Page 29 of Conquer

My mother would be proud.

She always said I tended to brood, think too deeply about things instead of just acting. But I had gone from virgin to brokenhearted in less than two weeks.

Pretty impressive trick, even if I said so myself.

I brought myself to my knees and prepared to stand, but something caught my eye.

I didn’t immediately recognize it, so I stared at a little more intently, trying to figure out what it was.

I narrowed my eyes on it and then crawled closer, reaching out, wondering what it could be.

The shape told me it wasn’t an insect, and it was no kind of dust I had ever seen.

I reached for it and pulled it into my hand, staring down at the thing.

It was a black rectangle no bigger than one of my fingertips.

I stared at it, confused, wondering what it could be. I brought it close, turned it over, and saw that one side was a smooth glass surface.

It kind of reminded me of a camera lens.

I stared at it and my mouth dropped open, my heart suddenly pounding.

A camera? It couldn’t be.

Everything told me that I was overreacting, letting my emotions get the better of me, but that didn’t keep me from getting on my knees and crawling along my baseboards.

I reached into my pocket and grabbed my cell phone, turned on the flashlight, and ran it along the floor, searching, hoping I didn’t find anything but somehow knowing that I would.

I moved in a slow circle, not caring when I ripped the corner of my shirt.

I didn’t really hear anything, just moved, going fast and then slow, looking.

And then I saw it.

Trepidation so intense that it made my hand tremble filled me as I stretched my arm out.

It was another of those black things.

I grabbed and examined it, and I saw that it was identical to the one I still held.

I thought I would scream or cry, but I didn’t do either.

Instead I crawled to my living room, made that same slow circle of the walls, and found another black thing.

Then another.

By now I wasn’t thinking. I was just moving, going from one room to the next, searching, by this point knowing what I would find.

By the time I finished, I had found thirteen of them—at least one in every room of my house, even the second bedroom that I mostly used for storage.

I squeezed them all into my fist, shocked that all of them were small enough to fit inside it.

And then, still on my knees, my shirt ripped in two places, my cotton pants with a tear at the knee, I accepted the only conclusion that made sense.

Someone was watching me.

Adrian

She had found them.

I stared at the screen, watching as each of the cameras went black. They were still transmitting, which meant she’d put them in her pocket or was holding them.

But either way, I had no doubt that she’d found them, that she’d pieced together the fact that I had planted them.

I wanted to retrieve them but didn’t want to risk being seen at her house.

A grave error on my part.

Because if Sam told the wrong person what she’d found, it would mean the end of her life.

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