Free Arabella by Nicole Sobon Page A

shit, different day.”
    “Seriously, why do we need to do this anyway? What kind of information are you trying to protect from getting out there? Shouldn’t we at least know what it is that we’re fighting to protect?”
    “You’re fighting to protect your existence,” Mara replied without the slightest bit of emotion. “The information on those drives cannot be made public, for if it did, the world as we know it would cease to exist.”
    At that, I rolled my eyes. The problem with working for my father was that he was never entirely up front about anything, and since Mara staked her loyalty with my father, she wasn’t much better than him. Every time we asked why we were being sent on a mission, it was the same song and dance.
    “You must secure the hard drive without harming the innocents,” they would tell us. And when we asked why, they’d respond with, “It’s to protect your existence.”
    As though that was a real answer.
    Sure, I got it. The world couldn’t know what Cole and I were – what we were capable of doing. But what the hell was on those hard drives that concerned us? That was the one thing that I wanted to know and the one thing they would never tell me.
    “We are nothing more than the result of an experiment on my father’s behalf,” I said, growing annoyed. “What is it that you’re so afraid of getting out?”
    “You know the rules, Arabella. You are not to ask questions; you are simply to complete the mission given to you.”
    “Easy to say when you’re not the one risking your life.”
    I could feel her eyes on me as I made my way out of the room, but I didn’t bother to turn around. What would have been the point? For me to give her the go ahead to ramble on about the mission statement, and how they had only sought to keep us safe? Yeah, I wasn’t buying that bullshit.
    “One of these days, you’re going to cause her to snap, you know.” Cole moved in quietly behind me and threw his arm over my shoulders. “I don’t see why you have to be so hard on her. She’s only doing her job, Bell.”
    “And is treating us like property part of that job?”
    “Who said anything about us being property?”
    I rolled my eyes at that one. That was the main difference between Cole and I. He actually allowed himself to believe my father was trying to do good in the world. He was far too gullible when it came to my father. I wasn’t.
    When you spent your entire life inside of a lab, undergoing tests every week to ensure your “powers” weren't waning and that you were still capable of doing your job, you came to realize that you were viewed as nothing more than property; a tool used by those too chickenshit to do their own betting.
    After twenty-something years of the same thing? I had grown tired of it.
    I’d spent far too long living underneath my father’s thumb, forced to remain in the shadows. All I wanted was to be a part of the world I that I had been told I was only meant to protect – a world that I was never supposed to exist in.
    “You’re not thinking of running off again, are you?” Cole asked, forcing me out of my internal rambling.
    “After what happened last time? I’m not that stupid,” I responded, which had partially been the truth. Every single time I thought about leaving again, I found myself thinking of Gwen. She had gone after me that night after I insisted she stay at the lab. I should’ve expected that she wouldn’t have listened; after all, she’d always been rather stubborn – even more so than me – but I figured that Cole would be able to keep her from coming after me.
    Unfortunately, I had overestimated his ability to oversee my sister.
    That night, I knew the chances of the Horde coming after me were great – a subject of my father’s Project X program all alone would be an opportunity they couldn’t afford to pass up – which was why I had demanded Cole keep watch over Gwen.
    I adored my sister, though I had never been the greatest at