Broken Dove

Chapter 1

Your name is Stella Hess.

Stella Hess.

My mind keeps tripping over that, spinning faster than the helicopter rotors above our heads.

Stella Hess.

The name is completely unfamiliar to me. It feels wrong. Like a piece of clothing you don’t recognize but are told belongs to you. The size is right, it fits fine, but you still feel like you’re wearing someone else’s clothes. I don’t remember being Stella, but it’s not inconceivable that I was. I must’ve had a name before Jim Darlington whisked me out of Sanctum Point at the insistence of my mother, who entrusted her closest friend with protecting me after I began manifesting the psychic powers unique to the Modified people.

My mother, whose name I’m also now privy to: Marina Serrano.

A woman I believed to be brave, who went undercover in the Command with the sole intention of burning down the entire institution from within. With the help of my father, she dedicated her life to saving the Mods of the Continent. Together, they were willing to go to any lengths to achieve that goal.

And me, I’m the product of their inspirational love. The heir to their unceasing loyalty to the cause.

Oh, wait.

That’s all bullshit.

Because everything I’ve ever believed about my parents? Lies. Fabrications. To make matters worse, I had to learn the truth from a dead man, in a letter I might never have even found if I weren’t forced to flee the city for the second time in my life.

Every word Uncle Jim scrawled on that page is seared into my brain like the brands we used on our cattle back in Ward Z.

Your parents are known as the Tin Block Traitors.

They are responsible for the loss of countless Modified lives.

Your mother betrayed her people, and your father helped her do it.

A letter? I want to scream at Uncle Jim. You had to leave me this information in a f***ing letter?

I assume he had a good reason for writing it, believing it would serve me well someday, but he only succeeded in leaving me with more questions than answers.

If my mother was helping the Company, then why did they execute her?

The attack that my parents helped coordinate, the tragic bombing that wiped out an entire Modified community . . . why? Why would they do that?

And how on earth am I going to keep this from the people whose trust I’m supposed to be earning? I escaped from the city thinking I was going somewhere safe, a haven where I could finally stop hiding who I am, and instead, I’m right back where I started. F***ing hiding again.

With this massive secret hanging over my head, I feel like I’m walking into a lion’s den. Or rather, flying into one—­on a helicopter piloted by another dead man, no less. Someone I thought I’d lost months ago in a devastating explosion.

In the seat next to mine, Xavier Ford rests his handcuffed wrists on his lap and grinds his molars like he’s trying to turn them to dust. He’s angry. I don’t blame him. We just trekked three days through the Blacklands, the place of nightmares, only for him to be detained by members of the Uprising, who are apparently led by my old, not-­dead friend Kaine Sutler.

Also known as Grayson Blake.

Sneaky little asshole.

It’s bad enough that he didn’t die in a fiery blaze—­we held a funeral for him—­but to then discover he’s the Uprising’s hotshot pilot and an absolute Mod legend? Unbelievable. He played me. Hard.

“I’m breaking that prick’s neck when we land,” Xavier growls at my ear. “Tyler’s dead because of him.”

I’m sobered by the reminder. Tyler Struck was one of my instructors in the Program, the training course that all Command soldiers must pass in order to join the Continental military. I didn’t know her well, but she and Xavier were together. I’m not sure how serious it was, but enough that her death affected him greatly.

Kaine—­Grayson—­led her right into a trap, knowing that the building would explode. Knowing that Tyler and our fellow soldier Noah Jones weren’t going to walk out of there alive. All so the Uprising could steal a plane.

Grayson asked me before I boarded this helicopter if I was ready for war. Until a few days ago, I thought I was. I’m here because I want to support the cause. Our cause. When I started working for the network to sabotage the Command, I spent months on that base hearing how Mods are spoken about, seeing the way we’re feared and despised.

We deserve a place in society, an equal one, and I’m willing to fight for it. I’m more than ready to work with the Uprising to make life better for Mods like me.

But . . . I don’t know if I could lead two people to their deaths the way Grayson did.

It’s becoming clear he’s not the same guy I knew from the Program, always quick with a mischievous grin or flirty remark. He’s a deadly network operative who’s perfectly at ease with taking two lives. Maybe not by his own hand, but certainly with his actions.

Except then he twists around in the pilot’s seat, lips quirked, and when our gazes lock, I glimpse that familiar sparkle in his green eyes. It’ll take some time adjusting to him being Grayson Blake, but I have to believe my friend Kaine is still in there somewhere.

“Do me a favor, keen?” Grayson drawls toward us. “Please don’t throw up in my bird.”

I furrow my brow, asking, “Why would we throw—­” but then the chopper rolls without warning and my stomach drops out from under me.

Nausea hurtles its way up to my throat, and I have to gulp rapidly to contain it. How are we even flying this way? The helicopter is almost completely on its side. Then it banks hard and my stomach lurches again.

From the air, the Blacklands are a thick canopy of black mist, swirling and undulating like a mass of clouds moving through the sky. When we lived there, Uncle Jim used to worry that an aircraft might be able to see into our little clearing, but I realize now he had nothing to fear. It’s impossible to see through that ominous blackness.

The scenery beyond the windows abruptly changes as the helicopter soars into a mountain valley. Flashes of green and brown fly past my vision. Lush grass. A narrow, twisting river. We’re moving so fast that I can barely focus on any one thing before it vanishes from view. I don’t know how Grayson is able to maneuver so precisely. It’s like the chopper is an extension of himself, and I can’t deny I’m impressed.

Finally, the chopper rights itself, my stomach settles, and we’re flying at a normal speed again.

Across from me and Xavier, two stone-­faced men are strapped into their seats. They’re the ones who handcuffed Xavier and dragged him into the helicopter the moment the Uprising came to collect us from the Blacklands. They haven’t said a word since the flight started. Neither has Grayson’s copilot, an auburn-­haired young woman with a long ponytail and guarded expression.

I’ve already opened a mental path to test their shields, to check if I can read their thoughts, but their minds are like steel vaults. It would take a while to sweep for any weaknesses, and time isn’t a luxury I have right now. And anyway, I don’t need psychic abilities to know what they’re thinking.

These two men? They’re prepared to kill Xavier if he so much as blinks wrong.

The copilot? Doesn’t trust me one hellf***ing bit.

I shift my gaze to the window and jolt when I find myself staring at the side of the mountain. Whoa. I had no idea we were this close to it.

The helicopter banks again. Jagged peaks, steep cliffs, and dense forest streak into view, and suddenly I’m staring at an imposing stone wall.

We’re about to fly directly into the mountain.

My heart leaps to my throat. I brace myself for impact, but to my utter astonishment, the mountain opens for us. It’s a false rock face, I realize. A secret entrance camouflaged in the rock. Two enormous doors slide open to reveal a dark, gaping space beyond them.

Leaving the daylight behind us, we fly into what appears to be a cavernous hangar, and as the doors close, the natural light cedes to the artificial. The chopper lands with a gentle thump on the black tarmac, rotors hissing for several more seconds in a steady thrum before fading into silence.

“Are we inside the f***ing mountain?” Xavier demands.

Grayson chuckles from the pilot’s seat. He’s unstrapping his harness. “Welcome to Blue Dagger base,” he tells us. “Aka the Dagger.”

A million questions run through my mind. Why is it called Blue Dagger base? How many people live here? How has it stayed undetected all this time? I’d ask, but I have a feeling nobody’s going to be forthcoming when I’ve got Xavier at my side.

“Get out,” one of the scowling men barks at me, and I scowl back as I unsnap my seatbelt.

The other man hauls a restrained Xavier out the side door. I jump out after them, my boots hitting the tarmac with a thud.