Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 110809 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 554(@200wpm)___ 443(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110809 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 554(@200wpm)___ 443(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
“Like what? Ask if they can fly? Ask them to contact the mother ship? Or if they can leap tall buildings in a—”
“Georgia!” Her sharp yell makes me jump. “This isn’t a joke! These people—these, these things—they aren’t human. They’ve stood by and watched us die out again and again and done nothing. This time is different. No more hiding. They are real, they are here, and they have offered to help.”
“If they’re just ‘things’ who clearly terrify you, then what are you doing working with them?” I shoot back.
“Because they can save us. You can save us!” She pulls me down to the bed, her eyes boring into mine. “Their blood is real, what it can do is real. You will have access to it, and you will find a cure.”
“Why?”
“What?” She blinks.
“Why now? Why you? You said they’ve sat back and watched us struggle, so why are they acting now?”
She looks away. “Like I said, they see a way forward for their people and ours if I win the White House. If we work together.”
“President Gray wouldn’t work with them. Is that true?”
“Yes.” She glances away. “He’s refused their offer of help.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.” She’s never had an obvious tell, not really. That’s why she makes an excellent politician. She could lie right to your face and you’d never know. But she’s my sister. She knows more than she’s saying. “President Gray is … Well, you’d have to ask him.”
“Juno, why?” I glare at her. “You have to know why. You seem to be five steps ahead of everyone, including me. So why would President Gray turn this offer down when it would cement him the White House?”
“Like I said, you’d have to ask him. As for me, I want to change the world.” She meets my gaze again. “And I want to do it with you at my side. I know we can do it. I know it.” Her eyes light with fervor. “I believe in you. In us.”
I let my hands drop to my lap, my skin cold. “Juno, what have you promised them in return?”
She sighs, her body sagging a little. “Nothing that isn’t worth it. Curing the plague—that’s what matters.”
“That isn’t an answer.” I feel hollow, like someone scooped me out and left me in the sun to dry.
“I know it isn’t, but it’s all I can give you right now. I’m bound by my agreement with them. I have to …”
“Have to what?”
She rises, her steps heavy as she retreats to her closet and strips off her jacket. Her cream-colored shirt underneath has sweat marks at the armpits. For all her pretending to be unaffected, hopeful even, the stress is there. This isn’t Juno—she doesn’t back down, doesn’t let fear rule her. At least, that’s what I’d come to believe. Now … Now I’m not so sure.
“Georgia, the terms of all this are my burden to carry, not yours. All you have to do is sit tight until we’re in the White House. But you can’t take blood from me or Valen. You can’t do anything to jeopardize our relationship with them. In exchange, you’ll lead the team in DC that will work on finding a cure from their blood. That’s what I can give you right now.”
“I’m not someone for you to cut a deal with. I’m your sister.” I follow her and take her wrist, smoothing my palm down her arm again, looking for some evidence of the wound. “I just want to know you aren’t in over your head. I want to know you’re going to be okay.”
“We are going to be okay as long as you trust me.”
I sigh. “I don’t believe in this superhuman crap.”
“Do you believe in me?” She pulls on her light pink robe and ties it perfunctorily at her waist.
I rub my temples. Nothing makes sense. This whole conversation seems like something I imagined or found in a fever-dream. But in my gut, I know Juno isn’t crazy. There is something special about Valen, something that doesn’t add up. A different species? I don’t know. “Do you?” she asks again, more softly, her eyes searching mine.
Even if it’s nuts, and even if I don’t know what any of this means, I know Juno. I know her better than anyone else in the entire world. “Yes, I believe in you.”
She shrugs, her eyes shining. “Then that has to be enough.”
5
The inauguration is a subdued affair. I stand behind my sister in the cloudy light, a flurry falling silently around us as she pledges her oath of office on a Bible.
It’s the first time I’ve seen her in weeks. Ever since the press conference, she’s been in meetings or somehow unavailable whenever I ventured to her office or her room. She, Vince, and Fatima have been on the move or otherwise occupied while Candice and I grumble with each other, or I spend time in my lab.