Page 72 of Juniper Unraveling

“Where is she?” Doctor Ericsson asks.

“My assistant? Hiding below the table.”

A dizzying nausea strikes my gut, and I snap my head up to watch his face for any sign that I should run now.

“Your son assaulted him earlier. He’s scared out of his wits.”

“She! I’m telling you, Father, Dani is a she!”

“And how would you know for certain, Ivan?” Doctor F crosses his arms, and I study him harder, trying to decide if I can trust him, the way I trusted my father to come up with a plan when bad things happened.

“She … because she bared herself to me. Crazy little bitch tried to seduce me!”

My hands ball into tight fists, the urge to swing out and punch him in the face taunting my muscles.

Bastard!

“It seems there’s only one way to confirm, Josef.”

Doctor Ericsson’s words rain over me, and suddenly I’m weary. Of surviving. Of worrying.

I’ve no choice. If they know Doctor F protected a girl, they’ll kill him. Of that, I’m certain.

Still crouched below the table, I close my eyes and push to a stand, opening them to find Doctor Ericsson and Ivan flanked by two Legion soldiers.

“Drop your trousers, Dani.” Doctor Ericsson’s lips almost seem to stretch to a smile at the request.

Lips trembling, stomach tight, I step in front of Doctor Falkenrath and feel a cold grip of my arm.

“This is absurd! Does my word mean nothing? I’ll not have you turning my lab into some peepshow!”

“In that case, you leave me no choice. You send her to the incinerators, or to be fed alive to the Ragers. Your only other option is to prove that she is, in fact, male.”

“You’ve no right. Dani is my charge. My assistant.”

“And I’m the medical officer in charge of this facility. It’s my duty to investigate violations that could cost us.”

“Cost us how?”

“What, exactly, do you think would happen to a young girl amongst a camp full of angry adolescent boys?”

“Why don’t you ask your son?”

Ericsson’s eye flinches with the shifting of his jaw. “Make your choice.”

“And what will the consequences be for me, afterward?”

“Nothing. No harm done. She’ll be disposed, and you’ll go back to your work. I’m not interested in losing your talents over something so petty as a misunderstanding.”

“In that case, I choose to have her sent to the Ragers.”

“What?” The air leaps from my lungs, my muscles cold with paralysis. “Doctor! Doctor, please! What are you doing?”

Casting his gaze from mine, Doctor Falkenrath shakes his head. “I’m sorry, Dani.”

Chapter 22

Wren