Page 153 of Off the Rails

I scoffed. “And you expect me to believe that you were just going to let us go?”

I knew how things at Heirs of Promise worked. Any other student would have turned us in to get whatever leverage they could. Fuck, some of them would have done it just to deny us the satisfaction of our freedom.

But Tess shook her head. “I wasn’t going to let you go. I was going to figure out a way to follow you. But I never would have let them take you, Cyrus. I wouldn’t have put you in danger. I adored you.”

Her chest heaved as the words left her lips, but my lungs nearly collapsed. Adored me?

I blinked hard, trying to recalibrate. For all these years, I’d assumed that Tess only asked to come with us because Promise was such a nightmare. I thought she was just an impulsive little kid who didn’t want to be left out.

But as the weight of that word settled in my chest, panic flooded in with it.

Am I wrong? Is the story I’ve been telling myself wrong?

Suddenly, I didn’t feel certain of anything. A decade out, how many details had I forgotten?

Piercing pain cracked right through my skull, knocking me onto my ass.

While I tried to moor myself to reality, Tess saw her opportunity and took it. Headbutting me with enough force to knock me off-balance, she wobbled to her feet and ran.

Dizzy as she was, she quickly escaped the mouth of the skull and disappeared back into the darkness.

And I… just watched her. Unable to move, unable to think. Unable to live with the error I’d made.

83

TESS

My thoughts raced even faster than my feet as I slipped out of the cave. How could Cyrus think that I would report her? I hated Heirs of Promise just as much as the Freaks did.

You know exactly how.

I winced as the truth pressed in. When we had lived in the group home, I had been a timid little thing. Most of the time, I was too afraid to speak up outside of the mandated prayers.

But those three… they’d been hell on wheels, refusing to let the nuns break their spirit. While the rest of us tried to keep our heads down and memorize our lines, the three of them constantly questioned the teachings.

Not a real shock to hear that they wanted to split them up.

Their questions weren’t disrespectful — not for the most part, anyway — but that didn’t stop the staff at the home from interpreting it as such. Our Church was interested in total obedience, and Blade, Nash, and Cyrus were impossible to subdue.

It was part of why I’d admired them so much. Blade had always been a ball of energy, but she was so smart too. She always fixed the worn out toys in the communal play bin for the little kids. Nash, on the other hand, was a constant source of calm. Just being in her company was a comfort.

And Cyrus?

My heart ached to think of that sweet yet confident teenager growing into a monster who hated me. Who thought I was the villain.

I needed to focus. I wasn’t sure how much of a lead I had on her, but I didn’t imagine it was much. Especially not with the fresh wave of adrenaline the headbutt would spur. She could be here any second, and I needed to be invisible once she caught up.

Racing out of Black Doubloon, I kept to the paved paths. I’d been careful to cover my tracks last time, but clearly it wasn’t a good enough job to keep her from finding me.

I ran until I reached the gritty, 1950s streets of Noir Nights. Halfway across the park, and still no sign of Cyrus.

My legs were quaking from the distance. But I didn’t dare slow down until I spotted a vintage car prop parked down one of the alleyways.

My legs are giving out on me. This is the best I’m going to find.

After limping down the dark alley, I laid as flat to the pavement as I could before squeezing myself under the car’s carriage.

It was a tight fit — I wouldn’t be able to get out fast enough to make another run for it.