CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Marcella was sitting in the waiting room of CarrHealth’s study recruitment office with her legs crossed at the knees and a tablet computer propped on her lap when Soren strolled in and sucked all the air out of the room.

Or at least, it seemed that way to her.

Damn him.

Without thought, she pushed out all compulsion magic meant to discourage curiosity from the others in the front office. For the most part, the place was empty. After coasting through the lobby in the most casual gait she could and heading straight to the elevators, Marcella had walked into the office and waited only ten minutes to get to the front of the reception line. Apparently, most walk-ins came right at opening.

Only one other person was waiting to be seen by a study assistant, and she looked to be in some kind of daze that most certainly wasn’t of Marcella’s doing. She had her knees pulled up to her chest and was chewing her nails as she rocked back and forth, back and forth, her gaze flitting wildly.

Soren looked from Marcella to the unmanned reception desk, back to Marcella.

Well, come on.

She waved him over. There was no good reason for him to be looming in the doorway. Likely, there was someone back in that maze of cubicles who had a monitor that displayed video footage of people walking in so they wouldn’t have to keep standing up and looking down the hall.

“If you’re going to be here,” she murmured through clenched teeth, scrolling down the participant input study, “sit closer so I don’t have to work so hard to confuse that lady.” She looked toward the wired lady, and she was still totally out of it. If she’d noticed Soren’s presence at all before Marcella pushed a waft of her forget-this magic out, she’d quickly forgotten.

He settled into the chair two seats away from her and draped his hands over the rests. “Fill me in,” he said in an undertone.

“I’m going through intake.”

“Real info?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Don’t—”

“I don’t need the warning.” She already knew what he was going to say. He wasn’t an idiot, and naturally, the next warning a man like him would have made would have been not to give them any spit, hair, skin cells, urine, blood, or even any fingerprints.

“Just checking. Doesn’t hurt to make sure you’ve covered all bases.” He leaned forward and snatched a dog-eared copy of Scientific American from the coffee table.

She held back a retort by pressing her molars firmly together and navigating to the last page of the intake form. Ostensibly, once she hit the “Send” button, the perky young assistant who’d greeted her earlier would return and escort Marcella to the back for an interview. Marcella didn’t plan to undergo an interview. She would be the one asking the questions. If she’d known how empty the place was, she would have compelled the woman to take her straight to the back upon arriving, but in a way, she was glad she didn’t. She’d had time to take a picture of every page and every question of the intake form, even changing her answers and backtracking so she could see how the questions changed depended on response. For example, people who disclosed that they were married were taken immediately to a wind-down section. For reasons that were clear to Marcella and to anyone who knew about the dirty shit the lab was doing, they didn’t want attached people in their studies. People who didn’t have husbands and wives or who otherwise lacked family structures were probably easier to take advantage of. No one advocated for them.

“As soon as I hit this button,” she murmured, already getting her leather glove ready to put back on, “the assistant will probably come fetch me. I don’t imagine I’ll be able to make you stay here.”

“Probably not.”

“Oh?” Digging deep into what she liked to visualize as a big trough of energy, she directed a wave of magic at him to see what would happen.

He should have set the magazine down and stood. That was the suggestion Marcella had planted in his mind. Instead, he squinted over the stop of the magazine and muttered, “Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Whatever you’re doing. The Bear in me doesn’t like it. Makes me want to run in circles to expend the energy I’m absorbing.”

“That’s not the way that’s supposed to work.” She’d made the throwaway comment for her own benefit, but she should have expected that he’d follow up. After all, he wasn’t a man who held his tongue.

“The way what’s supposed to work?” He tossed the magazine onto the table and leaned to the right, and she was grateful there was an empty chair between them. If he’d been a smidge closer, he wouldn’t have been doing things he’d been compelled to do by a stronger second party, but she would be. Shaking his head, he clucked his tongue in rebuke. “Are you using magic against me? I’m reasonably sure that’s against the company’s code of conduct.”

Probably was.

Clearing her throat, Marcella shrugged and directed her magic elsewhere. The fact that particular kind of magic had no effect on the Bear unsettled her. She couldn’t help but wonder what other modes of her craft he was immune to. And whether he was immune to them for any special reason. Perhaps all Bears were unaffected.

The theory needed testing.

Later.

She hit the “send” button on the form, held the tablet against her belly, and waited.

Sure enough, the pat-pat-pat of soft-soled ballet flats slapped the laminate floor a few seconds later, and the intake assistant, Cortney, appeared at the end of the cubicle walkway.

Her face tilted in Soren’s direction—she’d probably noted him in the video feed but figured she’d greet him when she fetched Marcella—but using magic, Marcella pushed the thought of him out of the forefront of Cortney’s mind. Her gaze homed back in on Marcella, and her smile broadened. “Okay, Miss Meeker!”

Soren snorted.

Shush, you.

“Come on back with me, and we’ll see what kind of good stuff we can get you into.”

“I can’t wait,” Marcella said flatly. “I hope you have something that pays a ton. Maybe a live-in study. I have lots of bills to pay off.”

A blind man wouldn’t have missed the glint of interest in the woman’s eyes. She probably made a little kickback for every recruited participant.

Soren stood up as casually as a Bear could manage, and ambled to the water cooler set up near the cubicle wall. He pulled a paper cup out of the dispenser and scanned over the wall while filling it.

Marcella would have been surprised if she could see anyone. In the twenty minutes she’d been sitting in the lobby, she’d only heard one voice that wasn’t Cortney’s, and that seemed to have originated from a far corner of the office space. The place was a ghost town, which seemed odd for a pharmaceutical company that was actively rebuilding its research department.

“We might be able to accommodate you with something like that.” Cortney emitted a phony titter that probably put actual desperate people at ease. All the laugh managed to do for Marcella was make her stomach turn.

“Is that so?” Marcella handed the tablet computer to her and cut Soren a warning look before following Cortney into the passage. Her glare was supposed to communicate that she intended for him to stay put.

He followed anyway.

She could sense his energy looming behind her.

She sighed.

Cortney patted her arm. “Everything will be fine, you’ll see. This’ll be easy-peasy.”

“Oh, good,” Marcella murmured. “I worried about that.”

Cortney stopped at the back wall and gestured to the cubicle on the left. “You can have a seat in that green chair there, and I’ll sit here.” She giggled as she took her seat behind the desk and shook her mouse to wake up her sleeping computer.

As Marcella had suspected, there was indeed a video feed of the entryway, but the camera’s angle was skewed for whatever reason. She wouldn’t have been able to see most people’s heads. If Cortney had seen Soren on the monitor, she likely hadn’t gotten a productive look at him.

Dana will appreciate that, for sure.

Soren appeared in the opening of the cubicle then, paused long enough to check their position, and then walked away, probably to scout the neighboring compartments to ensure they were empty.

As Cortney pulled up Marcella’s questionnaire responses—singing a little song to herself as she worked—Marcella discreetly looked toward the aisle.

Soren returned then and held up a single finger.

“Only one?” she mouthed.

He nodded gravely.

“Listening?”

He pantomimed putting headphones on.

Ah.

Though she hated to admit the truth to herself, he was handy to have around. He certainly made investigation far more efficient than it would have been had she been flying solo.

“Okay!” Cortney said cheerily, fixing a kohl-rimmed, sapphire-blue gaze on Marcella. “How about we—”

“How many people work here?” Marcella interrupted. She needed to get the woman off-kilter as quickly as she could. The faster she lost sight of the original conversational thread, the more confidential the nature of her information would be. Cortney was a novice, unused to being interrogated. People like Gene had their defenses built up to a certain degree. They were harder for Marcella to crack, but men were always easier than women. Cortney might have been a creampuff, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to make Marcella work for every drop of information.

“How… How many people?” Cortney scrunched her face, her befuddlement evident.

“Yes. In this office. Just you and one other?”

Soren eased into the tight cubicle, his gaze fixed intently on Cortney. He slid behind her desk chair and wriggled open the file cabinet behind her.

Cortney didn’t move a muscle, except for the ones she needed to furrow her forehead with. “Most days, two, but we have an intern who comes in sometimes, and the manager flies in from New Jersey every so often. Most folks didn’t survive the last layoff. I’m still here because my salary was one of the lowest, I guess.” She giggled.

Marcella didn’t find anything funny about corporate mismanagement, but she smiled anyway. Sometimes, a smile could disarm her opponents almost as much as her magic did, when worn at the right time. She was counting on that. Already, she was starting to lose sensation in her skin. She was using a lot of energy to control how much she took at once.

“Fascinating,” she said, turning her wrist over to glance at her watch. Cortney might have been compliant for the moment, but there was only so long Marcella could emit the level of magic she was using without passing out, or worse. The very last thing she needed was to start to lose cellular cohesion in a cubicle that reeked of stale corn chips and day-old coffee.

“Do you know a gentleman named Wes?” Marcella asked, sliding a slick company brochure that featured his grinning face on the back across the desk to her. The document had come from the Shrew’s files, and she wanted to see if the woman would recognize it.

Cortney’s eyes lit up. “Ooh! Everyone knows Wes. He’s the manager that comes down sometimes.”

“I thought you said your manager was from New Jersey.”

“Well, he is, isn’t he?” Cortney reached for her computer mouse and opened a browser window.

Marcella removed Cortney’s hand from the input device and gently placed it back on the desktop. No browser searches. No odd Internet history. Marcella may not have been well versed in corporate HR policies, but she could guess that there was a tech guy occasionally reviewing the machine logs for the higher-ups. If the workers didn’t have a manager on-site all the time, Big Brother had to get his information in other ways.

“You tell me,” Marcella said. “Where else does he work?”

“Oh, he goes all over. I think he has an office in Michigan he manages, too. And one in Durham, I think.”

Bingo.

“When’s the last time you saw him?”

Cortney pursed her lips and fidgeted the dangling gold hearts on her earring. “He was here last Friday to train me on the update for the intake forms. Funny that no one told me about them in advance. We usually hear about study changes six weeks or more before they happen.”

“Uh-huh.” Of course, CarrHealth couldn’t have told her about what they didn’t know about. Marcella suspected that was the case. They’d claimed they’d fired the man after the stunt he pulled kidnapping Doc and Drea. Perhaps their left hand didn’t know what the right hand was doing.

Soren held a binder up behind Cortney and turned it so Marcella could read the spine. Policies and Procedures. The update date was, handily enough, the previous Friday.

She nodded.

He bumped the drawer closed with his hip and stepped outside the cubicle. A moment later, a new figure appeared on the video monitor, cut off below the chin. Female.

“Sor—”

“I’ll see you outside,” he interrupted and waved.

She waved back, glad he didn’t have to make her explain herself. She needed to stop assuming he was going to somehow get in her way or sabotage what she was trying to do.

He left, giving a friendly wave to the person waiting at the empty reception desk as he went. Marcella glanced at her watch again. With him gone, she wouldn’t have to work so hard to disorient Cortney. Still, her energy was swirling down the drain fast, and she didn’t like being so close to her brink.

Maybe Soren was right. She should have done better for breakfast. She was trying too hard to do shit right, and she wasn’t pacing herself the way she knew she could. She was losing control with a cupcake of a woman.

She swiped a hand across her warm forehead and pulled in a bolstering breath.

Do this. Just get it done.

“When will Wes be back, and where does he stay when he’s in the area?”

“He’s usually here every Thursday and Friday, but he’s been pretty unreliable lately. I don’t know why, but he’s been super skittish. He never wants to take calls or answer any questions.” She giggled. “I said that he acts like he’s on the run from something. He didn’t think the joke was funny, but I had a good laugh. He used to stay at the Embassy Suites, but the last bunch of times, he told me he didn’t have any travel expenses to file. I don’t know what’s up.”

“Uh-huh.” Definitely fired. “Does Wes ever communicate directly with any of the participants of past studies? Who follows up with them after the studies have ended?”

“Depends on the study. We have research assistants who follow up, mostly, but Wes was hands-on with the last one. I think he still fields questions from a few of those participants.”

Marcella grabbed a sticky note from the desktop dispenser and a pen and clicked the plunger. “What’s his cell number?”

“Hold on. Wes had these special cards he used to give out.” She giggled. “Probably forgot he gave them to me.” Cortney bent and pulled open a desk drawer.

While she did, Marcella glanced at her watch. Another minute or two, and she might have to crawl rather than walk out of the building. She might even have to get Soren to toss her ass over his shoulder and haul her back to the car.

Oh, he’d love that.

She scoffed quietly, and then picked up the stack brochures Cortney pushed across the desk to her.

Same as the one Marcella had shown her, but with specific study information highlighted in an inset on the back.

“I don’t know why I kept them. Normally, I would have dumped that kind of stuff into the recycling bin at the official end of a study. I dunno. Maybe I thought the paper was too pretty to throw away.”

Marcella read:

Remember:

Questions?

Call the study query line at (970) 555-1632.

Reactions?

Log them at the study website indicated in your participant binder.

Referrals?

Email me directly.

“What is this 970 number?” Marcella asked.

Cortney shrugged. “I never asked. I figured they’d set up a line especially for that purpose. That happens sometimes, but those numbers usually have New Jersey or North Carolina prefixes.

“And where does the log data go? Who oversees the database?”

“I have no idea.” Cortney grimaced and said in a baby voice, “Sowwy.”

Marcella scooped up the papers, tucked them into her back pocket, and began pulling off her left glove one finger at a time.

She was probably going to regret doing what she was about to, but she couldn’t think of any better option. If Cortney hadn’t been smart enough to notice there was something amiss in her company, she would probably never wise up and blow the whistle if illegal activities were being facilitated by a rogue ex-employee.

Marcella pulled in a breath and forced a smile onto her lips. She stood, tucking her glove into her pocket and wiping the sweat from her palm onto her pants. “You’ve been very helpful,” she said in a whisper.

“Oh, good. I’m glad I could help. I like to help.”

“I’m sure you do.” Marcella moved slowly to the side of Cortney’s chair and leaned her right hand onto the arm. With the left, she gave Cortney’s bouncy blond waves a flick.

Her eyebrows darted up. “I’m…confused.”

“Yes, we all are, I’m sure.”

“What are you confused about?” Cortney reached for the coffee mug printed with Lift your head so your crown doesn’t fall, princess, and brought it to her lips.

“So many things, but don’t worry. I can help you. In fact, I’m going to help you.”

Cortney’s eyes widened. “Help me?”

“Mm-hmm. So you’re not confused.”

“Oh.” Cortney set down her mug and sat up straight, primly entwining her hands atop her lap as though she were waiting for her preacher to start a good sermon. “I’d like that.”

“I appreciate your cooperation.”

There were many ways to go about what Marcella needed to do, but Cortney made her job easier. She was guileless and didn’t know what she should have been lying about. She probably even tried to be a good person most of the time. So Marcella didn’t need to force her. Simply inform her.

She touched her fingertips to Cortney’s chin and lifted her face so she met Marcella’s gaze.

“You can do better,” Marcella whispered. “You deserve better. Look for something that’ll fulfill you.”

“I deserve better?” Her voice was as incredulous as a child on Christmas morning after being told that Santa really got that oversized bicycle down the narrow chimney.

“Yes. And so do the people who’ve walked through that door thinking they’d be taken care of. There are smoking guns here, and Wes has had his hands on all of them.” She grazed her thumb over Cortney’s chin. “Talk to your coworker. Ask questions about Wes. Find out where he stands so you know what to do the next time he comes in.”

“But…I don’t know what to do.”

“You’ll know. And if you don’t, call this number and leave a message.” She dropped a business card atop the desk. The number belonged to the Shrew & Company tip line. The number was unadvertised. If anyone called not knowing what it was, they wouldn’t get any information. The prompt merely informed the caller to speak at the tone. If anyone were nosy enough to do a reverse search on the number, they’d learn it was registered to a Catholic priest who didn’t mind doing the occasional favor for Sarah.

“Can you do that for me?” Marcella asked, hand shaking as she forced out the last little bit of magical reserve she was holding onto.

Cortney pulled Marcella’s hand up to her cheek and nuzzled her palm. “You’re warm. So warm.”

“Can you do that for me?” she repeated. She didn’t want to knock Cortney’s hand away. Abruptly disrupting the connection was generally a bad idea for both parties involved, but Cortney was going to suck her dry. Usually, she was better at predicting the clingers. She’d misjudged.

Cortney was needy, and Marcella was a natural provider. She couldn’t stop people from taking. That was an unfortunate aspect of her magic.

Shit.

“You poor, sweet thing,” Marcella said. “You need someone, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Go home early. Call your mother.”

“Okay.” Cortney nodded. “I will.”

“I’m going to leave now so you can work, dearest.”

“Okay.”

“Finish your coffee, then see to your visitors.”

“Okay.”

Marcella pulled her hand away and left Cortney staring after her, blinking like a rabbit.

“Your coffee.”

“Oh.” Cortney picked up the mug and sipped.

Marcella hustled out of the cubicle maze, only to be brought up short at the sight of the person standing at the counter.

She’d misjudged. On the video feed, the person had appeared to be a man because of the coveralls, but that wasn’t a man.

That was Kim.

Damn it.

Kim’s eyes narrowed in recognition, and her lips parted, but before she could speak, Marcella tossed out energy she didn’t have left to demand she answer one question. “W-why are you here?”

“I’m not gonna let anyone mess things up for me,” Kim said. “Who are you? What do you want with my momma?”

She wasn’t supposed to ask a follow-up. She shouldn’t have been able to.

Marcella left without answering, pushing her heavy feet to take step after step as her vision blurred and skin crackled in warning.

No. No no no.

Glancing down the hall over her shoulder, she stabbed the elevator button repeatedly, willing the box to move faster. Then she put her back to the wall so she could get her glove back on. “Come on. Come on.”

She couldn’t fall apart there. Anywhere but there.

The elevator dinged. The door opened, and Marcella dragged herself into the empty box, struggling to pull air into her lungs, and no longer able to feel her extremities.

She slid down the wall in the corner and closed her eyes.

Just for a minute.

She needed to regroup, and then she’d let herself fall apart in her motel room.

“Hold on. Hold on.”

She kept whispering the mantra, again and again. She didn’t know how many times. At some point, she stopped hearing her own voice.

She stopped hearing everything.