Page 6 of Fear
Jake jerked the wheel to the side, and there was an awful crunching noise as they left the pavement and hit loose rock that threw up a wave of dust around them. The Eldorado came to a hard stop, throwing Tobias back against the seat behind him.
“Stop,” Jake said, voice shaking with anger. “Stop right now.”
Tobias froze, lips still parted.
Jake couldn’t even look at him, but what Tobias could see of his face was dark with a rage Tobias had only ever seen on him once before. That terrible day when Jake had shaken him and then left him. “What kind of monster—why the hell do you think I’d want that?”
In the stillness after the damning words—Just a fucking monster, too stupid to know what Jake would ever want—every meager shred of hope Tobias had managed to rekindle from ashes for a life with Jake fell through his fingers, as insubstantial as smoke. That was it. His last chance, gone. Jake had stopped the car, had made it clear Tobias couldn’t do anything that would make him worth keeping. Any second now he’d order Tobias to get out, or pull out a silver-loaded shotgun from the clanking duffel in the backseat, or turn the car around back to the camp.
Tobias had fucked it all up, like the guards, the Director, Kayla, everyone had told him he would, because he was so useless he couldn’t hold Jake’s interest for twenty-four hours. The one good thing he’d ever been offered in his life, the thing for which he’d waited and fought for years, and he’d lost it.
He almost didn’t recognize the sensation of his throat closing up. It had been so many years since he’d cried—without hours of pain first and a guard sneering above him—that he couldn’t believe it was happening now, in front of Jake, nor could he stop it. Jake was the only thing in his life he had dared to hope for, and from the day he’d allowed himself to believe Jake would keep his word and take him away, he’d reminded himself it wouldn’t be forever—just a few weeks, maybe. But he’d never thought he’d fuck it up this fast.
And he still didn’t know what had gone wrong.
Sobs worked their way out of him, shaking his shoulders, but he never made a sound—that lesson was intact from interrogations and punishment innumerable. He kept his head tucked to his chest, pressing himself into the space between the door and seat.
“Tobias,” Jake breathed, something like anguish in his tone that Tobias couldn’t comprehend. Jake didn’t touch him, though. Tobias didn’t expect him to.
A moment later, Jake eased the car back on the road. Tobias waited for the inevitable U-turn, but a mile on, Jake only said, “We’ll be home soon.”
Chapter Two
They stopped every few hours to refuel, use the bathroom, and get drinks. Tobias hated getting out of the car, never sure if Jake was looking for an ASC checkpoint to dump him, but that had yet to happen. Usually, he just followed Jake to the bathroom—dirtier but less crowded than the Freak Camp facilities, and without any visible cameras—and then stood behind him while Jake paid for his Coke or candy bar.
“Get what you want,” Jake had told Tobias—without looking at him—the first time they stopped, but Tobias hadn’t had the foggiest idea what that meant. Besides, he hadn’t been hungry. Just that one meal with Jake at the diner and the muffin in the morning was more than he usually ate in two or three days, and his stomach knew better than to start demanding more food at this point. Really, the only thing he wanted was to know how badly he had fucked up with Jake. In the past, if he’d failed to satisfy anyone to this extent—whether that was a hunter, the Director, a guard, or some real stranger—he would have bruises to show for it, or more likely chained to the floor and beaten or whipped or branded. And that only if the Director wasn’t feeling creative.
Usually, the Director was creative. But Jake . . . Jake did nothing, and Tobias was almost blanking out just to keep control of his instinctive terror. Because this mattered, like following the Director’s instructions mattered, and he couldn’t escape the fear that because Jake wasn’t telling him to do anything, Tobias was just fucking up more and more.
He had assumed when Jake got him out that he would have a grace period, that Jake would tell him what to do, train him, and accept that there would be mistakes in the first few days because Tobias was so damned stupid.
Now, he suspected that he wasn’t going to get instructions or a grace period. Jake was just going to do what he always did and expect Tobias to know and do what was required. But Tobias didn’t have one clue what that might be, except it certainly wasn’t anything he had tried so far. Jake hadn’t turned the Eldorado around yet, and Tobias desperately wanted to take that as a sign that he still had a chance, but he couldn’t quite believe that. More likely, Jake wanted to make sure that he was a screw-up before he took Tobias back. And for once in his life, Tobias didn’t think keeping his mouth shut and his head down would be enough to keep him safe.
Jake gave him a funny look after the second stop, and Tobias had to fight the urge to run. Or to drop to his knees and beg. But he didn’t do either, because there was a real watching—a man working behind the counter—and, given Jake’s reaction to his begging earlier, that would be the worst thing to do.
When they left the store, a small bell above the door chiming cheerily, Tobias was tempted—briefly, wildly—to try begging anyway, just to see if he could get some kind of reaction from Jake. Even knowing what would finally earn him a boot to the balls would be a welcome relief to the sensation that he was falling and that Special Research was below.
He forced the thought away and settled himself in his corner of the passenger seat. There, at least, he could watch the endless fields flying past and let his dread and panic fade into the back of his mind where he didn’t have to feel it.
At the third stop, Jake bought two Cokes, a bag of M&Ms, and an Almond Joy candy bar. Before they stepped back outside into the sunlight, he turned and, before Tobias quite realized what was happening, shoved all four items at Tobias. Tobias felt unnervingly clumsy as his hands closed around the two bottles of soda and plastic wrappers.
“Think you got all that, Toby?” Jake said, smiling tightly.
Tobias swallowed. He would carry some of it with his mouth if he had to. Jake was letting him do something. “S-sure, Jake. I’ve got it.”
Jake nodded. “Good.”
Tobias followed him out of the gas station convenience store and barely twitched when Jake held the Eldorado’s passenger door open for him. He probably didn’t want to risk Tobias dropping his soda.
When they were settled in the Eldorado, Jake grabbed one of the bottles of Coke and the M&Ms, leaving Tobias unsure what he should do with the last soda and the candy bar. He stared at them worriedly. If he just held onto them, the soda would get warm and the candy bar would melt. But he wasn’t sure where he could put them so that Jake would be able to reach them easily when he wanted them.
“Those are for you,” Jake said, ripping open the M&Ms and tossing seven or eight into his mouth before setting the big bag on the seat between them. He slid the keys into the Eldorado’s ignition. “Well, the soda is. I claim half the candy bar. If you’ll help me out with the M&Ms.” He glanced over, and he still looked a little strained, but Tobias felt a big part of himself ease up just seeing Jake smile again. Maybe, somehow, impossible as it seemed, Tobias hadn’t fucked everything up beyond repair.
And then he realized that Jake had given him food, just like he had when they were kids, and Tobias had to look down for a second.
When they were younger, Jake coming to camp had always meant that there would be a candy bar or squashed bag of chips or some other esoteric real-person food that to Tobias tasted like a piece of heaven. It almost hurt to remember the times when being with Jake had been the best thing in the world, a time when, because he was with Jake, he didn’t have to be afraid of anything, because Jake would take care of him and never demanded anything in return.
Jake had always taken care of him. Of all the reals in Tobias’s life, Jake was the one he had never needed to be afraid of.
