Page 86 of Anarchy Missing

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE - LULU

Molly pulls the door to the media room closed behind her when they leave, and then Case and I are alone.

I turn to look at him, but he’s staring blankly past my shoulder. “What’s happening here?” I ask him.

“I wish I knew,” he says, focusing his gaze on me.

“Well, you certainly know more than me. Who are you people?”

He laughs but it dies in the silence of the big room. “We’re monsters,” he says without emotion. “That’s what we are.”

“I think that explanation requires clarification.”

He chuckles again, but it’s filled with sarcasm, and contempt, and anger. “You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Obviously Molly knows a lot more than I do. So she must’ve believed Lincoln.”

“That’s different. Much different.”

“How?” I ask, getting sick of his bullshit. He’s been lying to me. Ever since we came back together, he’s been lying. Lincoln and his comment about suicidal scientists. Thomas and his comment about Case not fucking up some major shit. The pills are for… what? Controlling emotions? Those hands of Lincoln’s. There’s some kind of metal covering his palms. And all that talk of heat and light, like it’s all normal. And even though Lincoln was wearing a long-sleeved shirt, there are suspicious bumps—or protrusions—jutting out underneath the fabric covering his arms. There is something very wrong with these people.

“Because Molly was there,” he snarls.

“Where, Case?” I ask, grabbing on to his arm tightly, afraid he will bolt and leave me behind. “I’m just trying to understand. Let me in so I can help.” I pause, wait for something, but get nothing. “Please,” I beg. “I just want to help.”

He tries to turn away but I don’t let him get far. “Stop,” I say. “Molly was where?”

“School,” he says, looking down at me. “She believed Lincoln because she’s one of us and you’re not.”

“Oh, that’s nice. I’m not going to let you cultivate an us-versus-them attitude towards me, Case. I’m still here, right? I should be running the other way as fast as I can, but I didn’t. I called your friends. And I came here with you. I just want to help, that’s all. So tell me, and don’t lie, OK? Just tell me… what is this school you’ve been talking about? And what does it have to do with everything that’s happening?”

Case walks over to the couch and takes a seat, leaning over to hold his head in his hands.

I join him, pressing my body as close to his as I possibly can, wrapping my hands around his bicep and resting my head against his shoulder. “Please,” I say in a soft voice. “I want to know more about you. I’m not gonna leave you, I promise. I’m here.”

“For how long?” he asks. And normally that might piss me off. Because it implies that I’m not invested. When I am. But this shit is so out of the realm of normal, I don’t take it personally.

“For as long as you want,” I say. I reach up and place my hand on the side of his jaw, turning his head towards me so he has to see me. “I swear, Case. I like you a lot. I think we’re kinda in this together. And if you don’t like me that way, then OK. I understand. I’ll go away and leave you alone. But if you do like me, then you have to trust me.”

He says nothing for several minutes. And I am patient. I let him work it out in his head. Let him weigh his options with me. Let him come to a decision.

“We were like… ten, I guess.”

“Ten?” I ask. “Years old?”

He nods, sighing. “That’s when the whole kidnapping lie started. I wasn’t kidnapped. I was sent away to a school. Lincoln and I both. Thomas was already there. Molly might’ve been there already too. But we didn’t meet her until later. Couple years later, I guess. They used us, Lulu. They did…” He shakes his head. “They did genetic experiments on us. Changed us. And not just us. There were lots of kids from lots of important families there too.”

“What kind of changes?” I ask.

“Bad ones,” he whispers. “Molly was made into a weapon to control Lincoln. Thomas and I had our own Omegas, like Molly. Kids whose only purpose was to control us. Keep us in line, and then if we didn’t comply, kill us. But Thomas and I…” He chokes on a laugh. “We killed our Omegas every chance we could get. But Lincoln fell in love with his Omega. The school administrators got tired of us wiping out their stock of Omegas, I guess. And they tried something new on Linc.”

“That was… Molly?” I ask, squinting my eyes as I try to process all this.

Case nods his head slowly. “He saved her when Thomas, Atticus, and I decided to kill everyone else.”

“W-w-what?” I ask. Did he just say… kill everyone?

“So she’s the only one left. We set the school on fire. Blew some shit up.” He looks down at me with a crooked smile. “We do seem to enjoy explosives more than most.”