Quicksilver Read Free Page A

while the crisis was fresh, but now that the shock had hit her, she was shaking. “And since Tori doesn’t have that chip in her arm anymore, there’s no reason not to use our emergency backup plan. I’d hoped it’d never come to this, but…” He opened the file folder in front of him and leafed through the stack of notes, letters, and printouts inside. “Maybe it’s time.”
    “There’s no maybe about it,” Mom said thickly through a fistful of tissues and fumbled across the table to grip my hand. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart. When they said they needed your hairbrush for the investigation, I should have guessed … but I was so afraid we’d never see you again…”
    “I don’t blame you, Mom,” I said. “You didn’t know, and you couldn’t have done anything else.” Not without obstructing the cause of justice and ending up as a murder suspect, anyway. I turned to my dad. “So what’s the plan?”
    “If the people at GeneSystem can’t find you, they’ll give up,” he said. “They’ll have to. There’s no murder investigation anymore, so they can’t ask the police to help. And they’re supposed to destroy all the DNA evidence, now it’s no longer needed. If they want an exception, they’ll have to fight for it in court, and by the time they get it, we’ll be long gone.”
    “But … where?” Mom asked. “And what are we going to tell everyone? All our friends…”
    This was the problem with being so community-minded, as both my parents were. If there was a charity event to run or a local festival to promote, Gisele and Ron Beaugrand were bound to be involved at some point. They threw a massive house party every New Year’s Eve and an outdoor pig roast every August, with plenty of smaller dinners and cocktail parties in between. Once the news got out that we were selling our house, the shock waves would ripple across the whole city.
    “Tori needs a fresh start,” said my father. “We all do, after everything that’s happened. We’ll tell them we’re moving to Vancouver.”
    Clear across the country, right on the Pacific Ocean. I’d always wanted to see more of the world, but this was so far away I might as well be moving to another planet. I was about to beg him to reconsider when my mother said, “We aren’t, though,” and I realized I’d misunderstood.
    “No,” Dad replied. “There are a few places in southern Ontario that should suit us fine, and we can move faster if we don’t have to go out of the province.” The chair creaked as he shifted his weight. “It’s going to be a big change, I know. But now Tori’s secret is out. I don’t see that we have a choice.”
    I clenched my hands together, fingers latticed tight. Four days ago, I’d despaired of ever seeing my parents or my hometown again. When Alison and Sebastian turned up to help me escape, it had seemed like such a miracle that I’d almost believed my troubles were over. That I could go back to my old life, piece myself back together, and carry on.
    I should have known it wouldn’t be that easy.
    “I’m sorry, pumpkin,” said my dad, sounding tired. “I know it isn’t fair, especially after all you’ve been through. You have a right to be angry. Even if it’s with us.”
    How could I be? All they’d ever wanted was a child to love and raise as their own. Even after Dr. Bowman found the chip in my arm and told them he’d never seen anything like it, they’d refused to give up on me. When it became clear that I had a natural affinity for machines but no instincts whatsoever when it came to people, they’d poured all their energy into teaching me how to relate, how to connect, how to care. My dad had coached me through girls’ hockey until I understood what it meant to be part of a team, and my mom had shown me how to read people’s facial expressions and turn their frowns into smiles. All the awards I’d won, all the popularity I’d gained at school, I owed to them.
    And now they were