Page 43 of Take You Home

Chester’s chest hurts. Obie sounds reluctant. “About Locke and Nehemiah, you mean?”

“Yeah. Especially Chester.” Her jaw tightens. “Honestly, I’ve been worried about him from the start.”

Chester’s eyes sting. Over the years, he’d managed to convince himself that Sawyer and Naomi wrote off him and his friends entirely after they left, that they didn’t care about their former students anymore, that maybe they’d never even cared in the first place‍?—

Apparently, though, Sawyer still thinks about them. Still thinks abouthim.“Oh,” he whispers.

Obie twitches again. To Chester’s surprise, he asks, “Because he’s a neophyte hunter?”

Sawyer grimaces. “Partly. He and JJ were always on shaky ground at the Sanctum. I’m less worried about Bryant, since the bloodlines hierarchy puts her closer to the top, but I know even that can’t always protect her nowadays.” She looks away. “But I’m more worried about Chester because of his job down in the prison.”

Chester blinks at her, startled. Obie’s eyebrows furrow. “I thought JJ said he was a good interrogator.”

“He isn’t. Never was.”

Chester jerks back, the words stinging like a slap in the face. Sawyer doesn’t think he’s a good interrogator? Sheneverthought he was a good interrogator?

The only mentor he’s ever looked up to thought he wasn’t worth it?

Obie’s eyes narrow. “That’s not what JJ said. And JJverymuch has firsthand experience with Chester’s skill set.”

Chester and Sawyer both flinch at the words. “I mean‍—‍” Sawyer begins, and she lets out her breath in a hiss. “Let me rephrase that. It’snot that Chester isn’t good at his job. It’s that his job isn’t good forhim.Do you know how the Sanctum assigns vocations?”

Obie shakes his head.

“The Council watches you,” she says. “For most hunters, they watch you from childhood. Once you get older, they interview other people about you, trying to get a feel for your strengths and weaknesses.” She shakes her head. “Obviously, none of that was an option for Chester and JJ. They were already ten years old when they arrived, so we had averyshort window to figure out where they should end up‍—or, more accurately,Ihad a very short window. I was the one who submitted their vocational aptitude scores and made recommendations.”

“And Locke and JJ were different?”

“Marginally,” Sawyer says. “Chester was a bit less of a team player than JJ. A bit more outspoken, a bit more likely to question orders. Nothing major. I figured they’d both be assigned to separate strike teams, and I’d just have to smooth over some of those rough edges with Chester.” She scowls. “But then they put him down in the prison, instead.”

“And that was… bad?”

“Obie,” she says, “that’s where they put the sociopaths. The sadists. The ones with low empathy scores who enjoy hurting other people. That’s the exactoppositeof what I observed in Chester. That wasn’t a matter of smoothing over rough edges‍—that was more like pinpointing Chester’s strengths and taking a sledgehammer to them.”

Chester’s face feels hot and his body feels cold and his skin feels clammy. He stares at Sawyer, uncomprehending.

She thinks he shouldn’t have been an interrogator in the first place?

“And then they gave him Adrian Nostrand as an interrogation mentor,” Sawyer continues, and Chester swallows hard. “The oneinterrogator who was guaranteed to be as unsympathetic as possible, to teach him in all the most callous and brutal ways, to constantly put him in his place until he started to believe it.” She leans forward. “With JJ, they played to his strengths. With Chester, they‍—they tried to kill him, honestly. Kill all the parts of him that matter.”

Chester can’t breathe. He puts his fingers on his chest, trying to fill his lungs with air, but it‍—it shouldn’t be this hard.

Is he having a panic attack?

“Why?” Obie’s voice is neutral, but his shoulders are stiff.

Sawyer smiles grimly. “To separate him and JJ, obviously. To isolate Chester from anyone who would tolerate him questioning the Sanctum. JJ wasn’t stupid, but he was willing to follow orders and conform without thinking about it too deeply. It was the only way he could survive. That’s why the Council put him on a strike team with a purebred and a mixed breed who was militant about never speaking out of turn‍—it was their best option to keep him in line.”

“But Chester?” Obie asks, and Chester almost flinches. Why is Obie still asking questions? It’s not like he cares about Chester’s life, not really. He could end this conversation at any time. He could‍?—

Is he just pushing for answers because Chester is right here?

And is he trying to help Chester or hurt him?

“They wanted to make Chester afraid to ask questions,” Sawyer says. “You haven’t had the displeasure of meeting Nostrand, but he’s a goddamn piece of work. He’s…” She hesitates. “He’s a skilled interrogator, but as a teacher, he’s notoriously intolerant of questions. The Sanctum actively gave Chester a job descriptionanda mentor that would make him spend all his mental energy on surviving, not questioning his situation. Not giving him the opportunity to eventhinkabout rebelling.”

Chester swallows hard. Fumbles to put his hand back on Obie’s shoulder.Please end this conversation. Please.