Chapter 6

“So…” Alessia said when next she was with Lana in the cell a day or so after she’d been carted off to see Erik. “What kind of weird chess game am I now a part of?”

“What are you talking about?” Lana asked from where she was playing solitaire on her phone. They didn’t get service down below so Lana had stocked her phone with games that could be played offline. Once or twice, she even let Alessia play when she needed to put her eyes on a real book or anything that wasn’t the damaging blue light of a digital screen.

“Something tells me James didn’t know about that meeting the other night,” she said.

“Was that ‘something’ blatant obviousness?” Lana said. “You’re no spy, Alessia, but I’ll give you credit for all that show.”

Alessia pouted and turned a little bit red and Lana laughed as she closed the game down and focused her attention on the girl in the cell with a slightly more serious look—as serious as Lana could get, anyway.

“I just hope you and Erik made productive use of your time together in that room,” she said.

“We did,” Alessia said, not wanting to give too much away. Just because Lana was up to something (and occasionally snuck her more food) didn’t mean that she was worthy of too much trust.

“Good,” she said and backed away. “You’re going to meet with your hubby next.”

Drake. Alessia hadn’t seen him in days by measure of the amount of food she’d been given. She didn’t think there was a chance he was too worse for wear, but she also didn’t trust his tension-filled communication with James the last time they were together.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked. “Is this some weird, long-con, mind game?”

Lana’s left corner of her mouth picked up in a crooked grin and she let out a breathy chuckle. She had an air of superiority that would make her and Erik get along just fine. Alessia bristled at staring into the face of someone who thought they knew better, but she held her tongue. Lana was her one chance at getting any kind of freedom from whatever strange game they were in. She wouldn’t piss her off over some pride.

“I’ll let you know when you need to know,” she said. “For now, just play along and go with the flow.”

Alessia didn’t like waiting around and being told what to do. But she didn’t have a choice. She was quickly learning that in virtually all of this, she had no choice. They told her to sit and she did. They said jump and she reluctantly asked how high. Going with the flow felt a lot like being a helpless child, in her eyes.

***

Alessia didn’t like Lana’s words but she also didn’t have a choice in the matter. She was a captive audience and, as Erik so eloquently put it, a pet. She was on a leash and subject to the moods of her owners. She’d have to deal with it all in stride, shut off that pride and the need to know everything. Her mother always said she was a little too curious. She needed to let go.

She wished she was one of those religious people who could so calmly say to themselves, “It’s in God’s hands now,” and be content in her own faith. But her mind buzzed too much for want of sunlight and the feel of real air. She was getting restless and wanted out of this little hellhole of a place they’d locked her in.

“Time to go, princess,” Lana said.

“Is there meant to be a goal for these little meetings?” Alessia asked, getting up and brushing herself off.

“You have your plots and we have ours. The more organic this happens, the better it works for all of us,” she said.

“It might help if we were working together.”

“Don’t mistake this for an alliance,” Lana said, carefully. “I don’t like you that much. You have goals and so do we. They might be aligned, but I’m not about to fall into the trap of being too tied to your allies.”

“I’m guessing ‘we’ doesn’t include James.”

“I’m guessing you should stop prying and just be excited you get to see your man—well, one of your men; that Erik fellow certainly likes looking at you,” she said.

Alessia glared and walked ahead, allowing herself to be pointed in the direction of the interrogation room, this time truly trying to memorize the way. Any part of this place she could map out was better than nothing.

Drake was already there and, luckily, not looking like he’d taken the same beating they delivered to Erik when they first arrived. He didn’t exactly look healthy but he looked alive and safe and that’s as much as Alessia could ask for. She moved forward and hugged him tightly from behind. It caused him to jump but he seemed to recognize her quickly and hugged her back, placing a deep, warm kiss on her temple.

“Alessia,” he breathed in her ear and she shuddered a little too much for the witnesses they had in the room.

God, she missed him. One time together hadn’t been enough. She could feel her cells singing from the contact with him, the way the hairs on her arms stood at attention like she was walking through a field of static electricity. Her body remembered him, remembered his smell and the feel of his arms around her, his breath on her neck.

“All right, keep the PDA to a minimum,” Lana said. “We’ve got fifteen minutes. Talk.”

Then she moved away and Drake’s face turned from the softness of their reunion to complete confusion. Alessia let her hand run along the side of his face and nodded her assurance. She didn’t know how to explain to him what was going on because she wasn’t even really sure she knew. But she could at least assure him this place was safe. What they were doing was helpful.

She moved away from him, despite how cold her skin got from the lack of him, and moved to sit in that same chair that faced him from the other side of the table.

“I think they’re going to try to break us out of here, or stage a coup or something,” Alessia said, quietly. Drake’s eyes widened.

“What the hell makes you think that?” he asked.

“They had me have this same secret meeting with Erik and Lana said some things,” Alessia said.

“You don’t know James,” Drake said darkly. “You’ve been a captive here for days, time blurs together, you haven’t seen the sun. There’s a lot of variables that could go into your thought process right now, including an unrelenting desire to be free.”

“Turn off the professor for a second,” Alessia said with some frustration. “This is weird, right? The cameras are off.”

“I don’t trust James.”

“I don’t think they do either.”

“This isn’t a case of the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” Drake said. “Things in this world don’t work that cleanly. We’re in a massive power vacuum right now and everyone is rushing to fill it before the rest of the world decides what they want to do with the shifters. Everyone is ready to step on everyone.”

“I know,” Alessia said and felt a felt a little stupid saying it. Of course she didn’t know. This wasn’t her world. As much as she wanted to help and be a part of things here, she couldn’t force it. She didn’t know. But she was learning. She could be a player in all of this.

“No, you don’t,” Drake said, not unkindly but with that same tone that he used for the first few weeks they’d known each other. The tone that wouldn’t let her have a say in anything in the classes they were meant to be teaching together.

Alessia sighed. She sat back in her chair. She crossed her arms. She thought it would have been easier to talk to Drake than Erik but there they were having a glare stare down. It wasn’t entirely A-typical, but it was still frustrating to Alessia. He was stubborn and captivity had only made it worse for him and Alessia felt her irritation rise.

“We need to figure this out,” she said. “They’re giving us resources and I say we use them as best as we can.”

“You don’t know these people like I do—”

“Oh, will you knock it off?” Alessia said. “I’m getting real sick of the whole ‘older and wiser’ crap.”

“Well, I do have tenure and you have two more years of school and a mountain of student debt to overcome,” he snapped.

Alessia felt, for a moment, she might have a dragon inside her waiting to jump out as well as her blood seemed to boil beneath the surface. He noticed because he was looking at her and she saw the ghost of a smirk. Angry as she got, she had nothing to show for it and they both knew it. He was a stubborn ass and she couldn’t force him to do a single thing.

“I’m getting out of here,” she said. “I don’t care what you think I do or don’t know about your fucked-up inner politics. I came here to find you and I did. So I’m leaving with you too and then we’re going to sort out this superiority complex you have and then you’re going to take me out for an apology dinner.”

His smirk changed to that of a genuine smile and he chuckled. He sat back, his defenses lowering, his attitude diminishing. He was calming down. It didn’t make Alessia any less angry at him. But it didn’t hurt. She sighed.

“Maybe let Erik and I take the lead on this one,” she said. “You’re smart, no one’s denying it. But we don’t have your weird baggage. Whatever we do, just go with it.”

“Unless I think it’s going to get us all killed.”

“Fair enough.”