Sitting on one of its highest branches, staring down at the old house, was Jamie.
She brought herself to a halt, floating easily in the air, and stared at her boyfriend. He was pale, which was not unusual, but his skin looked almost grey, apart from around his eyes, where it was red. She felt her heart thump in her chest; she wanted to go to him, to cross the space between them and wrap him in her arms, but she didn’t dare.
She was not yet sure exactly what she was dealing with.
“Hey,” she said, cautiously.
Jamie forced the tiniest smile she had ever seen him produce. “Hey,” he said. “How did you find me?”
“Kate ran your chip for me,” said Larissa. “I was worried about you, Jamie.”
He nodded his head, and returned his gaze to the house. She floated where she was, unsure of what to do and hating the feeling.
“This was where he was,” said Jamie, eventually, his voice low. “Alexandru. The night it happened, he was in this tree with his followers. I heard him laugh, but I couldn’t see anything. It was dark and everything was covered in shadows.”
“There wasn’t anything you could have done,” said Larissa. “He’d have killed you without a second thought.”
Jamie stretched out an arm and pointed down at the house. “You see that window? The big one?” Larissa followed the path of his finger and nodded. “That’s where I was,” he continued. “I was looking through that window because I heard Dad’s car pull into the drive and I was so excited that he was home. I was always so pleased to see him.”
“Of course,” she said. “You were just a kid.”
Jamie nodded again, and fell silent. After a seemingly endless moment, Larissa forced herself to speak.
“What’s going on, Jamie?” she asked. “Where did you and Frankenstein go this afternoon?”
He raised his head, and Larissa felt her stomach lurch at the sight of the empty expression on his face.
“He took me to see my dad,” he said, his voice low and halting. “He’s still alive. After everything that’s happened, after all this shit, he’s still alive. There’s a cottage in Norfolk, where we used to go and visit my nan. That’s where Frankenstein took me. That’s where he is.”
Larissa stared helplessly at her boyfriend. “Jamie …”
“He hugged me. Can you believe that? Just hugged me, like nothing had happened. I was nearly sick.”
“What happened to him? Where has he been?”
Jamie shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. I told him I never want to see him again. Told Frankenstein the same thing.”
Larissa grimaced. This was exactly what she had dreaded, every time she closed her eyes at the end of another day in which she had failed to tell her boyfriend what she had overheard.
“Why?” she asked. “What did Frankenstein do?”
“He knew, Larissa,” said Jamie. “He knew Dad didn’t die, that he was still alive the whole time. He was sending him emails, for Christ’s sake, giving him updates on me and Mum. How could he do that?”
“I don’t know,” said Larissa, her voice low. “I presume he thought it was for the best. He would never hurt you, Jamie, not on purpose. You must know that.”
“I don’t know anything any more,” said Jamie. “I can’t trust anyone apart from you and Kate and Matt. And my mum. My poor mum, Larissa. What am I supposed to tell her about all this?”
Larissa stared at him. She had no answer to his question.
“She thinks he’s dead too,” said Jamie. “She mourned him. We mourned him. It’ll destroy her if I tell her.”
“So don’t,” said Larissa, “if you don’t think it’ll do any good. Let her be.”
“I don’t have the right to keep it from her. I can’t make that decision on her behalf.”
“You can,” she said. “If you think it’s the right thing to do, if you think you’re sparing her pain. Or you just don’t know how to tell her.”
Jamie stared at her for a long moment, then frowned. His eyes narrowed, and Larissa saw red light flicker into their corners.
“Why aren’t you more surprised?” he asked, his voice suddenly low.
“What are you talking about?”
“I just told you that my dad faked his death, that he’s been alive this whole time, and that Frankenstein knew about it. So why do you look like I just told you tomorrow’s weather forecast?”
“Jamie …”
His face fell, and Larissa felt a shard of ice pierce her heart.
“Oh no,” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper, his eyes huge and staring. “Not you too, Larissa. Please. I can’t bear it.”
“I didn’t know,” she said, her voice high and unsteady. “Not for certain. You have to believe me, Jamie, I didn’t know. I just overheard something I wasn’t supposed to.”
“What?” he asked. “What did you hear?”
“When I came back from Nevada,” she said. “There was a prisoner on the same flight, in handcuffs and a hood. We weren’t allowed to even speak to him. When they brought him off the plane at the Loop, Cal Holmwood was waiting in the hangar and I heard him say, ‘Welcome back, Julian.’ That’s all, I swear.”
“That’s all?” said Jamie. “That’s all? How many prisoners called Julian do you think the Director would have made a point of personally welcoming?”
“I see that now, Jamie.” She was on the verge of tears, but she ordered herself to stay strong, to get through this without breaking down. “But I didn’t know if it would do any good to tell you. What if it wasn’t him? Or Cal refused to tell you either way? It would just have made things worse.”
“Worse?” said Jamie, his voice rising as his eyes narrowed. “It would’ve made things worse? Are you kidding me?”
Here it comes, thought Larissa. Here comes the explosion.
But she was wrong. Jamie stared at her, his face reddening, then let out a long, weary sigh and dropped his eyes.
“Were you ever going to tell me the truth?” he asked, his voice barely audible.
“I was going to tell you this afternoon,” said Larissa, realising how pitiful the words sounded. “I was coming to find you when I found out you and Frankenstein had left the Loop.”
Jamie let out a grunt of laughter with absolutely no humour in it. “That’s convenient,” he said.
“It’s the truth,” she said. “I hope you can believe it.”
“No more secrets,” he said, and grimaced. “Right? That’s what we promised each other.”
Larissa didn’t respond. There was nothing she could say. She stared silently at her boyfriend, profoundly aware of the chasm that seemed to have yawned open between them. Jamie kept his gaze on the ground, his shoulders hunched, his arms wrapped tightly round himself. He looked so small, as though a strong breeze could have blown him off the branch and sent him tumbling to the lawn below. When he finally spoke again, he didn’t look at her.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said. “About everything