Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 110757 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 554(@200wpm)___ 443(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110757 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 554(@200wpm)___ 443(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
I sit down beside Carlyn’s body and lightly put my hand on top of hers.
“I’m sorry.” My gut churns and I wonder if I made the right call. We traded her life and Max’s for around a dozen prisoners we’re saving from aromium. “You deserved better than this place. Thank you for your sacrifice.”
I didn’t know her well, but she was well liked by everyone who works our farming grounds. With so many people to care for, we can’t all spend our days training to fight. And not everyone is willing to, either. Most of our people work on farming, gardening, building, cooking, teaching, and other essential jobs. A fiftysomething man named Lenny spends fifty hours a week repairing work boots and mending clothes.
Everyone gets a few hours of training a week if they want it. The command and security teams are the only ones who train all day, every day, unless we’re away from camp.
I stand up, covering Carlyn’s body with a sheet. The ever-present knot in my stomach aches, making me unsettled and fucking furious at the same time.
This place is sick. We’re all a bunch of lab rats. Our research wasn’t about destroying humanity, but things went off track and Whitman seized the opportunity to become a tyrant.
I never knew my dad because he took off when I was young. My mom busted her ass raising me alone, and she’d be ashamed of what I’ve become.
I sure as hell am. But I cram those feelings down deep because there’s work to be done. People to keep safe. An experiment gone terribly wrong to destroy.
Briar wants off this hellish island so she can find her sister, the only family she has left. I’ll get her back to the mainland if it kills me. It’s the only thing I have left to offer her.
Niran’s giving me a shit-eating grin when I walk out of the Sub a few minutes later, using a hand to shield my eyes from the searing blare of sunlight.
“We need to talk,” he says, turning serious.
Before McClain recruited me onto his team of scientists, most of my friends were bro-dudes. I was a quarterback in college, and my teammates were like family. Niran fits that mold: he’s tall, built like an athlete, and he’s got a joke for everything. Women are drawn to his carefree personality.
He’s one of my best friends, but I wish he’d take things more seriously sometimes. This place isn’t a game, and I don’t want to lose him. I’ve already lost too many friends here.
“Yeah, we do.” I put my hands on my hips, letting him read the aggravation on my face.
“What?” His brows drop with confusion.
“Where the fuck have you been?”
His face clouds with a dark scowl. “In a fucking tree, man. Starving and pissing into a bottle for days because I couldn’t leave without them hearing me.”
I scoff, running a hand over my jaw. “Sounds like you picked a great spot. You’re lucky you made it back in one piece.”
“Yeah, it’s always luck when I do something well, isn’t it?”
“Guys.” I turn to see Amira—all five feet, three inches of her—moving to stand between us. “Not here.”
She’s right. I head back toward the Sub door, calling out over my shoulder. “Let’s go.”
I meant just Niran, but Amira and Nova follow, too. Once we’re all in our meeting room with the door closed, Niran flops into a chair, accepting the canteen Amira offers him.
“You disobeyed my direct order,” I say, a muscle feathering in my jaw.
He glowers at me. “You underestimated me. Again.”
“Niran, damn it—”
“Fuck this nonsense bickering,” Nova says. “Give us the intel.”
I press my lips together, fighting my urge to throttle Niran. My emotions are running high from losing two people. I’ll give it a day and see if I still want to fight it out with him.
“There’s a new guy at Rising Tide,” Niran says. “He’s about seven feet tall and three hundred pounds of muscle.”
“I saw him on the beach.”
Niran nods. “He said Virginia had a biometric tracker and whoever’s in charge of this shit show on the mainland knew she was dead.”
Icy dread fills my veins. Before McClain abandoned our camp for more than a year, he showed me how to send electronic messages back to the mainland. I’ve been lying my ass off, saying the experiments are on track. The supplies keep coming on schedule. Now I have to wonder how much the regime brass on the mainland knows about what’s really happening here. If they send in reinforcements, it might be the end of us.
“Five Tiders have died in the past week,” Niran continues. “People are turning on Pax. A group of level fours walking past my spot was whispering about a mutiny. They think they need to start picking us off so they can get our supplies, and they don’t think Pax is the right leader.”