Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 96065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 480(@200wpm)___ 384(@250wpm)___ 320(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 480(@200wpm)___ 384(@250wpm)___ 320(@300wpm)
“Kaitlyn’s surgery went well,” Dad says, patting my shoulder. “I thought you’d want that reassurance since she’s along the way.”
He’s right. Relief floods through me at seeing her.
“Surgery for what?”
“Nothing to worry yourself about right now,” he says. “Let’s go see your sister.”
My heart races in my chest, eager to get to the next leg of our journey. He pushes my wheelchair until we come to a crossroads of hallways. Doc Junior and Seth. I don’t understand why he’s been meddling in my life, teasing me about Calista. None of this makes sense.
Doc Junior points and then Dad begins pushing me in that direction down another hallway. We enter a dark room. I feel like my chest is going to explode in anticipation.
“The three of us should be able to get him in there,” Doc Junior says from behind us.
The light turns on, revealing a room, and in it is a chair with a strange contraption attached to the headrest. It faces the wall.
Nowhere in this room is Calista.
Have I been tricked?
Why?
I attempt to lift myself out of the chair, but whatever shit they’ve given me has made my muscles practically useless. My snarls and curses are my only form of resistance as Doc Junior, Seth, and Dad manhandle me from the wheelchair to the chair in the room.
“Stop,” I hiss. “What are you doing?”
They’re efficient in strapping my ankles and wrists. Then they brace my head into the contraption, locking it into place. Despite my furious name calling and threats, Doc Junior and Seth quickly attach a multitude of leads to my chest, neck, and head.
What are their plans?
“You lied,” I say to Dad, who’s staying out of my line of sight. “I fucking hate you, Orion.”
“I haven’t lied, Son,” Dad states coolly. “I’m going to show you what you asked for.”
Something clicks and then a video projects onto the wall. It shows a lobby or common area where several children of all ages are sitting in chairs. A few adults huddle together as if speaking in private.
A sudden flash of clarity burns hot inside my head. I know this place. I’ve been there. In fact…
A boy with dark hair and a stiff posture, no more than fifteen years old, stands near a set of doors. His arms are by his sides, hands fisted in anger. Despite his standoffish appearance, I can practically feel his pain.
I know his pain because the boy is me.
The video is the grainy quality of a security camera, but I recognize the furniture, decor, and linoleum—the same linoleum beneath me now.
I’m here.
I’m back at that place. The place that made me crazy and then tried to cure the insanity they created. Dad saved me and put me through his own methods to “fix” me.
The boy, me, stares at something just out of view. He’s angry, disgusted, frightened. My gut twists at the memory.
I went through so much abuse from…
Another blank inside my mind.
I’d been so eager to block it out, I played right into Dad’s efforts to make me forget.
What am I looking at in the video?
Then two people come into view.
A man, a monster, my doctor and guardian until Dad rescued me.
And her.
My sister. Calista.
Her blond hair has been braided neatly into two pigtails. The doll she had is now in his hand and she doesn’t seem pleased about it.
The face of the girl—my sister—is wrong, right? It’s the same face as the girl in the picture I’d found sitting on my hotel bed. They’re not just connected, they are the same.
How?
I blink several times to see if I can clear away the confusion of what I am seeing. If my hands were free, I’d rub at my eyes until a girl who looks like me comes into view. This one I’m watching doesn’t have dark hair like me and my biological parents.
They approach me in the video. His voice is soft but clear, directly being fed to my ears by a speaker attached to the contraption.
“I’ll take good care of Calista.”
He looks at the doll in his hand when he says it. He’s not speaking to me in that moment. He’s speaking to the girl.
How can that be?
Then he speaks to me in the video. “You’re being adopted, kiddo. I’ve done all I can do.”
Even as a grown man, hearing him say “kiddo” undoes me. My skin crawls and flashes of his mental torture starts assaulting me against my will. It takes everything in me to focus on the video and not my horrible memories.
The two of them walk away and disappear through a door. In the video, I stare after them, unmoving.
And then Dad appears with Ted.
I know the rest from here. He adopts me, takes me to his lodge, uses CUP programming to alter my mind to the point I don’t recognize it and question my past, and then brings me into the fold of his dark, twisted world as a partner in it—an heir to an evil empire.