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  JohnBoy was his screen name. Not his real one, of course. Just like Miranda wasn’t hers.

  He could be any of them—he could be her. She had to bear witness, not treat him as a disposable commodity, used and tossed away, like the Creep and his clients did.

  It was important. It was why she did what she did.

  Except now she was running out of time. In a few days, the Creep would win. Everything. Unless…JohnBoy…maybe he was the one. Magic Thirteen.

  He was a year or two older than her, sixteen or seventeen. He looked strong enough, nice muscles, tall—as tall as her dad, even. So many of the others she’d found, they’d already been broken, damaged beyond repair. You could tell it by their eyes: dead and dull, staring at nothing.

  Not JohnBoy. Despite the fake smile for the perv halfway around the world, she caught a spark of defiance in his eyes, hidden behind each blink. More than defiance. Hope.

  As if he knew she was there, searching for him. As if he needed her as much as she needed him.

  Shoulders tight, carrying a burden much too heavy for a skinny fourteen-year-old girl barely five feet tall, she hunched over her keyboard, fingers pounding the keys so hard shock waves raced up her arms.

  Hang on, JohnBoy. I’ll find you. I promise.

  2

  Thursday, four days later…

  Who the hell was William the Conqueror? I stare so hard at my exam paper my vision blurs. I know he’s important, but was he before or after all those Henrys? Somewhere in the middle? I can’t think, I’m so exhausted. After I got home from another fire last night, King woke me for a live-streaming session with one of his clients.

  Some days I get home from school and stand inside the door, unable to remember if I’m coming or going or anything about the day or if I even went to school. So much for education being the path to freedom.

  Maybe some of us never find a way out. We end up trapped forever—like all those peasants and serfs used as cannon fodder by William and the Henrys and every egomaniacal dictator who came after them.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket. Talk about your egomaniacal dictators. No phones in school, definitely not while taking a test. Those are the rules. But this is the phone King gave me. The one I must never, ever turn off or not answer.

  I stretch to cover my movement as I slide it under the desk, typing with one hand.

  JB: Can’t talk.

  King: Client wants JohnBoy. Now.

  JB: Can’t. Test. Gotta go.

  King: Get out of it.

  JB: Can’t. Teacher.

  King: I don’t care. Five minutes. Live feed or else.

  I stare down at my hand, at the words filling the screen. My mouth is dry; I can’t get enough spit together to swallow. Or else.

  Two words more frightening than anything the teacher can throw at me. I glance up at her. She’s marking papers, clueless.

  Not me. I know too much—learned it all when I was twelve, real-world stuff, true shit, not lies written by the conquerors for the history books. I know what King’s “or else” can mean. The Spanish Inquisition has nothing on him when it comes to devising new and cruel ways to torture. King’s torture doesn’t leave a mark or bruise—his weapon of choice is the Internet and he uses it to reach anyone, anywhere, anytime he chooses.

  I accidentally pissed him off a while back when the battery died in my cell and I missed his call. He punished me by setting my mom up on a blind date with a psycho she thought was a guy from the church choir. She was so excited, changed her dress three times—it was her first date since my dad walked out on us. Mom juggles two part-time jobs plus taking care of my little sister, Janey, so she doesn’t have time or energy to meet nice guys, much less date. I’ll never forget the smile she had as she ran to answer the door when he rang—I hadn’t seen that smile in years, not since my dad. It lit up her entire being, like she’d swallowed a piece of heaven.

  Haven’t seen her smile like that since, either. Her “choirboy” cornered me after he brought her home and told me exactly what he’d do to her if I ever kept King waiting again. Then he walked out of Mom’s life, and she went back to being overworked, underpaid, and overwhelmed.

  That’s King’s idea of “or else.” Hard to care about a history test when your life is already over.

  Pocketing the phone, I turn my paper over, lay my pencil on top, and walk up to the teacher. She glances up, startled. “What is it, Jesse?”

  “Can I please use the boys’ room, Mrs. Henderson?” I’m always extra polite with teachers. Best way to get them to do what I need them to do.

  She looks disappointed in me. It’s a look I get a lot. I’m used to it. Before King, it would have bothered me. I was always one of those kids who tried hard to be the best at everything. But that was a long, long time ago. Long before Mrs. Henderson ever met me. But every now and then, an adult like Mrs. Henderson realizes I’m not fulfilling my potential. Some kind of instinct makes them wonder why I’m such a loser.

  Can’t they see? I’m not a loser. I’m the Energizer Bunny, running a triple-A life fueled by anger, adrenaline, and anxiety.

  But they can’t see it. They don’t want to see it. No one does.

  “You know the rules, Jesse. You can’t leave during a test.”

  Class only started ten minutes ago, so no way will she believe I’m already finished. But no way can I finish, not with worrying about the price I’ll pay if I keep King waiting.

  “I feel sick.” It’s the truth. Nothing new. I’ve felt sick, worse than sick—a dirty, queasy, constant burning in the pit of my belly—ever since I met King. Or rather, when he met me. I was twelve then. I’m sixteen now. The feeling hasn’t gone away, gets worse every day.

  Her frown deepens. I’ve used the sick excuse too often with her. Shame, really, since I love history. All those stories of far-off lands and adventure. It’s the last class I’d ever skip if I had a say. But of course I don’t. I have no say in anything. My life doesn’t belong to me. It belongs to King.

  “I’m sorry, Jesse. If you think you need to go down to the nurse, you’ll get a zero for your test grade unless she can confirm that you’re really sick.”

  I look down at my size twelves, then up at the clock above her head, ticking away my precious five minutes. I nod. “I understand.”

  She scratches out a hall pass to take to the nurse. I grab my backpack and leave. As soon as the door closes behind me, I slide my phone free.

  “Why aren’t you live?” King answers.

  “On my way—” The phone is yanked from my grasp. It’s Mr. Walker, the vice principal. He’s always sneaking around the halls when class is in session.

  Stupid. I should’ve been more careful.

  “I’ll take that, Mr. Alexander,” he says triumphantly, as if he’d just single-handedly disarmed a suicide bomber.

  Little does he know he actually does hold my life in his hands.

  “Please, Mr. Walker—” I slouch, trying to make myself smaller than my six one. Don’t want to intimidate Walker, who’s only five eight with lifts in his shoes. He has short-man syndrome big-time.

  He arches an eyebrow at me, then hangs up the phone. Hangs up on King.

  Shit. Shit, shit, shit. The acid churning through my gut makes it all the way up to the back of my throat. Tastes like burning rubber. King is going to be furious. And I’ll be the one to pay the price.

  “That’s my emergency phone. I was calling to let my mom know I’m sick and headed to the nurse’s office.” Over the past three years, I’ve learned how to act better than any of those pretty boys in Hollywood. I can see he’s wavering, hold up the hall pass to convince him.

  Unfortunately, Mrs. Henderson chooses that moment to come out and see what’s going on. Two minutes later, my phone’s confiscated after Walker sees I wasn’t really talking to my mom, I’m back at my desk
scratching doodles on my test paper (because who can think when they’re imagining things far worse than any atrocities good ole Willie the Conqueror ever could have performed?), and I’m ordered to detention after school.

  Most kids would be whining about how life sucks or how unfair it all is. Not me. I couldn’t care less about my grade or detention or graduating.

  If I had my way, I’d be gone already. Enlist in the Marines or Army, get my GED, have Uncle Sam pay for college. Wouldn’t even care if they sent me to a battlefield, shit getting blown up, bullets flying.

  That kind of war would be heaven. At least I’d have a fighting chance.

  Not like now. Now, with King in my life, I don’t have a chance in hell.

  I stare at the closed classroom door. My phone is down the hall with Walker, waiting for me to pick it up after detention. By then it will be too late.

  King is going to kill me.

  3

  The rest of the day passes by me like I’m in a fog, trapped by smoke so thick I can barely choke it down. I make it through history and English. Then as the school empties for the day, it’s just me and the other losers sitting with Walker in detention.

  All I can think about is what King will do to me—or worse, my mom or sister. I’m the man of the house; I’m the one who’s supposed to be taking care of them. Yet here I am, trapped at a desk. Watching the clock, my heart speeds faster than the hand clicking the seconds away.

  Walker is working on his laptop, occasionally looking up to give us all the hairy eyeball. I’m stuck with the typical detention kids: stoners caught smoking pot or huffing in the janitor’s closet, the token cool kids being made an example of for chatting and texting during class, two jocks, both with black eyes, who glare at the rest of us, and an emo chick who hides her face behind her hair the entire time.

  Despite the worry turning my spit sour and the acid churning through my gut over King’s retaliation, I stare out the window, trying hard not to imagine what he’ll do to me.

  There are a few kids milling out front, missed their bus or waiting for rides. A silver Camry pulls up, the horn honks twice, and a man jumps out of the driver’s seat, leans across the roof, smiling right at me.

  The car’s nothing like my dad’s—he always had different ones, old junkers we’d work on together and then he’d sell them and start over again—and the man doesn’t look like him, but for a moment, a single moment, less time than it would take an atom to split, my heart beats faster, warming my entire body as I smile back. It’s Dad. He’s come to rescue me, to save Janey and my mom.

  For the duration of one breath—not even a full breath, all I do is inhale, imagining Dad’s scent of leather and grease and Lava soap—I’m free. King can’t hurt me. No one can.

  Then I blink and a kid races to the car, the man waving to him to hop in, and they drive off—leaving me with the same void in my heart that I’ve had since my dad left four years ago. I lower my head down onto my desk, closing my eyes against the rush of emptiness. I should be used to it by now. Besides, I can’t afford the luxury of indulging in fantasies, like Dad ever coming back.

  But if I did, my dream would go like this: I finish school and get a job, probably by joining the army. It’s not a lot of money, but it’s enough so I can afford a place for Janey and my mom. In my dream, they’re sitting inside my truck, I’m loading the last suitcase into the back of the pickup, and my uncle comes running out to stop me.

  I whirl and land one of those punches that only happen in the movies. Smack and my uncle goes down…and he stays down, staring up at me with a mix of fear and respect.

  Janey and Mom cheer. I hop into the truck and drive us off into the sunset and our new lives. Away from him. Away from King.

  That’s my dream, what keeps me sane. I might even be able to make it come true if I work hard enough, focus. Just have to make it through high school, just have to survive that long…

  Our phones are lined up in front of Walker’s laptop like trophies. One of the girls’ cells—pink and all bedazzled in rhinestones—keeps vibrating, bouncing against the desktop, buzz, buzz, buzz…buzz, buzz, buzz…until it finally skitters all the way across the desk and falls to the floor between the desk and the wall.

  A blond girl wearing more makeup than my mom ever has bounces up. “Mr. Walker,” she calls. “My phone!”

  Walker looks up, irritated. He rolls his eyes, but it’s obvious she’s one of the rich kids whose folks could hassle him for destruction of property or the like, because he gets down on his hands and knees behind the desk to scramble for the phone. It’s still buzzing and skids under the radiator. He curses and I see my chance.

  Before I can think twice, I race past the desk, grab my phone, and rush out the door and down the hall. I spin around a corner and plow into the girls’ room, figuring they’ll never look for me here.

  Footsteps pass by outside in the hall. I lean panting against the sink, thinking I might be sick. My eyes are wide, like a wild animal’s, and I barely even notice the fruity perfume smell of the pink soap or how much cleaner the girls’ room is compared to the guys’. All I care about is a few moments of privacy so I can call King and beg his forgiveness.

  The hall is silent. I risk moving into the farthest stall—the handicapped one with its own sink and a tiny window. My fingers tremble so bad they bounce off the phone’s keyboard. We use an Internet calling app—less traceable, King says, plus we can do video. One-way, of course. He sees me. I’ve never seen him.

  It rings four times, each ring ratcheting up my pulse, until finally King answers with a gruff, “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “It wasn’t me. I didn’t turn off my phone. The vice principal confiscated it.” I plead my case in a rush, not bothering to breathe between words.

  “You know the rules.”

  “It wasn’t my fault. The teacher—”

  “I can’t help it if you’re too stupid to outwit some dumb teacher. There are consequences when you don’t listen to me. You know that by now.”

  I scramble, trying to come up with a solution. I have nothing. Finally I say, “What do you want?”

  There’s a pause and I know the bastard is smiling. Like always, he has me exactly where he wants me—no way out.

  You think I’d be used to it by now, but every time I surrender to him, I lose a piece of myself. Like those zombie movies where they reach inside your chest and tear out your heart or intestines or liver. That’s me, walking around with half my insides torn out—half boy, half zombie, all of me belonging to King.

  “It’s not what I want,” King says. “It’s what my friend wants. He’s kinda like your uncle, only he likes girls. Watch.”

  The phone’s screen cuts to a video feed. From the date and time stamp, I know it’s live. At first all I see is a car dash and steering wheel. Then the camera jerks up, and I see a school bus pull up to let some little kids out on a country road with no sidewalks. My road.

  “No. You can’t.” My pulse throttles my voice until only a whisper escapes.

  I swallow hard as the kids climb down the bus steps and scatter in all directions. The camera focuses on one little girl walking with two others, a bright pink backpack making her an easy target.

  Janey.

  “Please. Tell him to stop. I’ll do anything.” Sweat cements my shirt to my flesh as I search for a way out. I can’t go through the school—too many teachers and guards. I’ll have to risk going out the window. I try to force it open. Locked.

  “Tell him to stop!” I scream as the car door opens. The camera jerks up and down when the man holding it crosses the street to follow the girls. Follow Janey.

  King says nothing.

  “Answer me, you son of a bitch!” Anger and panic fuel my punch as I swing my fist into the window. Hurts like hell but bounces right off. Damn safety glass. I spin for th
e door; I’ll just have to make it past whoever might be searching for me outside.

  “Is that the tone of voice you use with me?” King demands, his voice flat.

  I pause, my hand on the door. My entire body vibrates with the need to get to Janey, the urge to hit something—someone. I force myself to swallow my rage, close my eyes, and whisper, tasting every word as vomit: putrid, rancid remnants of my soul. “I’m sorry. Please stop him. Please. Don’t hurt my baby sister. She’s only seven. I said I was sorry.”

  Silence.

  “Please.” I’m begging for her life—not that King cares. “I’ll do anything. Just stop him.”

  The man in the video keeps walking. Janey can’t wait for King’s answer.

  I open the door and speed out into the hall, sideswiping a janitor, sending his bucket across the linoleum to crash into the lockers. He yells but I don’t hear it. All I hear is the silence on the phone. I race down the hall, take a corner so fast my sneakers squeak as I skid, bounce off the wall, and aim for the side doors, praying they’re still unlocked. Someone shouts my name from behind me, but I ignore them.

  As I run, I dare a glance down at the video. Janey’s at our door, fumbling for her key.

  “You’re supposed to be there with her, aren’t you?” King says. “Little girl like that, it’s not safe for her to be alone with no one at home.”

  The man with the camera starts up our driveway.

  “No, please.” I’m sobbing now, don’t care. Any pride I had has long since been ripped away. “Please, make him stop.”

  “It’s all your fault. It’s your job to protect her. Your job to do as I say. You failed on both counts, JohnBoy.”

  I reach the door at full speed, prepared to crash through it headfirst if it’s locked. My hand hits the push bar. Thankfully it slams open and I’m free.

  The man reaches our front steps.

  I was running late this morning, so my truck is parked at the far end of the lot. The world goes red around the edges as I run faster than I ever have in my life.