“It’s fine,” I say again, trying to regain my verbal footing. “Younger sisters, right?”
Eames studies me. “You want to swim? We can move over to the other side of the pool.”
“Oh, no.” A horrified laugh escapes me. “I don’t swim. Just here to check my mail.” Hopefully he doesn’t know the other residents well enough to realize that I don’t live here.
He nods. His sister is flapping around with all the grace of a half-drowned cat, but she’s staying afloat. Good for her. “Not too far into the deep end,” calls Eames.
The girl sticks out her tongue at him, accidentally gets a mouthful of water, and makes a gagging sound.
A wave of longing washes over me. That casual protectiveness, the easy conversation—I miss that. I miss belonging to a place, to a group of people.
“Good luck with the swim lessons,” I say, turning toward the mail room.
The door is half-propped open and I don’t shut it behind me. That would be suspicious. Instead, I make sure that I’m in no one’s line of sight.
Nonna’s mailbox is on the second row near the far-left corner. I kneel beside it, glancing at the door.
“Edgar,” I murmur, “keep a lookout. If anyone comes near, tell me.”
“Of course,” he replies.
I dig into my pocket for a ring of wholly illegal bump keys.Only for official assignments, Prefect told me when he handed me the lock-picking kit. Intelligent criminals still use old-fashioned locks, instead of ones keyed to their ringware or tattoos. They don’t want their biometrics associated with a crime.
I ease the bump key into Nonna’s mailbox, careful not to get it stuck. I press my ear to the cool metal of the boxes. Closing my eyes, I try to focus on the sound of the lock tumblers rather than the uneven thump of my heart. Slowly, ever so slowly, I pull the key back until I hear the last pin click into place.
I turn the key and get lucky on the first try. The mailbox comes open.
Inside are two bills—one for health care and one for her car insurance.
I shouldn’t open the envelopes; I don’t have an easy way to reseal them. But my fingers linger on the medical bill. If Nonna isn’t well, if she’s sick—
I bite down on my lip. Even if she is sick, there’s nothing I can do. I can’t send her money or groceries or evena get-well card. This is the closest I can get to my family: stolen glimpses and picked locks.
Replacing the bills and closing the mailbox, I rise from my crouch and walk out of the room. The lobby is still shadowed by the blackout. The security guard has retreated to his office—I can see him through the open door. Eames is calling instructions to his sister.
But before I make it to the stairs, a flicker of movement catches my eye. There’s someone at the front doors.
She waves her hand at the door sensor, then raps on the glass with her knuckles. She has long blond hair and wears dark jeans and a matching jacket—but that isn’t what draws my attention. Her hands are oddly pale. She wears light gloves that almost—but not quite—match her skin tone.
Why’s she wearing gloves, some distant part of my brain notes,when she’s trying to use her tattoo to open a door?
From this distance, I can’t hear what she is saying. She points at the door and waves at the security guard.
The security guard heaves himself upright and ambles toward the front entrance. “Hold on, hold on! Must not be working,” he says. “I’ll let you in.”
A squirm of panic clenches in my stomach. Something’s wrong. “Wait,” I call. I’m not sure what I would have said—and in the end, it doesn’t matter.
The guard pulls the door open, then heads toward his office.
The woman steps inside. And before I can so much as gasp, she reaches inside her jacket and pulls out a gun.
There are moments when you can feel your life taking an abrupt, unforeseen turn.
Some people like that feeling. They seek it out.
But for me, the unforeseen has always felt like the jerk and weightlessness of a car crash.
The gun goes off. The security guard staggers and falls.
