Page 74 of Mimic

“It is,” Blade confirmed.

“What?”

“It doesn’t matter. The fact remains, the information we have on you and the others says that you are a sleeper agent. We need to know if it’s true.”

“How?” I asked.

The idea that I could kill someone was ridiculous in itself. But that I would do it with my bare hands? The hands that were splayed out flat on the table in front of me as I stared at them.

“There is a phrase.”

My head snapped up to King’s voice. “A phrase? And it what... turns me into a killer? Do you understand how crazy this sounds?”

“I do understand. Which is why we have to be sure. Indie, I know you have no reason to trust us—”

“Except for the fact that you saved me from being kidnapped and didn’t give me back to my psycho father.” I paused, looking around the table. “He knows, doesn’t he? Or at least suspects? That’s why he wants me back, isn’t it?”

“We think so, yes. The Death Dogs were in bed with Daniel Scott.”

“I knew he fucking sold me,” I whispered.

“What?” Mimic growled beside me.

I slumped back in my chair. There was no reason to hide anything anymore; they knew most of it already.

“Devlin Scott and his son used everything they could to break us. Some lasted longer than others. In the beginning, it was manipulation. We were all young. I was only four. Every night I cried for my mom. We all did. So, they told us lies about our mothers, hoping it would sever that bond, make us feel alone, abandoned, so that they could swoop in and comfort us, convince us to trust them. Rely on them because we had no one else to rely on. They told us our mothers didn’t want us; that they were the ones who sold us.”

I felt the heat of Mimic’s body fall away as he sat back in his chair. He’d told me he had also been held prisoner. Not as long as I had, and not as young. But as I watched him shrink away, I wondered if his captors told him something similar.

“I never believed it, though I let them think I did. It was easier to give in. Safer.”

“Indie, I don’t want to interrupt, but I think maybe we should invite Haizley to sit in. Would that be okay with you?” King asked.

Did I want Haizley to know everything? Did I want her to look at me differently? The way everyone else was looking at me now?

Gunner stood from his seat and walked out.

“I guess I don’t get to choose.”

“You’re gonna need someone to talk to after. This way, you won’t have to go through it all a second time. Gunner will quickly fill Haizley in.”

I nodded. What else was there to do? My life had never really been my own, and it looked like it never would be.

“Will you use me?”

“What?” King asked, confusion marring his brow.

“Will you use me? If this is all true and not some fucked-up mind

game. Will you use myskills?”

King sat back in his chair as he studied me. I knew he was carefully choosing his next words.

“I’d be lying to you if I said the thought hadn’t crossed my mind. But until we know what we’re dealing with, I can’t answer that question. I will tell you this, though. I would never do it without talking to you first. Letting you decide if it was something you thought you could do. Something you could live with.”

“How would we know if it’s something I could live with until I’ve done it?”

“We don’t.”