Even if I wanted to, I no longer have the strength to get up. This really is it. There’s no fight left in me.
Why won’t my captor just leave me here?
The Guard grabs a handful of my overgrown hair and hauls me up from the dirt.
“You might be a Roth by blood,” he spits in my ear. “But you’re still a filthy Glut. You don’t belong here.”
I didn’t belong in Canada either. Where the hell can a Glut go, then? Where’s my rightful place?
Six feet underground, I guess.
Then, Mira’s wide green eyes take over my vision. Forest green, like the trees that surrounded my former home. My getaway spot. Out by the coast.
Maybe together Mira and I could find a place to belong. A place where no one would dare call us Gluts, or surplus.
Or in my case, a Roth.
That’s just another hallucination. I shake the vision away, knowing full well it could never be real.
The Guard shoves me into the back seat, and the door that must weigh as much as an airplane’s closes with a bang as loud as a shotgun blast.
I nearly jump out of my skin.
Seated directly across from me, our knees almost knocking, is the man I haven’t laid eyes on since he abducted me from the tunnels beneath his mansion. The man everyone keeps telling me I share my DNA with.
Governor Roth, the notorious ruler of Texas. Better known in my country as the superstar of the Lone Star state.
My not-so-dear grandpa.
He’s not the governor anymore, I correct myself. He ran from his capital; he lost his army.
Roth’s just a man, Mira’s voice echoes in my memory.
Really? Then why does it feel like I’m staring into the voracious eyes of an immortal titan that somehow survived everything the Common could throw at him?
Even poison.
For days I’ve believed the whisperings of the Guards, swearing their leader was on his last legs.
But I should know by now. Everything about these people is a lie.
“You’re lucky,” Roth announces in his low, placid voice, “that I have the patience to keep sending my men to retrieve you.”
Lucky is the last word I’d use to describe my situation.
Perched like a diminutive bird on the seat to Roth’s right is Director Wix, a woman I thought I’d never cross paths with again. I thought I’d made sure of it.
Mira and I left you zip-tied in a cabinet, I wish I had the nerve to scream. How are you not locked inside Guardian Tower?
The recently installed, and I thought freshly deposed, Texas Family Planning Director removes an IV drip from a bulging vein in Roth’s arm. She throws a little sneer my way. But there’s no room in this moment to focus on her.
Roth is here. With me. He’s never here on these hunt-down missions. This can only mean something’s happening. A big something.
He’s fully recovered. We’re moving to a new location.
“Drive!” Roth suddenly commands.
The Beast shoots forward and the shock on the Guard’s face is priceless. He hasn’t yet made it into the limo tank, and it looks like he never will. His shouts don’t penetrate the five-inch-thick windows, but I can see him scrambling for a door handle, for anything, even attempting a last-second leap onto the back. A loud thud tells me he didn’t make it.
The rear window serves as a screen, and it’s almost like I’m watching a far-fetched movie and not my real life. The Guard goes rolling, head over heels like a malformed tumbleweed, and I suddenly remember his name. Wheeler.
My blood stings ice-cold when I realize I’m smiling. That’s something a Roth would do. Find pleasure in another’s pain. I all but smack the grin off my face, trusting no one saw.
“Does anyone else have something they wish to say about my grandson?” Roth asks coolly. There’s a force behind his voice that I recognize from snippets of old speeches I’d sometimes catch my dad listening to on the news.
Roth’s strength is back. Redoubled. The others must feel it too.
Every soldier packed inside the luxury tank, including the Director, shouts, “No sir!” in hearty unison.
I can think of a million things to say about his grandson, but I keep my mouth shut. Halton. My half brother. Roth’s first and only grandson, or so all of North America thought for eighteen years. So I thought too.
Why did you have your grandson killed? Will you kill me too? Your illegal second grandchild?
The Beast speeds to ninety clicks, and soon the abandoned Guard becomes a speck on the wide horizon. He’ll be dead by tomorrow. We’re hundreds of miles from civilization. From water, food. Help.
A fraction of me feels sorry for him. The bit that still clings to who I am. Or was. If I’ve kept my days straight, it should be the third Sunday of my captivity. And if I weren’t caught in this waking nightmare, I’d be at my water polo match. Or safe, in my room, studying for a future I thought was mine.
Lies and ignorance, Mira would probably say to me.
My life was one long oblivious slumber before Mira came and shook me awake. Told me my truth.
Mira. You were the truest part of my life.
“I’m not your grandson,” I choke out, massaging my sore ribs, scraping together as much nerve as I can muster. But I find it impossible to look Roth in the eyes.
“In time, you’ll feel differently. Alexander left you too long in Canada. Both have brainwashed you.”
“The most serious case of Stockholm syndrome won’t make me call you Grandpa,” I vocalize, in case he’s under any delusions.
“That’s a title I’ve never much cared for. You can call me Governor.”
So Roth still thinks he’s in control. Has power. If we’re not retreating, what are we doing, then?
He unfolds and straightens his sleeves, buttoning his polished cufflinks with their distinctive logo of the Texas State Guard. Not a wrinkle or speck of desert sand spoils the striking effect of the military uniform that somehow still fits him like a glove. How’d he find the time—or the person—to alter it?
The man’s grown nearly skeletal since his illness. A sharp suit can’t cover that up. But any perceived weak point is made up for by his intensity. He emanates a severity that I assume comes from conquering death. Almost touching hell itself, then returning with a big middle finger.
He looks certain. Of what, I don’t know.
His place in this world, I guess.
“You’re strong,” Roth says, all his intensity aimed at me. “Not just your body, but your will.”
Something akin to a wistful expression brightens his clean-shaven face. It’s incongruous, unnatural. I don’t like it.
I know what he’s about to say.
“You remind me of myself,” he remarks, and I almost jam my fingers into my ears, start screaming, anything to blockade this stranger’s lies.
He leans toward me, offering a fresh pair of combat boots that look just my size. I gaze down at my throbbing feet, my runners that are shredded to pieces.
I can’t run in these. The desert floor is like lava, booby-trapped with plants armored in needles all across its pathless domain. But I’d rather attempt my next escape from the governor on my raw skin and bones than accept anything from him.
Roth grips my hand. “Your father and brother were weak by every definition.”