Earthbound e-1 Read online

  “What’s that?”

  In answer, he walks over to the gray filing cabinet and inserts the key into the spring-loaded lock. His body is so near I catch a hint of his deodorant. I breathe deeply.

  He turns the key.

  The lock pops with a click.

  “Excellent,” Benson says, drumming his fingertips together.

  “Library nerd,” I mutter, mostly to cover the disappointment I feel when he steps back and gives me some space.

  The drawer is full of files labeled at the top, mostly in Reese’s neat print, but some are in another handwriting. It looks male, but not Jay’s, and I wonder who she’s been working with. I’ve never seen anyone else around the house. Or, at least, not anywhere near the office. The labels are all names. I look at the front of the drawers and they show what letters are in each one.

  “Let’s start at the beginning,” I say dryly, and begin sifting through the As. “Reese told Elizabeth she’d check her files for Quinn. I guess these are the files.” A-r, A-t, A-u, A-v, A-w. “Nope. No Avery at all,” I say, checking through several files on either side of where it should have been, just in case it wasn’t alphabetized exactly right. I pause, my fingertips keeping my place among the files. “So I guess the possibility exists that he doesn’t have anything to do with this.” It’s a wish more than a logical conclusion, but I’m not above wishing.

  “Or that he gave you a fake name,” Benson says, looking weirdly broody leaning against Reese’s desk.

  I ignore him—not to mention the butterflies in my stomach—and take a shuddering breath as I close the A–F drawer and move on to my real task. My file.

  M–T.

  Michaels.

  The third one down.

  The drawer seems to glow like a neon light, and I’m simultaneously desperate and terrified to open it.

  Benson draws near and raps a knuckle softly against the label when I continue to stall. “It’s what you came in here for,” he murmurs. A soft hand touches my shoulder, and I try to draw strength from him like an emotional osmosis.

  After a long moment I nod and reach for the handle, carefully pressing the latch that lets it slide free, revealing dozens upon dozens of cream-colored files. I feel my world melting around me when I see it.

  Tavia Michaels.

  I knew it would be there—it’s the reason we broke into Reese’s office in the first place. For answers! But confirmation is a bitch.

  I pull it out and stare at it in horror and fascination.

  It’s pretty nondescript. A cream-colored folder with a small graphic on the upper right-hand corner of a feather floating above a flame. I peek back into the files; the others have the image too. But I don’t know what it means and don’t have the time to theorize.

  I need to look at my file.

  It’s pretty thick—I don’t know whether to be encouraged or discouraged by that. I flip the top and look down at a picture of myself as a sophomore.

  And, um, it’s not a great picture. Sophomore year was kinda awkward.

  “Awww, look at you,” Benson says with a grin, his arm resting around my back. “You’re so cuuuuute.”

  “Shut up, jerk,” I say, but he’s managed to break the tension. I lean very slightly into his arm and flip to the next page.

  A birth certificate. My Social Security card. High school transcripts. A copy of my parents’ will. Exactly the kind of stuff you’d expect to find in a filing cabinet in the office of someone who had received surprise custody of an injured teenager.

  But past all that—pictures of my art. And not just any pictures. I recognize these photos—I took them.

  “How did she get these?” I ask aloud, holding up several.

  “Hey, did you paint that?” Benson asks, pointing to an oil on canvas of my mother sitting by a window, slicing strawberries.

  “Yeah,” I manage to choke out. It’s one of my best pieces. Somehow I managed to capture the … essence of who my mother really is. Was.

  I can’t think about my mother right now. I swallow down the grief—push it away—then flip the photo, blocking her face from my eyes.

  But there’s still another photo of a painting. And another, and another.

  “You’re really good,” Benson says, taking one from me to get a closer look.

  It’s strange to realize that he’s never seen my work. Art was my life for so many years. And now Benson is such a big part of my life. And art isn’t.

  It feels wrong.

  “I took these pictures and sent them to the art school that wanted me,” I explain, as much to distract myself as anything. “How did Reese get them?”

  “Um, Huntington?” Benson asks in a wary voice.

  “Yeah, how …” But my words fade away as I look down at the first piece of paper beneath the stack of photos.

  It’s the letter I first got from Huntington.

  No. A draft of the letter.

  With notes in the margins in Reese’s handwriting.

  “What the hell?” I grasp at the corner of the letter and lift it up only to find a finished copy beneath it. And the pamphlet they sent with it.

  And copies of the photos in the pamphlet.

  “But … but I didn’t send my stuff to New Hampshire—it went to upstate New York.”

  “How hard is it to have mail forwarded?”

  “But there was a website. And a phone number. I called them!” I’m almost shrieking. Huntington was the reason we got on the plane in the first place. If it’s fake …

  “Here,” Benson says, pulling his cell out of his pocket. “What was the website?” He brings up the Internet on his phone and I recite the web address in a near monotone.

  “Here we go,” Benson says once it loads. “Huntington Academy of the Arts. The website is still up and there’s a phone number.”

  We both look at the screen for a long, silent spell.

  “I can call it,” Benson offers.

  I’m afraid to say yes. Despite everything we’ve discovered, this feels like a major turning point.

  Benson looks down at his screen, and his thinking wrinkle appears between his eyebrows.

  Every nerve is on edge as I nod. “Let’s do it.”

  He waits a few seconds—giving me a chance to change my mind maybe—then touches his screen and raises the phone to his ear.

  Nothing.

  Nothing.

  Nothing.

  Then the phone on Reese’s desk lets out a shrill ring.

  My knees collapse and I sink to the floor, drained of the will to support my own weight. “But I talked to them!” I shout, and my voice is so shrill—I hardly recognize it. “There was a woman, and it wasn’t Reese,” I add before Benson can say anything. “She wasn’t like Reese at all. I talked to her like six times. There’s no way it was Reese. Or Elizabeth. She was kind of cutesy and peppy, like a cheerleader. Like … like …” Like Barbie. Like Secretary Barbie. Who does her best never to talk to me, who’s hardly ever there even when I have an appointment.

  My heart is pounding in my ears.

  One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four.

  “It was all fake,” I say, my voice shallow and strained. “Why … why would they do that?”

  I hear Benson breathe in and out slowly a few times. “I’ve been thinking about this.”

  “You knew?” I almost shout.

  “No, no,” Benson says, his hands coming to my arms, rubbing up and down to calm me. “I didn’t know about the school thing. I mean I’ve been thinking about the whole plane thing, in light of everything else that’s happened.”

  “And?” I say after the silence grows heavy.

  “I hate to bring this up, I mean, I’m sure it’s still kind of fresh and all, but maybe … maybe you being in a plane wreck isn’t a coincidence.”

  “What do you mean? Like someone—” But the words are hardly out of my mouth when I realize what he’s implying. “No,” I whisper. “No way.”

  “Tavia, with ev
erything that’s happened, you have to at least consider it.”

  Despair rips through me. “No. No! I am not important enough for someone to bring down an entire plane! Do you know how many people were on that flight?” I’m managing to not yell, but only just.

  “Two hundred and fifty-six,” Benson whispers. Of course he looked it up.

  “It was an accident.” The words are shaky as they wisp from my mouth.

  Benson is quiet, but his eyes don’t leave mine. Just as I’m sure I can’t look at him anymore, he says, “I don’t think it was, Tave.”

  I sink to the floor, defeated. It’s one thing to lose my parents in a tragic accident—I’ve learned to deal with that—but murder?

  Murder that was intended for me?

  “Benson?” His name is a croak from my dry throat. “I’m no one.”

  “You’re not no one.” He reaches an arm around me, pulling me to his chest, where I bury my face. He strokes my short hair. “Think about it. Someone must have found you when you were living in Michigan. They sabotaged your plane, tried to kill you because of what you can do. It all fits.”

  Like a glove.

  The most horrendous glove in the world.

  I think I’m going to throw up.

  “Then why am I still alive?”

  “Maybe … maybe something changed.”

  “Did I change?” My voice is so hollow even I can hear it, and I can’t bring myself to meet his eyes.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Everything went crazy after the plane wreck. Did the crash change me? Have I always been this way, or did the crash turn me into something … something strange?” I look up at him now. “Did I survive a plane wreck because of my powers, or do I have powers because I survived a plane wreck?”

  “Does it matter?” Benson whispers.

  I look down at my file. “Maybe.” As I stare at that name—Tavia Michaels, is that even really me anymore?—a conviction solidifies in my chest. “I have to leave, Benson. I have to get out of here. Away from them, from everyone.”

  “You can’t leave, Tave.”

  Our heads jerk up to Elizabeth standing in the doorway.

  With a gun.

  Pointed right at us.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  I don’t think.

  I don’t have time.

  There’s a picture in my head—a flicker of a picture—and metal bands appear from nowhere, wrapping around Elizabeth’s body, around her hands, forcing the gun from her fingers. More bands. And more. Iron. Cast iron, I realize, and it feels vaguely familiar, as if I’ve done this very thing before.

  But now I can’t stop. More metal wraps around Elizabeth—her arms, her shoulders. Soon the weight drags her to the ground.

  “Tavia, you … holy crap, what did you do?” Benson stares in horror at the uneven contraption holding Elizabeth to the floor.

  “I don’t know. It just … it just happened.” Again. What is wrong with me that I can hurt people without even consciously thinking about it!

  Shaking the thought away, I scoop the files from the floor. “Come on! We only have five minutes.”

  “Tavia! Stop! Talk to me!” Elizabeth calls, but I ignore her as I scoot through the doorway and sprint to my room, Benson close behind. “You don’t understand what this all means,” she yells. “There’s more than you could possibly know.”

  “Tavia, stop, you need to slow down and think about this.” Benson’s face is white and his words tumble like white water. “What exactly are you doing?”

  I scarcely hear him as I stuff socks, underwear, and my favorite jeans in my backpack. “I have to get out of here. I need answers,” I mutter, more to myself than to him. A pair of red bikinis drops to the carpet and I don’t feel even the barest twinge of embarrassment when Benson looks down and sees them a second before I snatch them up and stuff them in with the rest of the clothes.

  We are way beyond that.

  “Tavia, seriously. Where are you going to go?”

  “I don’t care. Away. That’s all that matters. I have to go now!”

  “Go where?” Benson demands, grabbing my shoulders to make me look at him.

  I don’t want to—I let my eyes dart to the ceiling, his shoulders, the window, anywhere but his soft blue eyes. He gives me a gentle shake and I can’t avoid it anymore. I let my gaze rise to meet his.

  “Where?” he repeats. “And what are we going to do with her?” He inclines his head to where I can still hear Elizabeth calling me, begging me to come back.

  “They killed my parents, Benson. Reese, Jay, and Elizabeth—they’re all involved. They murdered them. They got me on that plane! I know that Reese and Elizabeth are working together; they’re just trying to get something out of me and then they will Fry. My. Brain.” A sob builds up in my throat as hopelessness washes over me. “If I don’t leave, I’m as good as dead.”

  He says nothing, but his hands loosen on my shoulders, and when I pull away to stuff things in my backpack again, he doesn’t try to hold on.

  “Can I stay with you for a few days?” I ask on impulse.

  “I guess,” he says. “But …”

  I’m not sure I can stand to hear what he wants to say. I’m already so overwhelmed my fingers are trembling as I dig into a sock and pull out the money that represents the extent of my personal fortune.

  It’s less than forty dollars.

  I’m so screwed.

  Maybe Benson will lend me some.

  No. I can’t. I can’t ask him for anything else.

  Maybe I shouldn’t even stay with him. What if they decide to just murder him too?

  “I’m going to see if Reese and Jay have any money sitting around in their room.” I should just say what I mean: I’m going to see if I can steal some money from Reese and Jay.

  What else can I do?

  I guess if I had to, I could magic myself some money when I went to buy something, but when it disappeared five minutes later, wouldn’t I still be a thief? I can hurt people and steal stuff. Why the hell is this happening to me?

  If I have to take something from someone, at least I know Reese and Jay are the bad guys.

  So why do I still feel guilty?

  Maybe because I know my mother wouldn’t be proud of me at this moment, and that thought makes me want to die inside.

  After a quick glance down the hallway, where I can still hear Elizabeth yelling, I go and stand in front of Reese and Jay’s bedroom door. When I reach for the knob and turn it, it gives easily.

  They didn’t lock it.

  They trust me.

  It’s a thought so jarringly dissonant from my actions that I stop, hand still poised on the knob as I try to think clearly. Why should they trust me? Do they think I’m that ignorant? Or do they think I’m so under their control that I couldn’t possibly be dangerous?

  Do they control me? Even after everything that’s happened, the fact is that I don’t know what I am.

  And they do.

  The door skims across the carpet as I push it open, a whisper in the silent bedroom. They have a chic, deco-style room with a sleek black king-size bed and square silver bedside tables. Wondering if I’ll leave foot prints on the carpet—and then deciding it doesn’t matter—I stride first to Reese’s side of the bed, then Jay’s.

  The top of Reese’s table is empty except for the lamp. I’m not surprised. Bedside tables tend to reflect a person’s personality more accurately than any clinical test, in my opinion. Sparse, elegant, and organized. That’s Reese.

  Still, a peek into the table’s shallow drawer nets me seventeen dollars, crisply folded.

  Jay’s side is more profitable—forty-six dollars—but also a thicker, more crumpled wad. It’s probably been weeks, maybe months, since he cleaned up the pile of junk he’s clearly been emptying from his pockets each night.

  I have about a hundred dollars.

  That won’t last long. But it’s a start.

  I turn and Benson is wa
iting for me in the doorway. His eyes are concerned.

  Of course they are. I just used my supernatural powers to incapacitate a grown woman and now am stealing things and running away like a crazy person.

  I slide past him without looking and stuff the cash in the small pocket of my backpack. I look around my room, wondering what else to bring. Is it stealing to take the laptop they gave me? That seems worse than the money I just filched. But the computer technically is mine.

  I pause. What if it’s bugged?

  Not bugged exactly, but what if they can find me through it? You see that kind of stuff in crime shows all the time, and I honestly don’t know if that’s one of those “facts” they’ve grossly exaggerated or if it’s actually true.

  Still.

  Making a split decision, I grab it and shove it into my backpack, then yank the zippers closed before I can change my mind.

  I can’t look at my art supplies. They feel important again. Necessary—like I can’t find Quinn without them.

  And I have to find Quinn if I want answers.

  But I can’t take them. There’s just no room.

  And now I have to decide: Phoenix or Camden?

  Quinn told me to meet him in Camden, but Reese seemed to think there was something important in Phoenix. Something to do with me. But … Phoenix is a big city. I wouldn’t know where to start. I’ve never been there before.

  I sigh. Somehow I always wind up forced to trust Quinn. Quinn who never stays, who never answers questions.

  Who makes my heart leap and my blood warm.

  Camden it is.

  “I’m ready to go,” I say to Benson, and I hate that my voice wavers. I feel weak, confused. I can create things out of nothing—I should feel strong and in charge.

  But I don’t.

  “Tavia, we …” Benson pauses and licks his lips nervously. “We should get out of the house,” he finishes, though I know that’s not what he was going to say.

  We walk out into the hallway and Elizabeth yells, “I think they’ve found you, Tave. You’re not safe out there. The Reduciata will get you—they want you more than any of our other Earthbounds. They—”

  “Earthbound,” I whisper, not hearing the rest of Elizabeth’s sentence. I’ve heard the word before—in Elizabeth’s phone conversation with Reese. But it’s something more. A word that echoes in whispers in my head. Earthbound … Earthbound …