Secrets Are For Keeping

Chapter Forty-Seven

My dreams couldn't escape the light that had shined over everything else from Kain.

They were filled with images of Beckam, of the guilt that followed what I'd done. My heart had focused on Kain, but my mind was still lost in my own memories.

I woke up to the sound of beeping, and my first thought was that it was my alarm clock. I hadn't actually heard my alarm clock since a week before, and it took a second for everything to come back to me.

I rolled over onto my side, and opened my sleepy eyes to see...

Inspectors. Standing right next to my bed. I almost shouted out in surprise, but stopped myself last minute.

They were here.

It was time.

And then thoughts of Kain and what had happened the night before crashed down on me. I almost let out a bitter laugh when I realized how stupid I'd been. I'd kissed him. It had been an awful idea and I regretted it, my entire heart aching at the thought of it.

I'd been so stupid.

The inspectors waited for me to stand up by myself before tying my hands behind my back with another zip tie.

They pulled me out of the room and took the same route they'd taken the day before. I stared at my feet the entire time, not wanting to see any of the inspectors faces, and only focusing on walking towards the one place I never wanted to go.

The place where I'd have to admit to it.

To what I'd done.

To my secret.

I saw a metal door come open in front of me, and when I walked in, I was expecting to find a room filled with people.

Except...it wasn't that room.

It wasn't that room at all.

It was a different room that made me look up immediately and increased the ball of dread that had formed inside of me tenfold. I felt anger running through my body, a deep desperate anger that cried throughout my veins, pleading to be released.

Olivia.

Olivia was standing in the middle of the room. And she wasn't alone.

Right next to her stood, Mr. Neilson, and everything came to me in a heartbeat. The answer to my question about how they were forcing everyone to confess was obvious and it almost physically hurt me that I hadn't thought of it beforehand.

Mr. Neilson was holding a gun to Olivia's head.

"Olivia!" I yelled out, suddenly trying to break away from the inspectors' grip. But it was too strong. They were too strong. I couldn't remember the last time I'd actually eaten something and my weakened muscles did nothing to help me.

Mr. Neilson was holding Olivia's hair, forcing her face towards the ceiling to make the black gun pointed at her neck more obvious. I saw Olivia's eyes trying to look down towards me, saw the pain that appeared in them when Mr. Neilson yanked her head farther back so she couldn't see me.

"No...va...," she attempted to say, but it came out sounding weird and stumbled because of the angle of her neck. She was dressed like she had been going to work, with skinny jeans and a black tank top. Her hair was hanging down behind her, a few chunks of it loose from Mr. Neilson's hold.

"So nice of you to join us, Nova," Mr. Neilson said conversationally. My entire body filled to the brim with fear, fear that he would pull the trigger on her, that the gun would go off and then she would go limp in his arms. My heart was beating rapidly with it, and my limbs jerked against the iron hold of the inspectors. "You know, I've always found your story quite interesting."

He began walking towards me, jerking Olivia along with him, who resisted as much as possible by digging her black heeled shoes into the ground. Her resistance stopped when Mr. Neilson shoved the gun farther into her neck. I saw her gasp out in pain and give up her fight.

"Stop!" I cried out, wincing and looking away as he did so. I couldn't stand the mere idea of Olivia getting hurt. She was the one constant in my life, my only rock keeping me from floating off into the ocean after what had happened to our parents and even after what I'd done.

"I've been watching you ever since that night. It's cute really. How you believed you could get away with that. But all of that doesn't matter now." He gave me a wolfish grin, and I saw his finger tighten on the trigger, yet not pull it.

I stopped moving, not daring to even breathe in fear that he would pull it. I couldn't allow that. I would do anything, everything to avoid it. "Please," I begged desperately, my voice cracking. "Please don't...please..." I could feel my throat closing up again and he only seemed to take joy out of my pain.

He smiled at me. "You're lucky, because I am giving you a chance. A chance that Beckam never got, now did he?" Shock jolted through me like I'd been struck by lightning. I'd already known that Mr. Neilson had known about my secret from Pepper, but hearing him say it, the first person to ever speak it out loud, changed it. It changed everything. I saw Olivia's face change slightly, her confusion obvious. Not even she knew what Mr. Neilson was talking about.

"I-," I started.

"No, don't tell it to me. Because that would ruin the purpose. I'm going to stay back here, keeping Olivia here in this room with me," he said, smiling and talking like I was a kindergartener and he was explaining the rules to a game. But this was no game. "And you'll go out there, you see." He pointed up to a series of screens imbedded into the wall that I hadn't noticed before. They lit up on cue, showing the bright gray room that was beginning to fill with other prisoners. "And you'll tell all of them exactly what you did."

This was supposed to be my motivation to tell the truth, to confess. He didn't have to say it specifically for me to understand the threat in his words. If I didn't confess the truth in front of everyone there, he'd kill Olivia. He'd shoot her without a second thought and then she would be gone, limp and lying on the ground just like Beckam had been.

I was breathing heavily now, from struggling against the inspectors and shouting at Mr. Neilson. He was still smiling at me as I watched the monitors and saw Kain escorted in by two inspectors.

"I'm also...sorry for all the damage this will cause," he added mercilessly. He was still smiling and the sorry was meant as a joke. He stared at Kain in the monitor, and then I grimaced as I realized what he meant. They were always watching. They'd seen what had happened last night.

The inspectors next to me began pulling me towards a second door to my left that I hadn't noticed until now. "Oh, and Nova, one more thing." The two inspectors holding me stopped as Mr. Neilson spoke. I turned my head to look at him eyes glaring. He gave me a shark-like grin before finishing what he'd wanted to say.

"Make me proud."