Viral Nation #2 by Shaunta Grimes

Author:Shaunta Grimes [Grimes, Shaunta]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-06-02T04:00:00+00:00

You have lost a child, a dear, dear child. I have lost the only earthly object of my affection . . .

—JAMES BUCHANAN,

LETTER TO THE FATHER OF HIS EX-FIANCÉE AFTER HER DEATH, 1819

“Bridget Kingston.”

Langston Bennett stood over the girl. He’d seated her in a low chair so that she had to tip her head back to look up at him when he spoke her name.

“Yes, sir,” she said. Her voice was barely a whisper. She was scared. She had been scared of him since that day in August when he walked into her house thinking that he could nip the problem of her eavesdropping in the bud.

Her fear satisfied him.

The world had gone to hell that day. That wouldn’t happen again today. Today Bridget Kingston was going to tell him what he wanted to know.

“Your father told me about the ranch. It’s upsetting to me that you’ve known about this place for months and didn’t share it with him earlier.”

She shifted in her seat. He was making her uncomfortable, even though he was careful to keep his tone soft and confidential. “I—I know. I should have said something. I was scared. I didn’t—”

He cut her off with a hand smoothing over her honey-blond hair, his fingertips following the line of her skull and catching on the suppressant port implanted at its base. Her voice devolved into a squeak that faded when his hand moved to her cheek. He thought he could feel her heart, beating rabbit fast, against his fingers near her ear.

“Bridget, it’s time for you to do the right thing now. I know that West Donovan is still alive, so you aren’t hurting him.” She jumped under his hand and then froze, and he knew. Finally he knew. West Donovan was still alive. “Where is he, Bridget?”

He’d given away too much. He felt it immediately. She tilted her head back to look up at him, emboldened when she shouldn’t have been. She had thought that the boy was already in custody.

“I don’t know,” she said. “If he’s still alive, I have no idea where he’d be. I showed my father the only place I know of.”

He tightened his fist around a handful of her hair. It felt slippery and very clean in his palm when he tugged, pulling her head back farther. He brought the back of his other hand, hard, across her cheekbone. She let loose a screech.

“You will tell me what I need to know, Miss Kingston.”

Maybe he’d overplayed again. He wasn’t used to second-guessing himself, and his doubts left him unbalanced. Bridget Kingston’s eyes were wide and terrified. It would have been easier if she’d kept her hope that cooperation and a forthcoming attitude would get her out of this room. He saw that hope leave her eyes, replaced with a determination to keep her secrets.

—

West spent the drive back to Virginia City, warmer now and finally drying with the van’s heater blasting on him, thinking about how he would explain why he’d gone missing to Christopher and Phire.

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