Calculated Risk
highlight_author
Janie Crouch
highlight_reads
15,6K
highlight_chapters
27
Chapter One
Bree Daniels froze, fork halfway to her mouth, at the sound of the knock at her apartment door. She forced herself to put the fork down slowly and remain calm.
A knock on the door wasn’t a cause for panic for most people. But from the time Bree was twelve, she’d been taught that danger of the most deadly kind could wait on the other side of any door.
She took a deep breath and let it out.
It wasn’t that no one ever knocked on her door. She regularly ordered things that had to be delivered. As a matter of fact, most of her shopping was done online. Everything from clothing to groceries. Buying what she needed on the internet meant less interaction with people and no need to leave her downtown Kansas City apartment.
But Bree always knew exactly—usually to the hour—when the items would arrive. When a knock would come on her door.
This was not one of those times.
She waited, hoping it was just some kid or lost person who would go away, tensing when a second knock came. She stood, moving toward the emergency bug-out bag she kept packed in the coat closet. It contained everything she needed for a quick getaway: clothing, a wad of cash, a few items that could be used to change her appearance and a fake ID she’d never used.
She hadn’t needed the bag since arriving here three years ago on her twenty-first birthday. She didn’t want to use it now unless she absolutely had to. Despite the wisdom of it, she loved this little apartment. It had become home. She didn’t want to leave.
A woman’s voice came from the other side of the door.
“Bethany?”
Now Bree ran for the closet. It was definitely time for the bug-out bag.
Nobody knew her by the name Bethany. At least, no one who wanted her alive.
Another soft knock. Another whisper at the door. “Please, Bethany. I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
Bree didn’t stop, just grabbed the bag and ran toward the window in the living room. The fire escape outside her second-floor apartment was the reason she had chosen this unit in the first place.
Always have multiple exits. Always have a plan.
And she did. To get the hell out. She was climbing through the window when she heard the words from the door.
“Crisscross, applesauce.”
Bree froze. No, it couldn’t be. She hadn’t heard those words, the code she’d shared with her cousin when they were younger, in more than a decade.
Melissa had been the only person Bree had ever truly opened up to, the only person who’d taken the time to try to understand the socially awkward Bethany. Their upbringing had been isolated and cold—before Bree’s had turned into a total nightmare—but together it had been bearable.
Crisscross, applesauce.
That phrase had been their agreed-upon code, hidden from the Organization, to let each other know if they were truly in need.
They were quite possibly the only words in the world that could’ve stopped Bree from crawling out that window and leaving here forever.
Was it a trap?
If Bree’s mother was still alive, she would’ve definitely said yes. They would’ve already been out the window and moving to separate locations to meet up later if it was safe. That had always been their agreed-upon plan, even when it meant Bree had to spend a week living by herself when she was fourteen. Whatever kept them alive.
Knowing she might be making the worst mistake of her life, that her mother was probably rolling over in her grave, Bree stopped and turned back toward her front door.
Saying a quick prayer and calling herself all sorts of stupid, she cracked open the door.
She knew immediately it was Melissa. She was more than a decade older than when Bree had last seen her at thirteen, but her features and long blond hair were still the same. Bree had been so jealous of Mel’s beautiful curls when they were kids. Her own straight brown hair had seemed so boring in comparison.
She’d made a mistake by opening the door. Even if Melissa wasn’t here because she meant to kill her—and Bree still wasn’t sure of that—Melissa was part of a life Bree wanted nothing to do with.
“I’m sorry, you’ve got the wrong place. There’s nobody by that name here.” Bree quickly shut the door.
“Bethany, I know it’s you. Please, it’s Melissa. I’m not going to hurt you, and I haven’t told anybody in the Organization where you are. But I need your help.”
Bree rested her forehead against the door. It had been so long since...everything. Since seeing Melissa. Since hearing anyone call her by her real name.
Since talking to anyone person to person at all.
“Crisscross, applesauce. Crisscross, applesauce.” Melissa kept softly saying it over and over against the door.
Shaking her head, Bree opened it again.
“Oh, God, thank you,” Melissa said before Bree yanked her inside. Immediately Bree started patting down her cousin, looking for a weapon. Not finding one didn’t make her feel any better. If the other woman was here to betray Bree, she wouldn’t be here alone.
“I don’t have any guns,” Melissa said as Bree finished the pat down. “And I don’t have very much time.”
“Why are you here, Mel?”
Bree stood stiff as her cousin threw her arms around Bree’s torso. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had hugged her. Her mom had stopped long before she died.
“Why are you here?” she asked again. “How did you find me?”
Melissa stepped back. “I discovered you were in Kansas City a few months ago. But only recently did I find this place.”
Bree tried to focus on what Melissa was saying and not on the fear coursing through her system. If Melissa could find her, so could the rest of the Organization.
Melissa grabbed her hands. “Nobody knows but me. I promise. I need your help, Bethany.”
“Bree,” she said automatically. “I go by Bree now.”
“Bree. It suits you.” Melissa gave her a small smile, her hands wringing. “I don’t have much time. It won’t take them long to figure out I’m gone. They’re suspicious already.”
Bree watched her closely, still ready to run if needed. “What do you need?”
“I found out the truth about the Organization. I want to get out. I’ve wanted to for a long time, but now I think I have the means.”
Bree shut her eyes and shook her head. “I—”
“Things are so much worse now than when you were there. The things they can do now...”
Bree didn’t want to get drawn back into this. She was already going to have to run again. The thought of leaving this place hurt. “I can’t help you. Honestly, I’m not in any position to help anyone. And if you know I’m here, the Organization does, too.”
Melissa grabbed Bree’s hand, and she fought not to flinch away. “No, they don’t know. They may know I’m here, but they don’t know it’s you. And I have a couple of allies on the inside now. People who can be trusted.”
The only person Bree trusted was herself. When it came to the Organization, the price on her head was too high to trust anybody.
The phone in Melissa’s hand pinged, and she let out a curse.
“I’m out of time.” Her features became more pinched. “There’s so much I need to tell you. Please, Bethany—Bree—please meet me tonight so I can explain everything. There’s so much more at stake than you could ever dream, than I could’ve ever dreamed. I have to make my move now or I’ll lose everything.” Desperation dripped from every word.
“Mel, I just don’t think—”
“Just meet me tonight,” Melissa cut her off. “At the downtown train station at midnight. I’ll bring the hard drive. It has everything we need to truly get our freedom. I’ll show you why it’s critical I make my move now.”
When the phone in her hand beeped again, Melissa bolted to the door. She turned, eyes entreating. “Crisscross, applesauce, Bethany. Please.”
All Bree could do was watch her go.
TWELVE HOURS LATER, at almost midnight, Bree sat in her car in a location giving her good visual access to the train station.
She was making a mistake. She knew she was making a mistake, that this was all going to end badly...yet here she was.
She’d been watching the station for the past two hours, looking for any sign that Melissa had set her up, that this was a trap and the Organization would be moving in to capture Bree.
She’d found no indication at all that that was the case.
Just like she’d found no indication of betrayal after she’d immediately vacated her apartment this afternoon when Melissa left. As far as Bree could tell—and she’d become very proficient at the tactical skill of observation—no one had been watching or following her all day.
It disturbed her slightly how much she wanted to believe her cousin’s intentions were good. Even if it went against the idea her mother had spent so many years instilling: no one could be trusted.
In the end, her mother hadn’t even trusted Bree. She rubbed the raised flesh of the knife scar on her shoulder under her shirt. Her mother’s parting gift, before taking her own life, thinking Bree was about to do it.
But Bree had seen nothing suspicious or out of the ordinary here for hours. So she was fairly certain she was going to do the stupid thing and get out of this car to help Melissa.
Even if she knew the smart thing would’ve been to already be two hundred miles outside Kansas City. That’s why she’d chosen the city right smack in the middle of America—she could travel in any direction if she needed to get out quick.
But the fact of the matter, and the reason Bree was sitting here right now, was that if Melissa had intended to turn over Bree to the Organization, her best bet would’ve been to do it earlier today when she had the element of surprise. Melissa had known her apartment number, so all she’d really needed to do was have someone guarding the fire escape and ready to catch Bree when she ran.
But Mel hadn’t.
Crisscross, applesauce.
Shaking her head, Bree got out of the car and headed toward the designated parking lot to meet Melissa.
The choice of locations was a good one. Trains were accessible, of course, and the bus depot was only two blocks away. In a personal vehicle someone could be on three different major interstates in less than five minutes.
Bree kept to the shadows, circling the area and waiting for Melissa. When by fifteen minutes past their scheduled meeting time Melissa hadn’t arrived, Bree began to get worried. She gave her ten more minutes after that, then knew it wasn’t safe to stay in one place any longer.
Something had changed—planned or unplanned. Either way, Bree couldn’t stay here. All she could do was pray her mother’s voice screaming in her head hadn’t been right and this was all a setup.
She had her answer a few moments later as she approached her car and felt the cold metal of a gun muzzle against the back of her neck.
Sorry, Mom, I guess you were right.
“Would’ve probably been less conspicuous to take me out at my apartment. Nobody knew me there anyway,” she said, raising her hands to shoulder level, as if she had no plans to fight.
There weren’t too many self-defense moves she could do if the shooter was going to assassinate her with a slug to the back of the head. But if he or she had instructions to bring Bree back alive, Bree would have opportunities to make her own attack. Better to make the person think she was compliant.
Bree very definitely wasn’t compliant, and there was no way in hell someone was taking her back to the Organization alive.
“Melissa sent me.” A man’s voice.
“Well, tell her I said she played me just right. I honestly believed she needed my help right up until the second I felt your gun at my neck.”
“She does need your help. I’m not here to hurt you. Melissa was being watched, so she couldn’t come herself.” And then, amazingly, the cold metal eased back from her skin.
Bree turned around slowly, then blanched as she found herself looking into cold eyes she hadn’t seen in over ten years.
It took every ounce of self control she had not to scurry away or whimper.
Everyone had called him Smith, although that certainly wasn’t his real name. He’d been in charge of discipline. He’d been old even then. He looked ancient now.
“You know who I am?” he asked.
“Yes.” How could she possibly forget the man who had broken more than one of her bones? “What I don’t know is why I’m alive and still conscious.”
Smith shook his head. “As I said, I’m not here to harm you. Melissa needed me to deliver important...items that are required in order for her to escape the Organization.”
“You’re helping her?”
“They’ve gone too far, even for me.” He gave the smallest shrug with his shoulder. “And maybe what I’m doing here today will help make up for the sins of my past. But we don’t have much time. I’ll lead them away from your direction, but that’s all I can do.”
He pushed an old flip phone into her hand. “You hold the future now. Melissa will be in touch as soon as she can. I placed the items in the back seat of your car. Be careful. They are everything.”
Bree turned toward her car. They were everything? She turned back toward the caretaker. “What are you talking about—”
He was gone, disappeared into the darkness.
She shook her head and turned back toward her car—a nondescript late-model Honda most people wouldn’t pay attention to—cautiously, even knowing she could’ve been killed multiple times over by now if that was someone’s intent.
She heard yelling on the other side of the parking lot and picked up her pace. Maybe it was just the normal type of trouble that could be found in an empty downtown parking lot in the middle of the night, but maybe it was trouble coming specifically for her. She paused again as she came up on her car, seeing two large, odd-shaped boxes in the back seat.
She’d been expecting some files, but electronic ones on a hard drive. Definitely not anything that size.
After another couple steps, Bree realized those weren’t file boxes at all. She ran the last few feet to her car, pushing her face up against the window.
“Oh, my God, Mel, what have you done?”
