“Already skipping my class?” a smooth voice asks, taking the seat next to me.
I lift my head and look to my right. Perfect posture in an immaculate suit, I muse. Sitting up straight, with his shoulders back, the man beside me exudes sophistication like it was bred in him. The elegant, charcoal grey suit gracing his tall body certainly conveys that perception, but his posture reinforces it.
He pinches the pleat on his pant and turns his head to look at me. Blue-grey eyes top a long aristocratic nose. Dark brown, wavy hair, longer on top with precisely trimmed sides, looks like the kind of expensive cut you see in the best of circles. Indentations under his cheekbones make them appear sharp and pronounced. Clean-shaven too. No nonsense lips pressed firmly together give me the tiniest hint of his ire.
“Sorry,” I say, flipping up the page in my hand to see the name. “Oliver. This hasn’t been the best day, and given that I was already ten minutes late, I didn’t think my teacher would enjoy me disrupting the class.” Come to think of it, where’s the rest of the class?
“There is no class. Just you and me,” he informs me. “Given your age, I doubt you’d enjoy learning to use your power in a class with teenagers.”
“Ouch,” I remark with a shake of my head. No woman likes to hear those words, even if he didn’t mean them the way they sounded. “No. Worse would have been the younger ones.” When he lifts a sculpted brow, I continue. “Lionel’s son burned the house down when he was five or six.”
“Really? I didn’t know,” he replies with a thoughtful look. “On average, our powers manifest when we’re teenagers, but it can happen earlier.”
“But not later,” I state with resignation.
“No,” he confirms. “Your meeting with Beckett didn’t go as planned.”
Fidgeting for a few minutes at the idea of someone knowing what we discussed, I finally blurt, “Doesn’t my discussion with Beckett fall under doctor patient confidentiality?”
“It does,” he assures me. “He didn’t give me any details, but I had to send Quaid in to diffuse the situation between him and River.” There’s a hint of anger in his eyes. “Beckett would never hurt another. Can you say the same about River?”
I frown at the thought of them actually fighting, but I don’t answer.
“We vet each and every person for weeks before we let them come to Phoenix. Lionel vouched for you, so we relaxed the rules. But once you started traveling with River, we had to revisit things,” he informs me. “Unfortunately, there is very little information on River past his freshmen year of high school. He’s a very powerful unknown. Normally, we wouldn’t have brought him here, but I promised Lionel I’d help you, and I didn’t think separating you from him would be wise.”
Is he going to force River to leave? If so, I’m going with him. I’m not tied to anything here. Surely there is somewhere safe out there. I shift uncomfortably in my seat while I wait for him to reveal what’s going to happen next.
He shifts to look directly at me. “We take the safety of this compound very seriously. I’ve given him a warning. In the future, it would be best if you didn’t invoke his… protection. If you feel Beckett is overstepping, come to me. I’ll resolve the issue.”
Feeling like a chastised child, I stiffly nod, but underneath, I’m secretly relieved that he isn’t kicking us out. I need to know my powers and how to handle them, and River can’t always protect me. He has a mother and a sister.
“I understand. I feel bad for leaving River and Beckett behind to deal with the situation,” I grudgingly concede. The idea that I could have saved my parents was a punch in the gut.
“Good,” he says, looking at the gold Rolex on his wrist. “Our time is up. Tomorrow, we’ll focus on using your powers.” He glances back at me. “What is your power?”
“Water,” I reply.
He tilts his head to the side. “Interesting.” While his face never changes, I can tell my answer isn’t what he expected.
I wait for him to ask more questions, but he doesn’t.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he murmurs, rising to his feet.
Totally looking forward to it. Not. “Do you know my room number?” All I want to do is hide for a few minutes. Maybe take a shower. Change clothes.
He taps on his phone, then replies, “113. There’s a map of the rooms on the tablet. Anything else?”
“No, thank you,” I tell him.
With one long look at me, he pivots and strides away, his walk as purposeful as his demeanor. A soldier, maybe? It suddenly clicks, and I want to smack myself on the forehead. Lionel said Oliver ran Phoenix. Guess that’s Senator Jack Harrison’s son. Major Oliver Harrison. I wince. Way to make a great impression. If Lionel was here, he’d be really disappointed.
I open the tablet and find my room. Through these doors, down one long hallway, then a right, and about halfway down the next one is room 113.
As I walk, I think about my conversation with Oliver. I need to learn my powers and some survival skills. If he thinks bringing River here is bad, he’s going to be livid when he finds out the truth. I killed Trent. And at some point, I’m going to have to tell Oliver why Hightower and his men are really after me. They couldn’t care less about my ability to manipulate water. Losing both his wife and son to someone with powers… Hightower will do anything to find me.
CHAPTER24
WILLA / GREER
