Elite

Sylvie lifted the soft leather to her nose and breathed in the musty balm. In New Eden, there was an ongoing craze for all things modern and new, but Sylvie had always had a soft spot for books. Her favorites were always the old ones littered with inscriptions and notes belonging to people long since gone.

When her mother died, Sylvie had inherited the little library she’d had since she was a child. With the OPTICS, entertainment was literally nothing more than a thought away, so institutions like libraries had become obsolete decades before Sylvie was born. The volumes had been scattered like dust in the wind, making them a rare antiquity and Sylvie’s most prized possessions.

Opening the delicate pages, Sylvie found a spot for Ellena’s flowers and tucked the tender petals inside. She pressed the cover firmly closed, sealing them in tight. “Do you like to read?” Jules asked, studying the little novel with eyes that had taken on an even greener hue. Sylvie considered lying—dismissing the token as nothing more than an inconsequential and paltry gesture, but before she knew it, she found herself confessing the truth.

“I love to read,” she said softly, running her fingers along the title and feeling the tiny impressions in the supple binding. She started to continue, to explain about her mother and how books had always been something that she cherished, but looking up at Jules, she changed her mind. The pretty girl’s face had left curiosity far behind for intense and undeniable worry.

Jules did not want her to like the token; she didn’t want her to have one at all. But since Sylvie had no way to undo the latter, she gave the former her best ditch effort. “Back home, we read with our OPTICS,” Sylvie said, squaring her shoulders. “It is much more convenient.” She tucked the book dismissively in her pocket and turned her eyes and attention to Jules’s present. “Are you happy with your token?” she asked, smiling broadly. “Weren’t you just saying how you needed a new skillet and that one looks practically unused.”

Jules considered her for just an instant as if she was trying to cipher out any insincerity in Sylvie’s words. But Sylvie only widened her smile and held Jules’s stare with unblinking eyes. Slowly, the expression became catching and it spread itself in a flourish across Jules’s face. “It is nice, isn’t it?” she said, running her hand along the smooth, dark surface. “I can’t wait to use it!” Sylvie nodded, in part to acknowledge Jules, but mostly out of satisfaction for diverting her attention.

The two of them resumed doling out the last of the fresh bread and Sylvie kept her passive smile firmly in place. It was the only way to keep Jules’s suspicion at bay and Sylvie’s own internal conflict silent. But it did little to make it go away. Every time she moved, Sylvie felt the presence of Jack’s gift brush firmly against her thigh, keeping thoughts of him fresh in her mind.

When she thought no one was looking, Sylvie would let her eyes drift across the yard where Jack sat circled around a small bonfire surrounded by most of his hunting companions. The firelight danced methodically across his face, the shadow slicking away at his features, but Sylvie’s memory managed to fill in all the parts hidden by the darkness.

She wondered about the story he wanted her to read, but she did not dare draw Jules’s attention back to the token he had given her. Especially not when she had no idea what message the story might contain. So she spent the following hour playing out a variety of possible scenarios in her head until something else grabbed ahold of her attention.

A shadowy figure, whose face Sylvie could not make out, approached Jack and leaned low to whisper in his ear. The good-natured smile vanished from his face and the curt nod that followed told Sylvie it would not be returning any time soon. Jack quickly rose to his feet and though she could not hear, Sylvie watched him excuse himself from his peers and follow the stranger away from the fire and into the shadows.

It was as if Jack’s departure was some kind of signal, because it set off a chain reaction. Once his form disappeared from the group, Sylvie watched a handful of others simultaneously rise and follow suit. Among them was Doc and a few of the older gentlemen she had seen him with on the day she had spent at their original encampment. Even the massive bodyguard from that day, who she knew as Michael, drifted into the black of the night behind the others.

The last to join them was Rex. And while the sight of him was in itself enough to make Sylvie run in the other direction, her desire to know what was amidst spoke louder than the whisper of reservation. “I am going to run to the ladies’ room,” Sylvie said, excusing herself.

She did not wait for Jules’s approval before darting off toward the nearest set of doors. The girl had warned her about the dangers of eavesdropping, but old habits died hard. She knew better than to follow the group directly—not only to avoid their detection but Jules’s as well.

Careful to keep her footsteps as secret as her intentions, Sylvie made the circle around through the halls. Only days earlier, the web of passages had felt unnavigable, but now Sylvie took the turns with confidence. Rounding the last corner, she came up short at the hushed sound of voices.

“What does this mean for us?” Sylvie deciphered from the unruly conversation. She could not recall his name, but she knew the voice belonged to a tall, sturdy man with a full auburn beard. She had first seen him her first day in the clinic when he had brought in the injured boy moments before he met his unfortunate end. She remembered the way his dark brown eyes had knit together in a mixture of worry and knowing. She heard the same combination in his voice now. “Will we have to go on the run again?”

“We don’t want to jump to any conclusions,” Sylvie heard Doc say. The deep timber of his voice was undeniable and it settled the discord of the group.

All of the group accept one.

“What do you mean don’t jump to conclusions?” Rex’s words sliced like razor blades through the silence that had fallen on the group. The reminder of his presence at the secret meeting sent the chill of ghost fingers down Sylvie’s spine. It was almost unnerving enough to case her to abandon her eavesdropping for a safer alternative, but the answer he received drew her back into the fold.

“We knew the risks from the beginning,” Jack said calmly and unruffled by Rex’s outrage. “To back down now would leave us looking like fools.”

“The only fool here is you!” Rex growled. From where she was standing, Sylvie could not see the exchange, but she pictured it much like the confrontation in the bathroom: Rex practically bursting at the seams and Jack a picture of perfect composure. The only difference being that this time there was a mediator.

“What’s done is done,” Doc said, the finality of his tone communicating just as much as his words. “Now we have to decide what to do next. Reidan Price is coming for his daughter, and we all remember what happened the last time we had something that he wanted.”

At the mention of her father’s name, Sylvie felt every muscle in her body stiffen. As the Premier of New Eden, it made sense that the band of Rebels would know his name, especially Doc since he had lived there at some point.

But the way he said it made it sound personal.

What was the last thing the Rebel’s had had that her father had wanted? And what had he done to get it? What had started out as a quest for answers had suddenly become a source for more questions. Sylvie slid along further in the shadows, the turn in the conversation literally drawing her in deeper. Passing the last door before the juncture of the hall, she leaned forward to peer around the corner when her foot collided with a doorstop hidden in the blackness at her feet.

The gasp that tore unwelcomed from her lips might as well have been a scream as the sound reverberated off the walls. A collective hush fell over the group leaving Sylvie with two choices. She could walk out, declaring her presence and demand to know more about her father or she could run.

She chose the latter.

On stealth feet, conditioned by years of sneaking out of her house to meet up with her friend Bianca, Sylvie retraced her steps to the nearest alcove and ducked soundlessly inside. With baited breath, she waited to see if her hiding place would be enough. Moments stretched out like hours and Sylvie had almost convinced herself that she had successfully avoided detection when the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

The window along the adjacent wall allowed moonlight to spill into the space like a waterfall, its beams pooling on the floor creating a blank canvas for his approach. She did not have to see him to know it was Rex who had found her. His scent twisted and spiraled into her nose—a mixture of alcohol and hate.

Sylvie did not make a move as the long, dark shadow stretched out toward her. Instead, she braced herself for what she knew would come next. Rex warned her that their business was not over and since Jack was nowhere to be seen, it looked like the time had come to finish things.

“Lookey what I found,” Rex said, his voice little more than a cruel laugh. “Where’s your bodyguard now, Elite?”

He took a final step, closing the distance between them until he was close enough that Sylvie could see his face despite the dark. His lips were peeled back in a hateful smile of jagged teeth and in the close proximity the smell of liquor on his breath was almost too much to take. Back at the celebration, Sylvie had seen casks of what appeared to be some sort of homemade wine cracked open and shared, but it was as if Rex had taken a bath in the stout liquid.

While Sylvie could tell his drunkenness had added to his rage, she also noted it had made his gait unsteady. Back home, her friend Anderson often took drinking to an extreme and most nights had been spent helping him remain upright for the walk home. She had always cursed people who did things to excess, but she couldn’t have been more grateful for it now.

Slipping her hand into her pocket, Sylvie wrapped her fingers around the hard spine of the book Jack had given her. In one fluid motion, she pulled it from where it hid among the folds of her clothes. “I don’t need a body guard,” she said an instant before slamming the volume into the side of Rex’s head.

The blow connected with a solid thud and it was followed promptly by the sound of Rex’s body colliding with the metal lockers that lined the wall. With the clang of metal still ringing in her ears, Sylvie dashed past Rex and tore off down the hall still clutching Jack’s token in her hand.