No Peace for the Damned

else’s thoughts—and they were all faster when they were together. Did it work that way when they were around us too? I’d never noticed it before, but then again, I’d never thought to pay attention
.
    “But Magnolia has more power than anyone,” Markus said. I stopped breathing. “As long as she’s here—” his words cut off in a gurgled gasp
.
    “Your sister,” Uncle Max said with disgust, “has power that will only weaken as she matures. She is utterly useless to us. If not foryour father’s desire to keep her for his experiments, she would have been dead a long time ago.”
    He was lying. My powers grew practically every day and he knew it. And God knew they’d tried enough times to kill me. So why the lie? I thought about looking in his mind to find out, but I was too scared about what I might learn. Finally Markus started breathing again
.
    “Of course, Uncle,” Malcolm said after a moment. “It was an errant thought. Nothing more. Thank you for your time.”
    I stayed behind the bench for over an hour after they left. I was never going to leave the estate. Never. They would try to kill me, use me for their experiments, and that would be it—my life. Six years old, and for the first time, I prayed for a miracle
.
    Please, God, just let me die
.

I sat at the kitchen table next to Thirteen. He’d brought groceries again, just like he’d said he would, so when the others arrived for the next Wednesday meeting there was something to snack on. Not that anyone actually ate.
    Heather smiled in my direction then quickly averted her eyes. Again. She’d been doing that for the last hour, wanting to bring me into the conversation but not sure how.
    Why the hell she even bothered was beyond me. It was obvious that everyone else just wanted me to go away. Forget reading their thoughts. Their tense postures, the way they looked at each other but just glanced over me—no one wanted anything more from me. Especially Theo.
    After a week, I figured I’d steeled myself enough that his presence would have no effect on me. Boy, was I wrong. The minute he’d stepped out of the car, my body had heated up. Then the sight of him stalking through the front door, a frown darkening hisface…it was like I had no control whatsoever. I had to force my attention to everyone else, then fight to keep it on the conversation.
    He was going through the same thing, too. And he hated it as much as I did.
    As for the others, they were eager about giving their status reports. Apparently research was exciting to them. Analyzing the information I’d given them, listing out which new agents had gone missing, trying to pinpoint a weakness in my father and uncles—yeah, good luck with that one. They didn’t seem to have accomplished much, but they were still upbeat, ready to do more.
    I wasn’t even sure why I was still being included. I’d given my information, and sure, I answered any questions they had, but for the most part I just sat back and watched.
    Then Thirteen had an idea.
    My stomach hit the floor when I saw his plans: Me. Training his team. Teaching them how to fight against my powers.
    My skin tightened as power swelled in my veins. The only reason I didn’t lash out at him was because of the innocence that coated his thoughts: Why wouldn’t I train his team? It was an obvious next step, right?
    He had no idea the implications of what he would be asking.
    He didn’t speak his thoughts out loud, but he knew instantly what I had seen. I waited for him to brush the idea away, dismiss it as an errant thought. But he held on, waiting until the updates were over. Then he turned to me, resolution hard on his face.
    “You know the purpose of this team,” he said in a low voice. The others milled around the kitchen, arranging plans for the day. “I don’t want to lose another team member. Not when we have the resources to avoid it.”
    A resource. That’s all I was to him now.
God, I was such a fool
. I should just kill him now and be done with it. Reach out, snaphis neck. Or even better, I could just fry his heart from where I sat and watch as he crumbled to the floor.
This
was the betrayal I had been waiting for. I would have preferred a knife to the throat.
    “Magnolia…” He sounded like one of those parents whose child was about to pitch a fit.
    “You bastard,” I hissed. My fingers curled into themselves, my nails sharp and digging into my palms. The dishes on the table started to shake. Then the