Mind Games (Mind Games 1)

“This is my only offer, James. Annie right underneath the arch. I know you’ll be watching. That’s fine. But she needs to be by herself. You know I can’t take her and run fast enough to get away. Tell them I’m confused and scared, and I need to see my sister, alone.”

“Why?”

“Annie under the arch. Now.” I put myself in the middle of a tour group, walk casually, circling closer. It’s a beautiful day, clear blue sky. Warm. A day for endings and beginnings. I glance behind me. Cole is tracking me, trying to be invisible. That’s fine. I look toward the arch and see a man—Darren from the hall—walk Annie to the center of the cement underneath. Then he looks all around and walks away. I watch him, trace him. No one can be too close. Annie looks so small. So alone.

Oh, Annie. Annie, Annie, Annie.

I will not cry. I will not be sorry. It has to be this way. It has to end. It’s the only way to move forward.

I keep walking with the tour group. The arch park isn’t crowded but it’s steady with people, and that’s enough. There is a man wh

o has stopped to tie his shoelaces about twelve feet from Annie.

My phone is out again. “James. Tell the man tying his shoe to get away from my sister. Now.”

He sighs. “Fine.”

The man abruptly stands and walks away. I break from the group and sprint to close the distance. I know they’ve seen me now. I also know they’ll hope that I’m going to come quietly after talking with my sister. Public disturbance is their last resort.

Annie looks so lost. I slow as I get close, walk up, drink in every detail of her. The brown hair kept simple at her shoulders. The china-doll mouth, exactly like mine. The squarer-face, delicate chin. The milky brown eyes looking out, looking out but seeing nothing.

She looks absolutely terrified.

I want to tell her it will be okay. But I can’t lie, not about that. I reach out and take both her hands in mine, her soft, perfect, clean hands. She smiles, but tears are tracing out the corners of her eyes.

“Fia,” she says. Her voice is strange, strained, choked. “I’m so sorry. For everything. But it’s okay. I understand.”

My stomach drops. She knows. She saw. Of course she saw. I wish I could tell her everything, but I can’t. Not now, not ever. She saw and she still came. A sob rises in my throat, but I choke it back. This is right. I am choosing it.

“Annie,” I whisper. “It’s the only way. I can’t protect you anymore, and we can never be free. Not together. I’m so sorry, but it’s the only way.” I let go of her hands, then lean forward and kiss her forehead. I want to stay here, frozen, with my sister, for all of time.

It’s not an option.

I pull out the knife, and the sun catches it at an angle to glint like a beacon. I am going to lose my Annie forever. The sob comes out, but only just. “I love you. I love you, but I need you to be dead. You have to be dead.”

I close the distance between us, the knife between our bodies, my hand behind her back supporting her in the last hug I will ever give her. And then I twist my wrist, and the knife cuts, cuts deep, my hand is wet with the blood. Annie gasps. “Be dead,” I whisper so softly only her ears could ever hear it. “I’ll miss you.”

Then I step back and after a few seconds (please, please, Annie, understand, you have to understand what I’m doing) Annie puts her hands over her stomach and drops to the ground, unmoving. I hold the knife out to the side, the red red knife, and a drop falls to the ground from it.

And while anyone watching will be watching that hand, my other slips into my pocket, pulls out the tiny phone, and drops it onto Annie’s hand, which quickly closes over it and then she doesn’t move, not a hint of movement, good girl.

I smile, so proud of her, and say, “Good-bye, Annie. I love you.”

Then I turn and walk away, toward where I know James will be waiting. After a dozen steps someone falls into place next to me, but I don’t look at him. He doesn’t matter. Someone else falls into step on my other side. I look back and see Cole running, dropping to Annie’s side, putting a finger under her chin to look for a pulse.

We keep walking. I pass a trash can and drop the knife inside. No blood evidence for Keane. James takes the place of one of the men next to me, and whispers harshly, “Fia, what is wrong with you?”

I look at him and grin. “Absolutely nothing. The man by her body is from the group that kidnapped me. It was his knife. They’ll clean up the mess. I’m free now to choose. And I choose Keane.”

He’s looking at me with horror—he has never looked at me this way—but then his eyes that pick up everything notice a deep gash across my stomach, the black T-shirt sliced open but hiding the blood. “What happened?” he asks, and I can see things falling into place behind his beautiful brown eyes. The angles. The showmanship of it all. The way Annie covered her stomach before falling.

“Had to jump out a window to get here. See?” I hold up my arms with their small cuts.

And then he smiles, and I know he knows what I did, and I know the secret will forever be safe with him because we will do this together. We will be inside Keane, farther inside than anyone else could ever get. And we will destroy his father and his webs of power and we will end this completely. I am giving up a life of freedom, I am giving up my sister, I am giving up who I could have been. But it’s the right choice, because together James and I will do what no one else can. We will do what is right, however long and however much wrong it takes us to get there.

“I see.” James laughs. “My clever girl.”

Next to a van two men are holding Eden’s arms, restraining her.