The Gender Lie(12)

He said it in a joking tone, but I wasn’t convinced. I was more than a little curious about the people Owen was using to shuttle us into Patrus.

I looked over to where he was sitting. He had his back to me and was staring at his handheld. We had both decided to sit on the massive rock jutting out of the ground, while Quinn, Amber, and Solomon slept below in the shade.

“Owen,” I called softly, so as not to disturb the others.

“Hmm?”

He didn’t even turn his head to look at me, and I gave an irritated sigh. Picking up a small rock, I tossed it at him, hitting him on the shoulder. He froze as the rock clacked across the boulder, skittering to the grass below.

Turning, he arched a brow at me, and I gave him a fake smile and a little wave.

“Yes?”

I ignored his annoyed tone and asked, “Who are the people who are picking us up?”

Owen frowned, a line growing between his eyebrows. “It’s not really important to the mission,” he said, starting to turn away.

“Great! Then you should be able to tell me, right?”

He turned back, his blue eyes trained on me. “Why do you want to know?”

I crossed my arms. “Look, I understand the need for operational security and all that, but the lack of information is starting to get to me.”

“I… I don’t understand.”

I gaped at him, but then closed my mouth when I saw the seriousness in his face.

“Wow. Okay… well...” I paused, searching for the words that could make him understand my position. “The last mission I was on, key details were excluded, which sort of led to me being in this mess. I don’t like walking into anything blind now, if I can avoid it. So… just give me this, okay?”

Owen considered my request as he leaned back on his hands and crossed his legs out in front of him. “All right,” he said. “The people who are coming to get us belong to a different rebel faction based out of Patrus. They have ways to cross in and out of the border that we don’t, so we employ them from time to time to help smuggle us in and out.”

I frowned—another rebel faction based in Patrus? Why hadn’t I heard of them? What did they stand for?

The last question worried me quite a bit, so I decided to ask, “Where do their loyalties lie?”

Owen’s face looked resigned. “I’m not going to lie to you, Violet—they are Patrian through and through. Which is why I had you and Amber change before we even got off the boat. They are paranoid, enough to have set up lookouts to make sure we are what we claim we are.”

“And that is?”

Owen’s face flushed red—not in embarrassment, but in something else that I couldn’t exactly place. “Matrian flesh dealers.”

“WHAT?” I exclaimed, rising to my feet.

My shout was loud enough to wake the others, from the groans and whispers below.

“Everything okay up there?” Solomon called. I glanced over to see him backing away from the boulder, his hands over his eyes to shield his gaze from the sun.

Owen sighed heavily and hauled himself onto his feet to stand before me. “I guess it’s a good thing we talked about this now,” he spat, brushing dirt from his clothes. “Because if this is how you’re going to react, you’re going to break our cover.”

“So what—Amber’s our Matrian female, whom we abducted to auction off to a rich Patrian?” I asked.

Owen laughed, and I took a step back, stunned. How could he be so blasé about this?

“Violet, we aren’t really going to sell Amber. You know that, right?”

“Of course I do, but—”

“And she’s perfectly okay with it.”

“Am not!” Amber declared from below.

Owen grunted. “Amber, what’s the reason you’re not okay with it?”

“Dresses are stupid,” she said.

“But other than that?”

“Oh, yeah, if I didn’t have to wear the dress, I would be perfectly fine with it. I don’t care.”

I rolled my eyes in annoyance. “Missing the point here, guys,” I said, addressing all of them.

Solomon pulled himself up the rock and came to stand next to us. “All right, what’s the point?” he asked, his voice even and calm.

“If we have to pretend that Amber is a Matrian woman we kidnapped just to get a ride from these people, shouldn’t we be asking if they are the kind of people we should be dealing with in the first place?”

Owen shook his head. “You’re looking too deeply into it, Violet. They are providing a service. In order for us to complete our mission, we have to do it. There are no other options available.”