Glitch

little bit suspicious? And then there’s
    his Re sis tance. I’ve looked into it, and they do all kinds
    of experiments in chemical warfare and coercion. They’re
    as bad as the Community. And Adrien’s helping them get to
    you. To make you think you like him so you’d work for
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    them. They need your gift. But I’m not like that,” he said,
    his voice intense as leaned in. “I want you. Just you.”
    He came at me and put his mouth on mine and pushed
    me up against the wall, crushing me under his weight.
    “Stop it.” I tried to push him away but he was stronger.
    He stopped kissing my protesting mouth, but he still
    trapped me there, hands on both sides of my head against the
    wall.
    “You’ll want me,” he said in a growl, keeping me cap-
    tured against the wall. “One day. I’ll make you want me.”
    “Let me go,” I whispered, all patience gone, and some-
    thing worse, something I’d never expected to feel around
    Max— fear.
    “Move back,” I said fi rmly, so furious at him for making
    me afraid. The anger started a buzzing in my ears. “Before I
    make you.”
    He laughed darkly, pulling back and holding his hands up
    to show he wasn’t trapping me anymore. “Don’t you see?
    That’s why you’re perfect for me. You have the darkness
    underneath, too.”
    His words were like a punch to my stomach. So he saw it
    too— the guilt that hung like a weight around my neck. He
    knew that, at my core, I was a betrayer. What I’d done to
    my brother would mark me for life.
    “Maybe,” I fi nally managed to whisper. “But it’s still
    Adrien I want.”
    He took another step back. He stood still for a long mo-
    ment and I could see his throat bobbing up and down as he
    swallowed repeatedly. It was a terrifying silence. Finally, he
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    lifted his forearm to swipe at his eyes and hurried out of the
    room.
    I felt like my stomach had been hollowed out, scraped
    clean of any goodness inside me.
    I’d hurt Max. I’d betrayed yet another person I cared
    about. I wanted to call him back, to somehow make things
    better, to help close the deep wound I’d made, but I didn’t
    know what to say.
    The front door slid shut behind him.
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Chapter 20
    the next day, I walked with Max to the cafeteria like
    always. We were trapped in our routine, forced together to
    avoid suspicion. He couldn’t avoid me, but I could sense
    from the furious heat pulsing from his body that it was tak-
    ing every ounce of eff ort to be near me.
    What he could do was ignore me. Which he did. I picked at
    my food, feeling him like a silent fuming boulder beside me.
    I tried over and over to catch his eye but he never gave any
    indication he even knew I existed. I fi nally gave up trying.
    Then, as I was about to stand up and collect my dishes, I
    heard a low scream from the other side of the room.
    My eyes widened as I craned my neck to see what was go-
    ing on.
    A boy screamed and thrashed, trying to get away from
    the two Regulators who’d just grabbed him. It was Juan, the
    boy Adrien had pointed out to me earlier, the one who was
    a glitcher.
    “Help me!” he screamed. “Someone, please help me!”
    I looked in panic at all the staid faces around me in the
    cafeteria. Everyone watching dispassionately. I looked back
    at Juan.
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    He managed to wrench away from one of the Regulators,
    but the other one still had a fi rm grip. I scanned the room
    as calmly as possible. There were more Regulators every-
    where. The ones not holding Juan were surveying the rest
    of us as if they were looking for a reaction.
    With a sudden wave of dizziness, I recognized what was
    happening in this moment. It was exactly the same as my
    nightmares of Daavd. The anger burned in me, and I felt
    my power respond, bursting instantly to life at my fi ngertips.
    One Regulator pulled out a syringe.
    I couldn’t stand here and watch this happen. I couldn’t do
    nothing. Not this time.
    The buzzing was at a fever pitch inside me. I started to
    rise, but Max’s fi ngers gripped my arm like a vise under the
    table. I looked at him, knowing the panic must be showing
    in my eyes. He blinked in surprised, as if he saw something
    in my face he’d never seen before. He quietly shifted his
    legs, locking them around mine and ever so slightly shaking
    his head in warning. I looked helplessly back at the boy.
    But my power was not as easily quieted. I felt myself losing
    control, but I had nowhere