The Mysterious Stranger (The Confidence Game 3)

“I am an addict,” she said, her eyes on the table. “I have to work every day at not being an addict.”

&n

bsp; “You loved drugs more than your brother, more than your life. Do you want to die, Rosie?”

“I guess I did.” She looked up at Orrin. “I don’t want to anymore. I’ve been clean for nine months.”

“Do you still want to get high?”

She held eye contact and nodded.

“There are no drugs inside Abundance. We have a clinic, but we rely on natural medicine. You will be safe here. You will recover completely. If you go back out into the decay you will fail to stay clean and you will die. Do you understand?”

Rory nodded again.

“I need to hear you say it, Rosie.”

Rory broke eye contact. She was every schoolgirl in trouble and Orrin was every principal who had power. “I understand that I need to be here to survive.” She lifted her chin and looked at him. “I want to live. I want to be happy.”

Orrin pushed his chair back and stood and they all followed him upright. “Welcome to the Continuance,” he said. “Welcome to life.” At the door he said, “Spencer, give them back their damn watches,” and then laughed when Spencer protested as he stepped out into the night.

It took another five minutes for Spencer to follow. He kept their watches, for their own good, and finally they spread out to explore the little cabin. Zeke went to the kitchen and clattered about, pulling out plates, silverware, and dishes from the fridge. Rory scouted for surveillance equipment, cameras, or sound-recording devices. They kept up a chatter about the food that’d been left, about how nice Spencer was, how amazing it was to meet Orrin. Nothing they wanted to say. Rory’s search didn’t turn up anything but that didn’t mean they weren’t bugged.

“Let’s go check out all those stars before we eat,” he said, when he’d finished laying the table.

Outside the stars were brilliant and the crickets were so loud they were another barrier to being overheard.

“So,” Rory said. “Orrin is impressive and an annoyingly handsome son of a bitch.”

Zeke’s brows shot up. “Your type?” Never hurt to be good looking if you were trying to start your own new world.

“He does have that rugged individual, could forge a raging river on a bucking bronco with a squirming child safe in his arms, look.”

He grunted an acknowledgement. “And Spencer?”

“He’ll be improved when he understands not to touch me without permission. He does that kindly uncle thing and it’s completely creepy.”

It was nothing Rory hadn’t dealt with before. Didn’t mean Zeke liked the idea of it. “Do you want me to lay down the law?” It would fit with their characters for Zack to be protective of Rosie.

“If he doesn’t back off I’ll break his hand. That should slow him up.”

He laughed. “You’re enjoying yourself.”

“Apart from no tech, no books, you betcha. You’re not.”

This was the water-wings moment, the easy stuff. Too soon to know how hard this job was going to be but not too soon to have a healthy respect for it. “Did you see the shitty bunk beds in there?”

She bumped him with her hip. He bumped her back. “I need my beauty sleep if I’m going to compete with the Marlboro Man.”

That earned him a snort of laughter and another hip bump. “At least we know the signal jammer is not in the welcome cabin,” she said.

Twenty-nine days to find it. And get to the western edge of the property, where a drone had already dropped a satellite phone.

“The watches,” Rory said. “That was a power play.”

Might’ve done something like that himself if he wanted to appear like the good guy. “It didn’t even look like a setup. Those guys are practiced. Want to go over hand signals?”

She turned to face him, lit by starlight, and smoothed a hand over her head.