ONE
Decima
The wallsof my rooms were so thick that the screams of the dying couldn’t reach me.
At least, I assume there were screams—and shouts and cries and the rest of the noises people make when they’re facing their end, especially if it’s violent. In my experience, hardly anyone goes silently.
But like I said, I couldn’t hear them.
I was finishing up a pretty typical evening in my part of the house with no idea what havoc was being wreaked beyond my door. I’d worked out in the gym for a couple of hours before dinner, running through the new exercises Noelle had given me. After a gazillion years of workouts and assignments under my primary trainer’s watch, it took a lot to bring the burn into my muscles. I threw everything I had into the jabs, kicks, and flips until I’d broken a real sweat.
Slacking off wasn’t an option. I had to keep pushing myself, keep stretching the time before fatigue started to set in. I never knew how long I might need to keep fighting or running to see a mission through, and a second’s weakness could mean failure. A.k.a., curtains for me.
It was a dangerous world out there, and the only way to ensure survival was to be the most dangerous thing in it. I’d been doing a pretty good job of that so far.
Anna brought dinner at the usual hour looking totally normal, so the massacre mustn’t have started until after that point. She’d set a novel on the tray beside my plate.
“I just finished that one,” she said, tapping it with a smile. Anna gave out smiles easily—not like Noelle, who I only got a rare grin out of when I’d kicked ass particularly well. “I thought you might like it, Decima.”
“Thanks,” I said, practicing my smile in return.
I wasn’t thrilled about the book, because I wasn’t much of a reader. I got impatient with words strung together with so many details that hardly seemed important, characters meandering around with no idea what they wanted, so I’d start skimming and then lose track of the story. But Anna always tried her best to be kind to me, and she meant that kindness a hell of a lot more often than most people I’d encountered. I was grateful for that.
When I was little, once I’d figured out what a family was from books and movies, I’d wondered if Anna was my mother. She used to spend more time with me between my training sessions back then. She’d laughed when I’d asked her, looking a little sad at the same time, and said no, that my mother and father had been taken from me by the bad people out there right after I was born. But the household would stop those people from getting me too. The household would look after me. They’d make sure I was strong enough to handle the world outside our home when it was time.
And they’d definitely come through on that promise.
Hungry after the long workout, I wolfed down the lasagna and salad, and then I just couldn’t settle down. My pulse kept thumping a little too fast as if the exertion of the workout hadn’t worn off. Maybe some part of me sensed a shift in the air, a vibe of brutal chaos that seeped through the walls even if sound couldn’t.
None of the movies or shows available on the TV—the nature documentaries, thrillers, and ridiculous comedies that Noelle had decided didn’t have any lies distracting enough that they might interfere with my missions—caught my interest. I couldn’t make it through two pages of Anna’s book. I brought up a game on the new console she’d brought last year, which Noelle approved of for honing my reflexes and observational skills. Not even assassinating my way through an office building took the edge off the restless itch crawling under my skin.
Finally, I went into my bedroom, sprawled out on the bed, and dipped my hand between my thighs.
Getting off like this usually brought a rush of energy and then a mellow lull that helped me relax after an intense mission or get to sleep. I kept my eyes shut and my mind blank, focusing completely on the physical sensations I summoned with the pressure of my fingers. If I let my thoughts stray, the chilling memories that would rise up might kill any chance of release. All that mattered was the slowly building pleasure and the thumping of my heart alongside it—
The whir of a lock disengaging jolted me off the bed. Every tingle of bodily enjoyment vanished in an instant.
With all my senses on the alert, I darted into the main room, instinctively sticking close to the furniture. Unexpected visits after dinner time were unusual. It could be Noelle coming with an urgent mission or with some kind of test, in which case I’d better show I’d prepared myself quickly.
But it was the other door that was swinging open, away from me into the room beyond. The door that led to the rest of the household.
No one ever came through there after dinner.
As I froze, bracing for the unknown, Anna staggered into view. Even clutching the door’s outer handle, she was crumpling toward the ground. She’d always been so separate from the harsher parts of my training that it took my brain a second to process that the red all over her dress was blood.
The blood pulsed from beneath her other hand where it was pressed to the side of her neck. It seeped from a bullet wound that’d seared through her dress and stomach, and another at her hip. Holy hell.
I dashed to her, my mind automatically taking stock of the arteries and veins that were most likely severed, the amount of fluid she’d already lost, the odds of survival.
She was bleeding out. She’d already lost more blood than most people could have endured.
For both my safety and the rest of the household’s, I wasn’t supposed to leave the boundaries of my rooms without approval. I’d never crossed this specific threshold, only leaving by the outer door into the yard. When I reached the doorway, tension locked around my muscles. I stopped with my feet on the threshold and caught Anna just before her head hit the hardwood floor.
“Anna!” I said, her name coming out like a protest. My throat had constricted. I felt like I was choking.
I’d seen a lot of people dying before, but mostly people I’d killed with the full intention of doing so, and the others I hadn’t known anyway. This—this wasn’t right—how could this be happening?
Anna’s grip on my forearm was weak. She couldn’t lift her chin enough for her eyes to meet mine. She seemed to be staring at my running shoes braced on that uncrossable line between my rooms and the rest of the house. Her blood dripped in a rhythmic patter against the floorboards.