"What's the problem?" Everett asks me as we're heading down the hall toward the elevators. "Did I miss something?"

"You need to stay away from her," I tell him.

"Who?" Everett asks, playing dumb. He’s really good at that.

"Who do you think, jackass?"

"I knew it," he says. "You still have a thing for her, don't you?"

I reach up and squeeze my fingertips around the bridge of my nose. "She's Isabelle," I tell him.

Everett doesn't pause or seem surprised by this. It's what we've thought all along. "Are you shocked by this or something? How did you get her to admit it?"

"That's not important," I tell him.

"And we're going to D.C. with her," he reminds me. "So you must have some kind of plan."

"No," I tell him. "She's Harley, for all intents and purposes."

Everett stops in front of the elevator and presses the button before turning to face me. "Okay, I think I might be a little confused. You just said she's Isabelle."

"She's Harley, okay?"

"Dude, I—whatever you say, but what the hell are you doing? She’s literally the one thing standing between you having a criminal record for the rest of your life, and having a free and clear name. Let’s not make this a wasted trip to D.C."

I should have known this was going to be an issue. I should never have accepted this proposal in the first place, especially without knowing who was involved before I agreed. The worst part of all is that I don’t know if she understands the severity of what she was involved with. Isabelle had everything going for her—she could have had any career or job she desired, but instead, she followed Dr. Phillips around, shadowing him and his malpractices. She had to have known something wasn’t right. I sure as hell did.

"So, I was doing some research on Isabelle," Everett says. "I found something kind of crazy."

I look over at Everett with a squinted eye, wanting to laugh. "Dude, I know everything there is to know about Isabelle."

"I don't think you do," he says.

"She's the last unfound apprentice to work for Dr. Phillips. What else could there be?"

"She has something Phillips didn't have."

"What is it?" I continue trying to pull the information from him, but he’d rather dangle it over my head like this is a game.

"It's Darkest Perception," he says.

"You think I don’t know that? What the hell do you think we’ve been looking for throughout the last ten months?" I argue. "I explained all of this to you. We were given written information about that, and you’re telling me it’s news to you?"

"Let me finish," Everett snaps. "She helped develop the ensemble—she didn’t just assist in testing, she was one of the music theorists behind it."

I stop walking to lean up against the wall. "Jesus." I knew she had knowledge of Darkest Perception, the documentation and all that, but I wasn’t aware she was part of the development. Apprentices don’t typically take part in the facilitation of methodology when it comes to psychology. They can offer their opinions and suggestions but rarely have their hands in the meat of the development.

"I know," Everett says, proudly.

"How did you find this information?" I ask him.

"When I brought her breakfast the other morning, I saw this black thing sticking out from beneath her pillow when she got up to use the bathroom. It was an SD card." Beside wanting to punch the smirk off of Everett's face and the fact that he's been trying to get in her pants since the moment he laid eyes on her, I'm having trouble understanding how this could be the case. She was only Dr. Phillips' scapegoat. At least, that’s what I was told.

"So, she knows you took it, you realize that right?" I snap at him, feeling stress coagulate in my head.

"I don’t think she noticed it was gone," he says.

"If it was under her pillow, that means she was sleeping with it, which means she probably doesn't let it out of her sight for more than a second. If it was gone for any amount of time, she would have noticed," I argue. "You are aware she can kill either of us with little effort, right?"

"But, you said she was Harley," Everett jests.

"Wait, how does that SD card prove she was one of the developers?"

"How else would she have the hard file?" Everett asks.

"That’s a real weak assumption we cannot go on, nor does it matter. What’s important is that this documentation exists, and it’s within reach. I don’t care what part she had in all of it. She was working for Philips and doing what he told her to do."

"Trust me, she was one of the developers," Everett says.

"How do you know?" I ask again. "Seriously, you’re pissing me off."

"You’re right. I’m just assuming. Forget it. It was a joke."

"How the hell are you joking around right now. If Agent Roberts finds out we found the documentation files and haven't turned them in yet, we're done."

"So, D.C. ... probably isn't the greatest idea," Everett says.

"Agent Roberts demanded that I be there tonight," I tell him. "I don’t have a choice."

"And we're bringing 'Harley?'" he questions me again.

"Versus ... letting her run off while we're gone?" I don’t even know what I’m saying. I should just let her run off, but at this point, I’m not sure if she’d be safer or not. Agent Roberts is probably onto me somehow, and until I know what he wants tonight, I can’t let her out of my sight.

Ten Months Earlier

Everett pulls up in front of the unemployment building in his beat up Civic, blasting some techno crap I’ve always hated. I whip open the passenger-side door and slide inside. "Thanks for coming to get me, man."

Everett places his hand on my shoulder and looks at me with sincerity. "We have no family, so we stick together, bro." I appreciate what he's saying. We've both had a shitty road, found each other in our last foster house when we were seventeen, lived there for about a year, then moved out within a month of each other since we both turned eighteen around the same time. That’s when we tried to figure out life on our own. It was a bumpy road for both of us, but seven years later, we're still standing somehow. "You're wasting no time, huh?" he asks, looking past me toward the unemployment building.

"I have no time to waste. I already have an interview set up for six tonight."

"No shit," he says, pulling out into the slowly moving traffic.

"Yeah, I don't know about it, but we'll see. Finding a job should be interesting since I’m twenty-seven, spent the last two years in a prison setting, and stupidly job hopped for seven years before that."

"Well, I hope you get it." Everett is a compulsive driver, checking every mirror over and over so many times, I wonder if he ever looks at the road in front of him.

"Is someone following you?" I ask. Regardless of the OCD nature in which he’s always driven, he seems paranoid, and that part is unlike him. "You didn't get into some kind of trouble while I was gone, did you?"

"Nah, nah, it’s all good." He's a lying fool.

We get to his pad and hike up the three flights of stairs before he shoves a key into his lock, then punches the heels of his palms into the door so it will open. The sound of metal scratching metal screams loudly within the hall as the door flies inward. "Some WD-40 will take care of that," I tell him.

"Yeah," he grunts. "I’ll get to it." We walk inside, and I was completely unaware that he’s living in a studio apartment now. "This is my place."

"It's nice, bro, real nice." I'll claim that one bare spot on the floor over there and hope it isn't reserved for someone else.

"There's a couch you can take," he says, pointing across the room. I look in the direction he's pointing at, but I don't see a couch, so I glance back at him with a question. "It's just under those boxes and shit."

Everett. Some things will never change. As I'm walking toward the heap of trash sitting on an apparent couch, the time on the microwave catches my eye. I had no clue how late in the day it already is. I only have a little over an hour before I need to get my ass back downtown for the interview.

I look down at what I'm wearing, while tossing some of his boxes to the side. "I'll assume you don’t, but do you happen to have a sports coat or something I could borrow for tonight?" Everett has never believed in dressing up. He thinks if people don’t appreciate him leaving home fully clothed, they can go to hell. It’s been one of those statements I just nod my head at. I’m sure he’ll grow out of that thought someday. Maybe.

Everett flops down onto his unmade bed. "Why would you be so quick to assume I don't have a sports coat?"

I don't even see a closet, which probably means that whatever he does have for clothes are balled up in a pile somewhere on the floor. "Just a hunch."

"Nah, I don't," he says, grabbing a magazine off his makeshift, cardboard nightstand.

"No problem," I say. While I appreciate having a place to sleep at least, I have nothing to my name, and I’m already setting myself up for failure by going to this interview in jeans, a black tee, and work boots. I’ve never had a great outlook on my future, but my plans weren’t supposed to be like this.

"Want to have a late dinner?" Everett asks.

"What were you thinking? I mean, I don’t have any money, man, so I'm not good for much at the moment."

"I told you, I got your back, Ax."

"I'll get you back as soon as I can," I tell him.

"I know you're good for it."

"What are you doing with yourself now, anyway? Are you still doing the paramedic thing?"

"Nah. I got tired of that so I’m driving for Uber now," he says, looking at me with a slick grin. "It's a sick job. I work when I want to work, and sleep when I want to sleep. Plus, do you know how many chicks have a thing for Uber drivers?" By the smartass smirk on his face, he’s obviously proud of himself, but who am I to judge?

"I guess I'll have to consider doing the same if tonight doesn't go well." I'm not sure I'd be too disappointed with driving around all day and getting laid occasionally, but at the moment, I don’t have a car to drive. I’m sure my job application and interview will go really well when they see I spent a year in a psych ward. God, I’m so screwed.

"Well, I'll be taking a nap, so just let yourself in when you get back," he says, making himself comfortable.

I hike across town, sweating my balls off even though it’s the middle of January. I don’t remember a winter this warm here. It’s got to be like sixty degrees, and I’m wearing cold whether shit. In any case, it's nice to be walking around out here versus the alternative.

The Long Wharf hotel is less than a block away, and my blood is pumping heavily through my veins as I ponder why some guy from the government wants to talk to me, of all people. I suspect he knows what the hell I've been up to for the past year, which just makes this more questionable.

In all the years I've lived around the city, I've never been inside this hotel. It's a five-star resort, and I've only seen rich folks walking in and out. It’s not like I didn't already feel out of place, but the bellhop feels the need to make it clear that he’s noticed my appearance, staring at me with a disgusted sneer as my boots thud across the lobby.

In search of the Black Diamond restaurant, I spot it off in the back corner. I’m forced to cross in front of the hotel’s check-in desk, and I feel their glares burning against my back. They can all shove it. I'm sure they're not getting paid all that much just by working behind a desk all day, which tells me they aren't good enough to be staying at a place like this either.

In front of the Black Diamond restaurant, I find a middle-aged man in a brown suit. He’s scrolling through his phone and not paying attention to anything around him. I don’t know if this is the guy I’m supposed to be meeting or not, so I stop near him but try not to look over in case he’s not this Agent Roberts guy.

"Axel Pierce," the man says without lifting his gaze from whatever he's reading on his phone.

"Yes, sir, that's me," I reply, walking over to him.

He nods his head toward the restaurant and drops his phone into his jacket pocket. "They have a table waiting for us," he says.

He still hasn't made eye contact, and I get the feeling he has no intention of doing so. This is fucking weird.

We're led into the restaurant to a corner table for two. It's segregated from the rest of the restaurant, giving us privacy—something I'm not so sure I want with this freak.

As I take a seat, Agent Roberts unbuttons his coat and slowly squats into the seat as if he were in pain. "Do you know why I put a watch out for you?" he asks. He clearly doesn’t intend to waste time, which I’m okay with.

"No, sir, I don't."

"You've been treated by Dr. Mason Phillips for the last two years, correct?"

"Yes, sir."

"When's the last time you've seen him?"

The last few months of rehab didn't include many sessions with Dr. Phillips, not like the prior year and a half. I was taking classes at the rehab facility, so I saw him maybe once every other week, but at this point, it’s been a bit since I was going through discharge and all that crap. "It's been a month or so," I tell him.

"Well, he's in prison right now," Agent Roberts tells me.

I want to say I’m not shocked, seeing as Dr. Phillips was a fucking nutcase, but I saw him as a mad scientist type, nothing more than that.

"For what?" I ask.

"Forty counts of murder," he says, as if it's no big deal.

A laugh hitches in my throat because for a second there I thought he said forty counts of murder. "No, really? What's he in for?"

"It's no joke. He was committing highly illegal practices. Did he ever try any unorthodox type of treatment on you?"

"I don't know. What do you consider to be unorthodox?" I ask. In truth, I've never met with any other shrink before him so I don't have much to compare Phillips to.

"Did he ever do any type of hypnotization?"

"Yeah, but not like with a yo-yo and shit." I realize I'm cussing at this government agent, but what the hell is he getting at here? "Is this for a job, or are you just interviewing me for information?"

Agent Roberts clears his throat and leans back into his seat as he calmly folds his hands on top of the table. "I do, in fact, have a job for you if you're up to the task?"

"I'll take it," I say without question. "I don't care what it is at this point. A job is a job."

"This isn't just any kind of job, Mr. Pierce."

"Call me Axel," I correct him.

"Fine, this isn't a typical job, Axel."

"It's fine. Whatever it is, I'll do it."

Agent Roberts places two fingertips between his lips and whistles. I don't see who he's calling over since no one is in the nearby vicinity, but a curtain is released from a nearby wall and swooshes around us, creating a closed off confinement for us. Shit.

"Dr. Mason Phillips knows too much, and he shared it with too many people. Are you following?" he says, speaking quickly and nearly under his breath.

I shake my head, not following at all. "Not really."

"Whatever you hear over the next ten minutes is confidential information. You repeat it, and you're dead. You help me, and you're free from your five-year probation sentence."

I may still be confused, but I'm not confused about my answer. "Say it, and consider it done."

Agent Roberts tilts his head to the side and swivels the tips of his fingers together as if it were a nervous twitch. "There have been three apprentices working with Dr. Phillips over the past year. One of them was killed in an accident while crossing Commonwealth Avenue a few months back. The other committed suicide two months ago. There's only one left. She was Dr. Phillips's right hand-person throughout all the research he had been conducting. We believe she has the remaining data we’ve been trying to acquire from Philips. Not only is she likely holding the documentation, but she’s supposedly well-versed in the practice of using it, as well."

The thought of death and suicide doesn't affect me like it might affect some people. I'm numb to it after being exposed to it at such a young age. Maybe this guy has done his research on me and knows I'd be the best candidate for whatever the hell it is he wants. "So, there's one person left," I repeat to him.

"Exactly."

"And you want me to extract the documentation and bring her to you."

"Exactly," he says. I notice his fingers stop moving and he rests his hand back down on the table.

"Very well. In order to do so, I'd be interested in knowing some of the facts about what she was doing with Phillips," I tell him, unafraid of being blunt. A job like this will pay me nicely and—"I also want my criminal record erased."

"Consider it done," Agent Roberts says.

"So, what's the backstory here?" I ask.

"I can't tell you everything, but Mason Philips was practicing unlawful methods of interrogation, most of which were intended for high-profile scenarios. With the help of his apprentices, he developed a new method referred to as Darkest Perception. It's a form of music torture with the use of techniques that cause over-stimulation of the brain. Phillips tested this method on forty people, tweaking it slightly each time, but using them as if they were all disposable. As a result, they all died from complications. The technique can, in fact, be tweaked to work appropriately, but the way he was conducting the testing was highly illegal. What’s worse, is some of the information about Darkest Perception got leaked, and there are copycats trying to replicate what they assume is music torture. It went viral until we could get most of the popular videos shut down, but we believe there are still some videos on YouTube that will cause some damage, even if used properly. In any case, the effect from those videos is nothing in comparison to the original ensemble, but the documentation and MP3 file needs to be confiscated and kept away from the public before more damage is done."

"Shit," is all I can come up with. Phillips. The guy always seemed like a loose cannon, and now that I’m hearing this information, I can picture him accidentally murdering innocent people. I suppose mad scientists are known for that shit too.

"As mentioned, the woman you will be searching for holds the knowledge conceived by Phillips. It's a serious danger to civilians. We cannot simply arrest her as an accomplice because she was never caught in the official act of murder with Phillips, nor do we have proof that she was a part of the development of the technique. If we do obtain proof—the files—from her, however, she will be put away with Phillips. All we know right now is that man was smart enough to keep those testing incidents private and secluded from his apprentices. Regardless of what she has knowledge of, she knows too much and might have been brainwashed to do whatever is necessary to protect his documentation and files."

"Understood," I tell him. I watch as Agent Roberts slides his hand into the inside of his coat pocket and pulls out a folded piece of paper, then places it down on the table and slides it over to me. "Why me?"

"You shared a class with this woman," he tells me. "In fact, we’ve been tipped off by an unknown source that you were friends with her."

"In high school?" I ask, knowing I went to five different high schools in four years.

"No, at Boston University."

I laugh because I was never a student at BU. "That couldn't have been me."

"You sat through a semester of classes with Dr. Phillips as part of his treatment, correct?"

I almost forgot. It was at the beginning of my sentence and only for a semester. "Right, yeah, I was in one class."

"You sat beside her," Agent Roberts continues. "Isabelle Hammel."

I've always assumed the government knows what they want to know, but how the hell would they know who I was sitting next to in that class? How long have they been watching me? Her. Jesus. Who even knew we were friends?

"Isabelle, I remember her very well." How could I forget her?

He wants me to fucking destroy her life.

She was this adorable nerd, but also one of those suburban rich girls who probably grew up using dollar bills as toilet paper. I spent the entire semester envious of her, as well as, admiring every attribute she encompassed. I'm not sure I was ever forced to inhale the scent of an expensive flowery perfume so many days in a row, but it became intoxicating. She became intoxicating—a far reach for a scrub like me to own even a second of her attention, but we were friends throughout the duration of the class. I would have liked there to be more between us, but I was still owned by the state during that time.

"Good, then I assume you won't have much trouble locating her," Agent Roberts continues.

My mouth says, "No, sir, I won't have any trouble," but my head is seizing with regretful thoughts. I could never hurt her, or turn her in for that matter. I can’t imagine she took part in what she’s being accused of. They must be mistaking her for someone else.

"Your weekly salary will be ten grand. You'll have a driver, and we'll grant you residence in this hotel on the penthouse floor. We have a contract with Hotel Long Wharf."

Finding it difficult to swallow, I chug down the glass of water sitting in front of me that I hadn't noticed until right this second. "Okay," I garble.

"Isabelle Hammel is in hiding, so I realize this won't be a simple job. We will give you the time you need to locate her and do what needs to be done after we train you to handle any particular situations that may arise."

As I finish the last drop of my water and place my empty glass down, thoughts and questions consume me. "I have no resources to find her," I tell him, keeping my situation vague, though I'm sure he's aware of everything my life has become.

"We need some paperwork from you——signatures, the necessities to formalize your position as a private mercenary for the U.S. Government, then you will be protected and covered under our jurisdiction." Agent Roberts hasn't had a change of expression since the moment we sat down at this table. It's as if nerves don't affect him—as if he's numb to all kinds of secrecy and underground projects.

I open the piece of paper he handed to me, finding Isabelle's name written across the top. The woman in the black and white picture is the person I remember, with her long, barrel-curled hair, piercing eyes, and a body any man would kill to touch. It was as if she had to try and fit the role of looking studious, so she would wear these dark-rimmed reading glasses that only added to her sex appeal. Yet, at the same time, I had a suspicion she had no clue that men were ogling her daily. I don’t think she had much interest in the idea of a social life like most college girls do.

"I believe her appearance may have changed slightly since you've seen her last. We can't say for sure, but it's important to keep the thought in mind."

"Of course," I tell him.

"We will supply you with the technology you need, as well."

"I have one last request," I tell him, not even feeling as though I'm pressing my luck. "I want a partner."

"Everett McGovern," he says, obviously knowing my only relationship outside of my previous confinement.

"Yes," I agree.

"Done," he says. "Tomorrow morning at seven, please meet us here in the lobby and we will set you up with the resources needed to begin. You can plan on being consumed by training for a couple of months, which will include other small projects for you to build upon your technique, confidence and knowledge on methods of interrogation. I’m also aware of the psychology courses you’ve attended as a part of your rehab program this last year, which will come in handy. Oh, and of course, all test cases you work on in the interim, while searching for Isabelle Hammel, will only be for the greater good. It’s important to remember that."

"Yes, sir," I reply so easily, agreeing to destroy the life of a girl I once hoped would notice me long enough to just ask my name.