Free The Amanda Project: Book 4: Unraveled by Amanda Valentino, Cathleen Davitt Bell

shadows. I was squinting at the racks of blood vials. I’d managed to find the one where my dad’s blood, Vial C33-1780 was stored.
    You see, when we’d first stepped into this room, I’d had a thought. I’d always hated how we’d left my dad’s body behind in California. I wished I’d seen him laid out in a funeral home. Or at least had an urn of ashes to scatter. Anythingat all.
    But now, I had something. Maybe it was a little creepy, but I didn’t care.
    My fingers closed around the vial of my father’s blood. I reached for the pendant Amanda had given me and rubbed it between my fingers to soothe myself for a moment. I squeezed it and thought hard about my dad, trying to remember the exact color of his eyes, the little crinkles in the corners of his smile, thesound of his laugh, how his shirt smelled when I hugged him . . . I could suddenly feel him all around me, and the tears started to come. I looked at the pendant in the dim light, and it came to me . Tears, blood, it’s all the same. I realized I could slip the vial right into the pendant. A perfect fit. Had she somehow known that I would find his blood at some point? I felt weird taking it, butknowing the vial fit into the pendant made me feel better. This place had stolen my dad’s childhood. And then they’d stolen his life. All I wanted to do was to get him out of there.
    I stepped out of the dark and showed myself to my friends.
    Callie had one arm hooked through Hal’s. I took four steps toward them and grabbed his other elbow. Nia locked arms with me. And we waited for Hal to see.
    Only nothing came. I was watching him, wondering how I would know what he was thinking. I believe he would have shifted. His face would have changed. Something.
    But he was perfectly still.
    What finally broke the silence was the buzzing of Hal’s phone. “Sorry,” he mumbled like he’d been caught getting a text in class.
    Nia let go of Callie’s and my arms. “Do you want to check it?” she asked sarcastically.
    Almost as a reflex, Hal said, “What if it’s important?” glancing at the screen.
    Nia rolled her eyes.
    But the second Hal read the text, his face wrinkled and then it opened up. Before he even said a word, I knew we’d been offered a lifeline.
    He showed us the text. I didn’t recognize the number.
    44355512123        17:48:22                1K
GET OUT NOW. GUARDS CHANGING SHIFT
IN 60 SECONDS.CAR WAITING.
    I closed my eyes, trying to find a window when everyone working in the lab would be looking the other way. And I got it. I whispered “Now,” opened the door, and we hustled silently through the lab, staring straight ahead. Up the stairs we went, fast as we could without running, though somehow, by the time we got up to the hospital ward, our pace had accelerated to an all-out sprint.We made it out the dormitory door, down the hall, into the ordinary classroom, through the window and then, still managing to duck around the corners of buildings and behind trees, we made it to the gate, around the garage, into the woods, and out to the road.
    It wasn’t until we were leaning against a brick wall, waiting for a guard to turn his head that Hal caught his breath enough to say, “Isn’tsomeone going to ask me who sent the text?”
    “It wasn’t Amanda?” Callie asked.
    “She was my guess too,” Nia answered.
    “No,” said Hal. “Believe it or not, it came from my dad.”
    It’s hard to imagine a moment where the sight of Hal’s mom’s minivan complete with its MY HONOR ROLL STUDENT CAN KICK YOUR HONOR ROLL STUDENT’S BUTT wouldn’t be completely mortifying for Hal.
    This was the moment.
    Thesliding door slid open and we piled in. He started pulling away before the door had closed. The van was fast and Mr. Bennett pushed it to its limit, taking corners on two wheels and running red lights without even blinking an eye. Who knew?
    “Dad, what are you doing here?” Hal said.
    Mr. Bennett’s face was pale and