CHAPTER 54

Less than two hours after I’d heard the first shot, I walked out the front gates of Hardwicke with my hands raised. I was greeted by a SWAT team, the FBI, Homeland Security, and a dozen guns trained at my head.

“Are you armed?” a woman in an FBI jacket asked. “Are you wearing any explosives?”

I shook my head.

“Are you injured?”

I gave another shake of my head.

“We need you to get down on the ground,” the woman said. “Face-first.”

I did as she asked. A second later, I was being patted down. They found nothing other than the USB drive I wore on a chain around my neck. Instructions. For the authorities. From Senza Nome.

They let me sit up. I didn’t realize I was bone-cold and shaking until the FBI woman put her own jacket around my shoulders. “You’re okay,” she told me. “Tess, I need you to listen to me: you’re okay.”

Maybe those words should have been comforting, but they weren’t. I was okay. But if I didn’t do exactly as Mrs. Perkins had instructed, if I didn’t follow orders, the others wouldn’t be. Not Vivvie. Not Emilia. Not even Henry, if they thought they had anything less than his undivided loyalty.

“I need an EMT in here!” the female FBI agent shouted. “She’s going into shock!”

People crowded in around me. Agents fired off questions. A medic shined a light in my eyes.

Eight hours, I thought. I have eight hours.

“Tess!”

My body responded to Ivy’s voice, my shoulders caving inward, my head coming up.

“Oh God, Tessie.” Someone tried to stop Ivy from coming to me. She turned on him like nothing I’d ever seen. “That is my daughter,” she said, fury in her voice and tears streaming down her face. “And the next person who tries to get between me and my daughter is going to rue their existence on this earth.” Ivy didn’t believe in unspecific threats: “Every secret you’ve been keeping will find its way out. Every decision you make will be questioned. You will be audited, investigated, and transferred to the most hellish nightmare of a desk job I can find. Now, get out of my way.”

Everyone got out of Ivy’s way.

She was by my side in a heartbeat. She dropped to her knees, fast enough and hard enough on the concrete that it must have hurt, but she didn’t seem to feel it. Her arms encircled my body, pulling me tight against her one second and pushing me away the next as she ran her hands over my shoulders and arms, assuring herself that I was here, that I was in one piece, that I was whole.

Then Ivy was saying my name, over and over again, a low, keening sound. She asked me if I was okay, her hands finding their way to the side of my face. She smoothed down my hair, pressed a kiss to my forehead.

My arms wrapped their way around her. “Ivy.”

“I’m here,” Ivy murmured into my hair. “You’re safe. I’ve got you, Tessie. I won’t let anything happen to you. I won’t ever let anything happen to you.”

“Ms. Kendrick.” The female FBI agent stood a respectable distance away. She’d given Ivy and me our moment but couldn’t afford to give us any more. “I understand that Tess has been through a great ordeal, but she’s our only source about what’s going on in there, and that makes her our best chance at getting the rest of those kids out alive.”

Eight hours, I thought. Less than that now. I wanted to believe that the FBI could handle this, that if I told them what I knew and what I’d been told, they would find a way to save the day.

But I didn’t have that luxury.

Every hour on the hour, I will put a gun to one of your classmates’ heads.

“The agent’s right,” I told Ivy. “I need to talk to them.”

I’ll enjoy pulling the trigger.

“And after that,” I said, my voice low enough that only Ivy could hear me, “I need to talk to you.”

Several feet away, behind a law enforcement line, I saw Adam, trying to keep a grip on his emotions as he stared at Ivy and me. And behind Adam, I saw a stone-faced William Keyes. Ivy followed my gaze, and I clarified my previous statement.

“All of you.”

CHAPTER 55

It was four hours before the FBI let Ivy and Adam take me home—half of the eight I’d been given gone answering questions and describing the situation on the inside.

The hostage negotiator and profilers had asked me to provide a description of each of the players involved. Homeland Security had then begun running background checks on Mrs. Perkins and Dr. Clark. I’d been able to describe one of the guards—the one who’d knocked Anna unconscious, the one Henry had incapacitated in his quest to get me out—in enough detail for an artist to make a computer rendering.