we might be able to minimize the damage.
There was no way they were going to do that. But it was a nice thought.
There was a soft click from one wall, like a lock was being turned. Nice as it would have been to stare defiantly at the door as it opened, I wasn’t in the mood to have my retinas seared after sitting in the dark for this long; I turned my face to the side. It was a bad choice. The actual door was in the wall I was facing now, and as it swung open, a blast of industrial white light streamed into the room, framing the outline of Margaret Healy.
“I see you’re awake,” she said pleasantly. That was more frightening than any threats she could have made. “That’s good. We’ve got quite a lot to talk about, you and I.”
“You could have invited me to coffee,” I said, squinting as I waited for my eyes to stop watering. “I don’t know how you do things in Europe, but here in America, we usually start our family reunions with something a little less high-impact than assault and kidnapping.”
“You hit me first,” Margaret shot back. Her pleasant tone didn’t waver. “Besides which, you’re not much of one to talk, since the first thing you ever did was lie to me. Where did you leave that girl who was with you? Sandy, I believe you said her name was?”
There was no way I was going to remind her that Sarah was the one who hit her, not me. “She has nothing to do with this,” I said. “She’s just someone I met at a dance class. Leave her alone.”
“That’s the thing about traitors and liars. You can’t believe a word they say. She lied for you. She tried to cover for you. Now why would she do that if she had nothing to do with this?” Margaret flipped a switch next to the door. The overheads came on, filling the room with more light. This didn’t hurt as much. My eyes were adjusting. “Your name isn’t even Valerie, is it?”
“Does it matter?”
Margaret smiled. “Oh, it matters. It matters a great deal. We’ll need to know what name to bury you under, when we’re finally done with you. If you’re worried for your life, don’t be. You’ll be with us for quite some time.”
“I gathered.” I forced myself to relax, trying to look unconcerned. “What makes you think I’m going to talk?”
“I have a better question for you: what makes you think you’ve got a choice?” Margaret lunged across the small distance between us, grabbing my hair before I had a chance to move. She yanked my head back, making it pound even harder. “No one knows you’re here. No one’s coming to save you. You’re going to get what you have coming to you, finally, and you’re going to tell us where to find every other stinking rat in your hole.”
The pain in my head helped me focus on what mattered: she was right. I was her captive, and I was pretty sure the Covenant wouldn’t slap her wrists for using excessive force on me. All the advantages were hers. I put on my best tolerant reality television smile, trying to look like I wasn’t even a little bit concerned about my situation. “Oh, Christ, you’re a metaphor villain, aren’t you? You’re the ratcatcher, I’m the rat, you’re here to exterminate the vermin, is that it? Wow. Do they have a cliché course that they make you guys go through before they release you into the field? Or maybe you’re naturally talented. I mean, that happens, right?”
Margaret’s eyes widened in confused indignation before she let go of my hair and shoved my head hard to the side. My neck audibly cracked. I somehow managed not to squawk. “You may think you’re funny now, heretic, but you won’t be laughing for long.”
“You may as well kill me,” I said, aiming for boredom rather than bravado. I wasn’t sure that I was managing either. “I’m not going to tell you anything.”
“Aren’t you?” Margaret smiled. “You’ve already told me plenty.”
My stomach sank. “Oh?” I asked.
“You’re a traitor from a bloodline of traitors, but no Healy has ever been a coward. You wouldn’t be telling me to kill you if you didn’t have something to hide.” Margaret’s smile grew, chilling me. “You’re not the last of your family. And you’re going to tell me where to find them all before I let you die for your sins.”
I was so busy watching her face that I didn’t see her tense her arm until her hand lashed out, her fist catching me square in my unprotected jaw. The lights went out—for me, at least—and for a little while, the world went away again. My last thought before I lost consciousness was that I really, really hated this girl.
The sound of the door opening again woke me. I cracked my eyes open just enough to see that the lights were on, and that the person standing in front of me wasn’t Margaret. It was a man, slim, dark, about my height. Dominic. The sight of him made me sit up a little straighter and open my eyes all the way, my heart thudding painfully in my chest. Thankfully, I managed to bite my lip before I could say his name.
It wasn’t him. This man was the right height; that was where the resemblance ended. His hair was dark red, not brown verging on black, and his eyes were a cool, implacable blue. His skin was pale, spattered with freckles . . . and he was smiling.
“Why do you people smile all the damn time?” I asked, and was instantly ashamed of how shaky my voice sounded. Head injuries and unknown periods of captivity without food or water will do that to a girl.
“Because, love, you’re our unicorn,” he said. His accent was Irish, and heavier than Margaret’s. “Never thought I’d see the day.”
“Wait, so first I’m a rat, and now I’m a unicorn? If you’re going to be metaphor villains, maybe you should have a meeting first. Come up with a nice theme and stick to it.”
The man clucked his tongue, looking amused. “Oh, you’ve got a mouth on you, don’t you? I hoped you would. You look enough like the family standard that I assumed some other bits might breed true.” He leaned closer and murmured, with evident satisfaction, “You may have thought you were hiding, but you never stood a chance. You look too much like your ancestors.”