“We were given our abilities in a lab?” Lainey’s eyes were wide. She hadn’t stopped asking questions for at least ten minutes, but Sienna would keep answering them as long as her calm continued to float over the group. The others, along with their partners, had arrived within a half hour of Sienna’s call. They’d been already waiting at the mile marker Jace had suggested as a meeting place, parked in a discreet sedan and a black SUV. The cars were covered in mud and dust, and dented in a few places. Jace had turned his truck around and waved at them to follow. He’d stopped only to open his property’s gate, but they hadn’t spoken until they’d stepped inside the house.

Sienna watched, her head tilted as she studied Lainey. Was it intentional, or just what she did? The night Sienna had first used her abilities, they’d come out even when she had no idea she was doing it. She doubted Lainey had any idea she was keeping everyone from freaking out, Sienna included. She walked over to the table and pulled a file out of the box. “My mother was working for a military contractor to produce us.”

Keila’s back straightened at that. “Is that bitch working for the military? Because if she is, then we’re screwed.”

“I don’t know.” Sienna dug further into the box and pulled out a thick folder. She passed it to Lainey, who took it with one hand, almost dropping it when the weight of it surprised her.

“I don’t know if I can open this.” Lainey dropped the file on the table, staring at it.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Keila said, storming over from where she’d stood in the corner near the window. She grabbed the box and placed it on the floor in the middle of the room. “No more games. It’s time we figured this the fuck out.”

Payton leaned forward and plucked out a folder, this one even thicker. She picked out a piece of paper and started reading aloud. “Whittaker, Dumas, Crowley, Gardner, Mesmer, Fox . . .”

“What’s that?” Emily asked.

Payton flipped back to the front of the folder. “It’s a list of families—bloodlines, I think—that had psychic tendencies. I know the last time; the Fox sisters were mediums back in the nineteenth century.” She shuffled the papers, flipping forward again. “There’s also a list of possible abilities—stichomancy, pyrokinesis, clairaudience, psychometry.” She snorted. “There’s even the ability to divine the future from cow dung. Fuck, there’s thousands of them.”

“How did they decide, who decided?” Emily asked. “Even just with us, the abilities are pretty diverse.” She reached down and pulled out a folder. “Oh, my God. It’s a list.”

Payton immediately dropped hers and moved to read over Emily’s shoulder. Keila scowled. “Going to share with the class?”

“It’s a list,” Emily repeated. “There are others.”

Keila nodded once, her jaw firming. “There are a lot of us,” she said. “That much I know.”

“Can we find them?” Lainey asked. “Or maybe they’re better off never knowing, if we can stop this.”

“No,” Sienna spoke for the first time since they’d picked out the first folder. “This is their birthright. They have a right to know.”

“It’s not something to be taken lightly, either,” Payton said. “But I’ve been to hell and back again—and now I know why. They deserve to know, too.”

Lainey nodded. “Okay.”

“But first we take the bitch out.” Keila’s voice was quiet, but it echoed around the room. A deafening silence followed it. Jason was the first to move, sitting down behind Keila and tugging her to sit between his legs. Emily rested a hand on Keila’s arm, meeting her gaze for a quick but intense stare, before sitting down next to her and leafing through her pile of papers. There were quiet murmurs, but no more big expositions. It seemed everyone had settled in for the long haul.

Minutes passed, then longer, until Payton made a small sound of surprise as she uncovered a folder with her name on it, and then suddenly everyone wanted in on that box. Lainey hefted one with Keila’s name on it over to her with a grin. “Look at the size of that. You must have really pissed them off, even in the beginning.”

Keila grinned. “Hell raiser from the start. I like that.”

Lainey pulled over another box and started pouring through it, but Sienna just stared. She didn’t see anything in the box with her name on it; no official records or transcripts. There wouldn’t be one. She was made in secret. What the others had been through had been no less crazy, weird, or scary than what she had been through, but it seemed they were getting their answers. There wouldn’t be any coming for her. What had her mom been thinking? That she’d fight off the entire world? She should have picked Keila, Payton—hell even choosing Lainey would be better than her. The blonde was as sweet as pie most of the time, but Sienna had the feeling you wouldn’t want to be anywhere nearby if someone pissed her off.

She sat back and watched as more boxes were opened, their contents passed around the room. Jace caught her gaze, raising an eyebrow questioningly at her, but she shook her head. The letter that morning had been more than enough. If the others wanted to read through the rest of the bombshell that her mom had dropped on them all, she’d catch up later.

The box Payton had been lifting dropped to the floor with a loud bam. The lid was still off and Payton stood above it, unmoving and a hand held over her mouth. Keila’s head shot up. “What?”

“It’s him.” Payton lifted up a folder with shaking hands. Clipped to the front was a photo of a man; huge, completely bald, and with what seemed to be almost a disfigured face. “That’s the man who abducted me.”

“His name was Zero,” Keila spat out. “I traveled across the country, tracking—and being tracked by—that piece of shit. He killed most of the others I found.”

“Was?” Sienna felt shaky herself, her hands cold and face pale. The guys in her motel room had been massive, too. Were there more of them out there, too, just like there were more of the girls?

“Until we killed him.” Keila looked over at Jason, a shadow passing over her face. She braced herself against the table, a move so slight that Sienna would have missed it if she hadn’t been looking directly at her.

“What?” Emily turned around from her file.

“Keila, I can hear you shouting it,” Payton said, her voice dry. “They’re all going to find out sooner or later. You can’t lock everything away anymore.”

“It’s my mom,” Keila said in a whisper. She held the piece of paper in her hands with reverence. “I grew up in foster homes. I never knew her.” Her lips clamped shut again. That was clearly the most anyone was going to get for now.

Sienna walked forward, standing next to Keila and taking one edge of the folder in her hand. She stared down at the picture. “She’s beautiful. Like her daughter.” Fuck, Keila seemed almost misty-eyed.

“Is she still alive?” Emily asked softly. Keila flipped through the file, breathing loudly. After reading a page, she dropped the file back on the floor, scrubbing her hand across her face. “No.”

“How did she die?” Sienna asked. Had she been murdered the same way her mom had?

“I don’t know,” Keila sighed, a pained expression crossing her face. “Maybe the blonde, maybe even Zero. I just don’t know.”

“The male subjects are different,” Payton said, raising her eyes from her box. “Males reacted differently to the genetic coding.” She made a face. “That’s why they started experimenting with us, apparently. The body rejects the chromosome, twists it almost.” She flipped the pages over, her finger trailing down the paper as she read. “Some of them have powers, but more physical, like super strength or invulnerability.” She shrugged. “Still useful, but not what the military were looking for with this experiment. Explains the fuck out of Zero though. And the monster who attacked Cole and me.”

Sienna paled. “So she could have hundreds of henchmen? Readymade, superman henchmen?”

Jace pulled her close, guiding her to a chair. “Sit, goddamn it, before you fall over. We’ll deal with what we have to when we have to. Meanwhile, you just got out of the hospital.”

“Look!” Lainey had pulled out a folder. This one was different, filled with sheets of paper of all different shapes and sizes, some even colored. Some were photocopies, while others had been torn from notebooks. “Sienna, I think these are your mom’s personal notes.” She handed Sienna the folder and sat beside her. “There’s a list of names here . . .”

“Are all of us there?” Emily asked.

“Yes—except for me.” Sienna pawed through the rest of the file’s contents. “There’s DNA charts, lists of early abilities manifesting. It looks like she was tracking the results of the early experiments, trying to work out what was different.”

Lainey leaned forward and plucked a final piece of paper from the box. It was small and rectangular, with jagged tear marks down the side. “Looks like it’s from a diary.”

Sienna took the paper, her eyes widening. There, among the typed and photocopied reports, was her mother’s open, flowing script. There was a date first, March 3, 1997—the year before Sienna was born. She read aloud:

I think Claudia caught me logging into the chromosomal database. Yesterday, she spent hours pouring over the system security. I don’t know what she’s trying to do. She isn’t sleeping, barely eats. As far as I can tell, she hasn’t even left the building for nearly a month. She has everyone under watch. I don’t know how she convinced them to give her complete control over the program’s security, but it’s going to make things a lot harder.

She paused, her eyes skipping forward, her breath halting when she read the next part. “Shit, I can’t do this.” Lainey touched her knee, passing warmth and support, and then took up where Sienna left off.

I borrowed some equipment from downstairs and set my project up in a small room in the basement. I called it my nest. I hung a printout of a forest scene on the wall and brought in an old lamp. As strange as it sounds, it’s the closest thing I have to a real home. I made my daughter there, singing to her while I imbued her with gifts. I’ll sit in a stolen desk chair, cradling her in my womb while reading nursery rhymes. She’s going to have as much of a normal life as I can give her, until it’s time for her to know. I can do that much for Sienna.

I’m scared half to death that Claudia will find out before she’s born, and I won’t have any way of defending myself, defending her. My only hope is to escape. If I can’t do this, then Sienna will never be born and Claudia’s daughter will go on to commit unspeakable atrocities. She, with the others, is the key to stopping it all.

“No.” Sienna shook her head, lifting her hands. “It’s not me. I don’t even have a clue what I can do. Keila, Payton, you all make far more sense.” She shuffled backward, looking at the others’ faces. Panic ran through her veins. Her entire life was splayed out before them, each one staring into her and her mother’s secret life, hidden away under the stairs. God, how could such a cherished childhood memory turn into something so dark, so twisted? She wasn’t anyone’s savior!

Sienna dropped the file and rushed to her feet, nearly knocking Lainey off the chair. She didn’t pause, didn’t stop, until she’d cleared the room and then the house. She kept running until her feet touched driveway, and then dried yellow grass, until finally the house was out of view. She found a flat rock and nearly collapsed on it, hunched over and breathing hard.

She closed her eyes, forcing herself inward. She would find her own space. Somewhere no one could reach her. What the hell had her mom been thinking? How was Sienna supposed to stand up to Isobel, to defeat her for fuck’s sake, when she didn’t even know what she could do? Why had her mother kept her skills hidden? Fuck, she was being hunted down and she still had no idea.

Sienna thumped her hands down on the rock, ignoring the ache. She swiped angrily at the tears running down her face. Why hadn’t her powers awakened while her mom was still alive? She might have been able to save her. Then she’d be at home, safe with her mom where she belonged, and not sitting in the middle of some God-forsaken field, so hurt and angry that she could barely see straight.

A tendril of gray flowed in Sienna’s mind, and she pulled it into substance. That was their place under the stairs. Their shelter, where they hid from thunderstorms and played with her favorite dolls. They’d have endless board games and parties with stuffed animals. Nothing bad could ever touch her in there. Now it was tainted, built on secrets and lies, and full of nightmares. Most of all, it was where Sienna’s mom had lied to her and changed her entire life.