The Replaced

Hours had passed, and I’d spent most of those doing nothing and thinking everything.

I was surprised, then, when Griffin stepped beneath the dull lights of the hallway. I hadn’t even realized there’d been a change of shift until she nodded to the two new guards, indicating for them to give us some privacy.

Like good little minions, they did as they were told.

“What do you want?” I didn’t bother getting up, just stayed where I was with my hands lying on my stomach.

“We need to talk,” she said, her voice even. “We have a problem.”

“Oh we do, do we?” I asked, lacing my voice with as much sarcasm as I could round up. “Seems to me you got everything under control.”

She waited a second before adding, “It’s Tyler.”

She had me. I couldn’t pretend not to care, and I sat up.

“That’s what I thought.” I wanted to wipe the smug look off her face, but this was about Tyler, and I bit back the Bitch hovering on the tip of my tongue. “I think we both know why I’m here,” she continued, her voice way, way lower now, like she didn’t want even her own guards to hear what she’d come here to say. “I think he’s . . . like you.”

I went to the bars, to where she was clutching them, and I leaned close so we were nose to nose. “How long was he gone?” I asked, trying to piece it together.

Her dark eyes searched mine. “When we found him, he wasn’t sure, so we had to figure it out for him. Daylight Division chatter put his disappearance somewhere around twenty-five days ago.” I did the math in my head. That was right. That was when he and my dad and Agent Truman had vanished from Devil’s Hole. “We picked him up some five days later—the day he said he was returned.”

Five days, not five years.

Still, that was three days past the forty-eight-hour mark.

She must’ve read my thoughts, because she said, “I knew it was too long, and at first I assumed he was confused. It happens. People—those of us who’ve gone through it—tend to lose track of time. It’s disorienting. But even when I figured out he was right, I didn’t tell him how unusual that was.” She didn’t say unheard of, because we both knew that wasn’t true; I was proof of that. “And then . . . when he could heal the way he could, I assumed they’d done something more to him. More than they’d done to the rest of us. It just never occurred to me . . .”

I nodded because I knew what she meant—even with everything her father had told her it would be a stretch to assume Tyler had been successfully Replaced.

I could hardly believe it myself.

“His memory,” I whispered. “Do you think that’s a side effect? Maybe they sent him back too soon . . . ?”

“Maybe.” She looked over her shoulder. Ever since we’d been here at Blackwater, I hadn’t known her to be anything but confident and in command. It was strange to see her so spooked.

“Do you think he’ll get it back? The part he’s missing.”

Griffin gave me a look. “That’s the least of my concerns.” Then she smoothed her hand over her hair. It was a nervous gesture. “Who knows. Look, I get that you want this to be like some kind of happily-ever-after fairy-tale sort of thing, but that’s not the way the world works. I’m just trying to keep him alive. I can’t worry about your little crush.”

My heart crashed. “Alive? Why? What happened?”

“Kyra,” she said, saying not just my name, but saying it so sincerely and looking me in the eye that I couldn’t help the jolt of alarm that boomeranged in my chest. “I need you to get Tyler out of here.”

I didn’t understand why Griffin was being so secretive, or why she was all of a sudden confiding in me, especially considering she’d been the one to order my detainment in the first place.

“Where are Simon and the others?” I demanded, wondering if they were being held the same way I was.

“Simon’s safe. He’s making plans as we speak.”

“Plans? He was there when you had me arrested. I seriously doubt he’s helping you make any plans.”

“I explained everything to him; he gets why I had to do that now.”

“Mind explaining it to me?” I gave her my best this-better-be-good look while I waited.

Griffin pinched the bridge of her nose, releasing her breath on a hiss. “I know you don’t trust me, but you need to believe me when I tell you we have a traitor in our midst.”

Traitor. The word hit me like a thousand tons of lead.

I thought of Simon’s complicated history with Griffin.

“It’s not Simon,” I defended, my voice raising and echoing off the concrete walls. “And it’s not Willow either.”

“Shh!” she shushed, flapping her hands and warning me to keep it down. And then she met my gaze directly, her expression weary. “I know that, Kyra. It never was.”

I lost some steam with her admission. “So who, then?”

Pulling out a key, she unlocked the door and opened it. I didn’t know if she was coming in or if I was coming out, so we both just stayed where we were. “I wasn’t sure until I had you locked up. I had to make it look believable, so everyone would think I was keeping you prisoner.”

“Well, bravo. You were convincing.” I cocked my head to the side, crossing my arms. “But for what purpose?”