Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 127712 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127712 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
“Do you want to play with me, Nova?” Patricia spits these words out.
And I come back with the same amount of venom. “I certainly do.”
“I’m going to destroy you.”
“Oh, no you’re not. Because I have already destroyed you. You just don’t know it yet.”
She laughs. “Is that so?”
“The moment your car pulled into my parking lot we sent a flurry of emails. And in that email, there is a link. And at the end of that link, there is a database. And in that database are the videos.”
“Let me guess. You sent these emails with this link to reporters?”
“Wow. You really do think I’m stupid. No, Patricia. The reporters all work for you and your Institute. We didn’t send the link to reporters. We sent the link to hackers. That was what?” I look at my watch. “Ten minutes ago?” Then I smile. “They’ve copied this database at least a thousand times by now. Every video on that island. Every trial. Every sex scene. And if you think I’m embarrassed about the sex I had in that last trial, try again. It was fucking fantastic. And I do mean that literally. And now I really am bored. So I’m going to end this. You’re finished. I’m in those videos. Locke is in those videos. Travis, Mercer, and just to make sure we covered all our bases, we recorded a full confession and made sure Veda was in those videos too. So if you so much as look at us the wrong way—“
“Get out.”
“Oh, I’m going. But I’m gonna get this last threat in first. If you so much as look at us, there will be another data dump. This one isn’t of the trials, but of the parties.”
This was Mercer’s idea. He had these vids from when he was a child. He would not tell us what was on them. “Some things you can’t unsee, Nova. These are the type of things that ruin you.” That’s what he told me. “I wouldn’t let my worst enemy watch these videos.”
Finally. Fucking finally Patricia goes pale white. And I know, with one-hundred-percent certainty, that we are safe now.
“Let me out,” I say. “Now.”
She knocks on the glass that separates the driver from the passengers and there is a click in the door as the lock is released.
I open the door, find a startled Eliana, then face her and say, “You can leave too, ya know. Even if she is your real mother, you’re free to go. We’ve made sure of it.”
Then I push past her, walk across my parking lot, and go into my house.
Mercer and Locke are standing there in the living room—Veda between them, holding their hands—with a shocked look of happy surprise on their faces.
I nod, then realize that Locke is holding a phone out for me.
“It’s Travis.”
I breathe funny for a few moments, grab the phone with a trembling hand, then say, “I’m here.”
And he knows just what to say.
It’s the perfect way to end this chapter of my life.
“You sure are, Bugs. You sure are.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR – LOCKE
There are ways to set things right, and then there are ways to set things right.
I decide to start down my road to redemption with Travis Olsen.
He and I have to clear the air. Because even though he’s not interested in Nova the way Mercer and I are, he’s still a part of… us.
The midnight-blue clapboard siding is aged and the paint is starting to peel. And it’s super small. Two bedrooms—one for him, one for Veda—and one bathroom. But like Nova’s house—it’s got charm. A cottage, really. But it’s right on the beach. Like… I’m taking one of those private three-story staircases out back that leads straight down into the waves and sand kind of beachfront.
This is not his weekend with Veda.
I planned it that way on purpose—and I brought beer. Because he means a lot to me and I don’t’ think I’ve ever told him that.
When I get to the house I don’t go to the front door. I just walk around the side and find him kicking back in a Adirondack chair, staring at the sunset and smoking a cigar.
Every time I’ve come out here, I’ve found him in this same place. Just… staring out at the sea, or the sun, or watching Veda make sand castles and jump around on the rocks as she looks for tide pool creatures.
I set the six-pack of local brew down on the arm of his chair and take the seat next to him.
Travis Olsen smells like… I dunno. Something good.
“Were you barbequing?”
He side eyes me—cigar clenched between his teeth—and it suddenly occurs to me that maybe he sits out here and wonders how it all happened.
That trailer park.
And now he’s here.
He’s got a black hoodie on. It’s pretty faded and the white letters across the front spell out the word Anonymous. Like the hacker group.