If I asked, that would suggest I knew something was wrong, which would only earn me closer scrutiny. So I just walked in silence. Dr. Inglis didn’t seem to notice—she was too busy chattering at me. While she’d never been cold or standoffish, I swore she said more to me in five minutes than she would have in a year at Salmon Creek. It wasn’t anything important. Just talk—overly bright, overly optimistic, overly flattering talk. Under the misguided impression, I guess, that I might put in a good word with Antone. Still, I could use allies, so I nodded and feigned interest.

We seemed to take an overly complicated route back to my room. As we walked down a corridor, Dr. Inglis slowed and talked louder, and I wasn’t surprised to catch a glimpse of Antone and Moreno through an open doorway, Antone sitting at a desk, Moreno perched on it, talking.

Hearing us, Antone came to the door. “All done?”

“Yes, and I was just taking Maya to the kitchen for something to eat.” A conspiratorial smile my way. “And letting her avoid her room for as long as possible.”

“Good plan.” Antone walked out. “I’ll take Maya from here and grab us coffees on my way back. We need to go over a few memos.”

She hesitated, but it was clear he didn’t want her accompanying us, so she reminded him she took her coffee black. When he said “I know,” she glowed.

Before we left, Antone remembered something in his office and popped back in. I waited while he jotted a note on a piece of paper and dropped it into a file. As we walked, he asked how my exam went. He didn’t seem to be listening, though, and when we turned the corner into another hall, he opened his hand and I saw the piece of paper that I thought he’d put in the file. He unfurled it and held it out for me to read.

Dead zone coming up.

He counted down on his other hand. Five, four, three, two . . . another couple of steps and he whispered, almost too low for me to hear. “If you want to negotiate, we need leverage. You don’t have that while you’re in here.”

“I—”

He motioned for me to keep quiet. “I’ve arranged something. You’ll know when it happens. You need to take advantage of it. At that point, I can’t help. I need to stay clean.”

“I—”

A stern look cut me off again and he counted down from three this time, then said, “Any requests for dinner? Since you’re locked in your room, I’m sure we can make allowances. Takeout, maybe? Just tell me what you’d like, and . . .”

He continued talking as we headed for the kitchen.

I was going to get an opportunity to escape. To find Daniel and make sure he was all right, heal him if I could. Antone was setting it up, but once he did, he had to step back so he wasn’t implicated in my escape. Or I think that’s what he meant. I hoped it was. I also hoped I’d get some hints about what form this opportunity would take. An unlocked door? An ally who would break me out? And what about the others?

But that was all Antone said. In fact, it was the last time I saw him all day. So I sat in my room, waiting for . . . whatever. Nothing came. If he’d launched his “opportunity,” I’d missed it. Unless he meant tomorrow. Or the day after.

Damn it. I appreciated that he thought I was clever enough to need only those few cryptic sentences, but more detail would have been appreciated.

THIRTY

I DON’T THINK I got sleeping pills in my hot chocolate. I didn’t need them, considering my ordeal the night before—and the fact that I’d refused to nap all day, certain Antone’s “opportunity” would come at any moment. I stayed up until nearly midnight, then drifted off, Kenjii again curled on my bed.

When I heard Kenjii growl and opened my eyes to see my door swinging open, I jumped up out of bed and sprang into fighting stance. So did Kenjii, snarling and planting herself in front of me.

Two armed guards stopped in mid-stride.

“Control your dog,” one said. He waved his gun to remind me what would happen if I didn’t.

“Why the hell do they let her keep the mutt?” one muttered. “Like we don’t have enough to deal with.”

“Calvin insists,” the first said, and shared an eye roll with the second. Then he turned to me. “Grab your shoes, sweater, whatever else you need. You have five seconds.”

“Need for what?” I said, still sleep-dazed.

“Grab it or leave it. Four seconds.”

Antone. His opportunity. This was it.

I’d gone to sleep wearing my clothing, just in case. So I only needed shoes, a sweater, and my stash of money. They hadn’t noticed the cash when they brought me in—or they didn’t care—so I took it now, shoved it into my pocket, and followed the two guards into the hall.

When I stepped out, the noise hit me. Noise from everywhere—shouts and barked orders and running footfalls. The guards tried to steer me to the stairs, but I heard a voice behind me and turned to see Rafe breaking from his guards and jogging to join us.

The whole house was in an uproar. All the bedroom doors were open, as if we were all being taken out.

“What’s going on?” I whispered to Rafe.

“Evacuation,” he said. “No idea why.”

This must be Antone’s opportunity. Not just to get me out, but the others, too. That made sense. More leverage for negotiating.

Still, as they led us downstairs, I kept looking for Antone. Just a glimpse of him so he could tell me, even with only a look, that this was his scheme. But he wasn’t there. Nor was Moreno. Had he launched this, then found an excuse to be elsewhere, so he couldn’t be blamed? Or did this have nothing to do with him?

“Listen,” Rafe whispered.

I caught snatches of conversations in other rooms. Conversations about what was happening. Most of it was out of context. Then I heard Nast’s voice behind a closed door and zeroed in on that.

“—thought we had people working to prevent exactly this possibility,” he was saying. “If we found out about the projects, so could the Cortezes. When they did, they’d want in and that is a problem we do not want to deal with. People were supposed to be making sure we didn’t need to deal with it. So tell me why we are dealing with it?”

“We don’t know for certain it’s the Cortezes, sir,” a man’s voice said. “That’s just the information we received—”