“Me,” says a familiar voice from behind us.
Dread grips me as I turn toward the doorway in time to see an unmistakable figure stride into the room, wearing a wide smile.
Will.
Chapter 15
GREEN EYES MEET mine. For a moment I can’t breathe as I remember the way those eyes glittered with calculation during The Testing when Will shot Tomas and turned his gun on me. I had thought he was my friend. I had thought he was on my side. I had been wrong.
I drop Stacia’s arm. My fingers wrap around the wooden butt of my gun as I stand. No one says a word as I raise the gun, wrap my other hand around the handle for balance, and take aim.
Will doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t look to the others for help. His eyes stay fixed on me. Waiting for whatever I decide to do next. My brain tells me to shoot. I cannot allow Will to betray me again. I won’t let Zeen be caught as a rebel traitor and killed. Will cannot be trusted. There is no choice but to eliminate him.
But I do not fire. Because for some reason Will saved Stacia and Raffe. Just as he saved Tomas and me on the plains when we were attacked. Why? During The Testing, Will decided to eliminate the competition in order to better his chances of being one of the twenty selected for the University. He could have allowed Roman to kill Tomas. He could have waited to see if I had the nerve to kill before stepping in to save us. He could have stood by and allowed us to die.
But he didn’t. Ever since my memories returned, that fact has haunted me. Will wanted us dead. Yet he saved us despite his intent to kill. And now here he stands, calmly awaiting my decision after coming to the aid of two of my friends.
No, I am wrong. Though there’s a lack of emotion on Will’s face, he is not calm. The grip he has on the strap of his bag has turned his knuckles white. That and the rapid breaths he takes speak of the emotions swirling beneath the surface. But he doesn’t speak. He doesn’t plead for his life.
“You remember.” The words are barely a whisper, but the way Will flinches tells me he has heard. Still, I say the words again in case I am wrong. This time my voice is firm. As is my need to understand this boy who has done good even as he has deceived. “You remember The Testing.”
“No one remembers their Testing,” Stacia snaps.
But Will doesn’t look at her. His eyes hold mine while he says, “Not exactly.”
“But you remember something,” Tomas says, taking a step closer to Will.
Despite Tomas’s obvious anger, Will doesn’t move. His voice is steady when he says, “I remember enough to know that I’ve earned whatever punishment you and Cia think I deserve. Whatever you decide, I’ll accept.”
“What are you all talking about?” Stacia asks, trying to climb to her feet. Raffe hurries to help her up, but she pushes him away. “Why would Cia and Tomas want to punish you, Will? You haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Yes.” His voice is quiet but firm. “I have.”
It is that calm acceptance of what he has done and the punishment he deserves that makes my finger ease on the trigger. If Will were angry or defiant or belligerent I would shoot. But I find myself remembering the boy I first met during The Testing. The one who heard me confess that I didn’t finish one of my tests. Instead of ridiculing me or rolling his eyes as so many of the other candidates would have done, he thanked me for being willing to admit the truth. I saw Will’s heart break when his brother didn’t make it through the first Testing phase. I watched as he killed the boy who was about to kill Tomas in the fourth test, and I know that it’s thanks to his insistence that I was freed from the locked metal box Damone wished me to die in during Induction.
Which is the real Will? The one who coldly killed or the one who helped me live? I don’t know.
Slowly, I lower my gun. Tomas frowns as I ask him to get me a bottle of water from the kitchen so we can tend to Stacia’s wound, but he does as I ask.
As Tomas leaves the room, Stacia shifts, winces, and says, “I don’t understand. How do you remember your Testing? No one else does.” Stacia looks at me. “Do you? Do both of you?” she adds as Tomas walks back through the doorway. Anger flashes from her eyes.
I choose my words with care. “During The Testing, I discovered a way to record some of what happened. I found the recording and started to remember.”
“What about Tomas?”
“The memory-erasure procedure never worked on me.” He sits down next to her and wets a cloth with water. “I’ve always remembered.”
Tomas starts to wash Stacia’s wound but she pulls away. Jerking her head toward Will, she asks, “What did he do?”
“I killed people during the fourth test,” Will says. “Then I tried to kill both of them.”
“Well, I guess that tells us you need to work on your aim.” Stacia winces again but jerks her arm away when Tomas tries to tend to it. “How about me?” she asks, glaring in my direction. “Did I do anything that would make you want to shoot me? Or aren’t I allowed to know what happened?”
“I don’t know,” I answer truthfully. “I only talked to you once during The Testing. You were with Vic and Tracelyn during the fourth test. You and Vic completed that test. Tracelyn never did.”
“Do you think I killed her?” Stacia asks. The resentment has faded from her eyes, leaving only pain behind. Pain from the wound or from the thought of committing the murder of someone she knew? It’s impossible to say.
“I don’t know,” I answer truthfully again.