The Replaced by Derting Kimberly

Author:Derting, Kimberly [Derting, Kimberly]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-04-28T07:00:00+00:00

“What is this place?” I pressed my hand against the dirt-smeared window and looked outside.

This camp was nothing at all like sleepy Silent Creek. This was more like boot camp, with tents everywhere. Only these weren’t the fun camping kind you slept in during summer excursions with your family. These were the heavy canvas tents of war. The ones with beat-up Humvees, or maybe even tanks, parked out front.

There were obstacle courses, too. Tall rope walls, and orange cones set up at regular intervals, and rows of tackle dummies—similar to the ones the football players used at my high school during practice. And even at this hour, several people were running in formation, their paces perfectly timed, military-style.

We were so not in Kansas anymore.

Thom’s voice came from behind me as I stared out to the field beyond, watching the predawn drills. “To the outside world, it’s one of those camps for troubled teens. The kind of place parents spend a small fortune on when they think their kids are doing drugs or being delinquents. Utah has a ton of those places since the laws are more lenient here for that kind of thing.”

I moved out of Jett’s way when he nudged me aside so he could pry yet another faceplate off one of the outlets, this time the one beneath the window where I’d been standing. He was on a mission to find some way to tap into their communications system. So far he’d pulled apart every outlet, wall plate, and even the overhead lights, trying to find the right combination of wires he might use to get a message out to the Silent Creekers so we could let them know we might be in over our heads here.

“It makes it easy to hide a bunch of teens in the desert,” Thom went on. “Plus, no one ever questions why a group of minors always has cash for supplies when they do have to go into town.”

“What about the guns?” I asked. “No one questions that either?”

Simon stopped pacing the creaky floorboards long enough to answer. “The kind of people they buy weapons from don’t care where they get their money.”

Good point.

“How much longer do you think they’ll hold us here?” All of us except Willow had been confined to a room with two army-style cots, a sink, and a toilet that sat smack between the two cots with absolutely nothing to shield it from view. As in, zero privacy.

It was suspiciously like being in jail, minus the bars and the supersweet orange jumpsuits. No one would tell us where Willow had been taken, and we were in no position to lodge a complaint.

“Not long,” Thom said. “Griffin’ll want to know exactly why we’re here and what our end game is.”

Natty looked up from the cot she was sitting on. “End game? Why does there have to be an end game?”

Simon and Thom shared a look. “There always is with Griffin.”

“What aren’t you telling us?” I asked, frustrated by this constant looking thing they were doing between the two of them.

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