“Cursed Vengeance,” I murmured. “CV. The guy who grabbed me had ‘CV’ tattooed on his neck.”
“So that was them,” Sage agreed. “Both groups have been around a long time, but they seemed to get stronger after your father excavated the Elixir vials, so I made myself disappear. No one had ever found me until he knocked on my door. It was shocking, actually, and I never would have let him in except I recognized him from all the news stories. Plus, he looked so serious.…”
“Like Dr. Prichard said,” I realized. “He told us Dad was very intense the days before he disappeared.”
“That’s right,” Ben agreed. Then he thought of something, and his jaw dropped. “Whoa—what about when he saw you? Seeing you in person for the first time after so many years …”
“He acted very strange,” Sage admitted. “But … what do you mean ‘so many years’?”
“The pictures,” I said. “You’ve been showing up in my pictures all my life.”
“I have?” Sage looked at me wonderingly. “That’s very odd … because I’ve never seen you before today.”
I don’t know what I expected him to say, but it wasn’t that. I thought he’d be the one person who could explain the pictures. If he was as confused by them as I was, what did that mean? I stared into his eyes—was he lying? No—he looked genuinely amazed. I had no idea what to say, so I reached for something real.
“What happened next with my dad?” I asked.
“He said he knew how to help me retrieve the Elixir, and that we needed to speak to a ‘dark lady.’”
“A ‘dark lady’?” I asked dubiously. “That’s not how my dad would speak.”
“That’s what he said,” Sage maintained.
“Did he say where you’d find her?” Ben asked.
“No,” Sage said. “He just promised to take me to her. We made arrangements to meet the next day, in the Tijuca Forest.”
He turned to me. “I think your dad was afraid I wouldn’t show. He gave me his watch as a strange kind of reverse collateral. He said it was his most prized possession.
He said he knew I was a good person, and I wouldn’t run off with something that meant so much to him.”
I smiled. That was my dad’s way: He always believed people lived up or down to the amount of trust you put in them.
“What happened? What went wrong?” Ben asked. “Why didn’t you guys go?”
“I don’t know,” Sage admitted. “He never showed. I thought maybe something had come up, so I went to the same spot at the same time the next day. And the next.
For several days. Then I saw on the news that he’d disappeared, and I knew it wasn’t safe for me here anymore. I left the country.”
“That’s it?” I snapped. “You didn’t go to the police? You didn’t go to … oh, maybe my family?”
“I couldn’t put myself out there like that,” Sage said defensively. “I couldn’t have the attention.”
“How dare you? We’re talking about my dad’s life! If you’d told us about these groups, we could have spent the last year going after them! He could be alive right now!”
“You’re assuming he’s not,” Sage said.
I opened my mouth to retort, then snapped it shut as I realized the import of his words.
“You think my father’s still alive?”
“I think it’s very likely. To get the Elixir, either group needs both what Grant knows and what I know. Unless Grant was foolish enough to give them his information, he’s still alive.”
“Wait,” Ben said. “If whichever group needed you both, why did they just kidnap him? Why didn’t they wait until you were together in the forest?”
“Grant must have realized they were following him, so he changed the plans. He probably thought it would keep us both safe, but instead they decided to strike and at least get him. As you saw this morning … they’re still after me.”
“So you think he’s alive.” I almost hated to think it. I wanted it so badly. The idea that my dad could actually be alive—even if he was hurt, even if he’d been tortured
… it felt like too much to hope for.
“So what do we do?” I asked. “How can we find my father?”
“And the Elixir of Life,” Ben added.
“There is no Elixir of Life,” I said.
“Yes, there is,” Ben and Sage chorused.
“No, there isn’t. And even if there were, I wouldn’t care unless it helped me find my father.”
“Which it might,” Sage said.
Ben and I both wheeled to face him.
“How?” I asked.
“We take the trip I was supposed to take with Grant. We find the dark lady. She’ll help us get the Elixir. That’s what whoever has your father wants. We get that, we have the ultimate bargaining chip.”
“But we don’t know who or where this lady is,” Ben said.
“Dad would have figured it out before he came down here to tell Sage, right?” I said. “That means he worked on it at home. You know how he wrote everything down and kept all his research. I bet somewhere in the house there’s some kind of information about what he had planned.”
Ben turned to Sage. “Okay. So all Clea and I need is for you to tell us what you know about the Elixir, and we can go get it. You won’t ever have to see us again.”
“Not possible,” Sage said. “I said it before; you’ve been tied to me. That means you’re in danger. I don’t think you get that.”
“Oh, I get it,” Ben said, “I just think Clea and I will be safer on our own. And with all due respect, I don’t entirely trust you. And I don’t think Clea does either.”
“Respect duly noted,” Sage said wryly, “but I’m not telling you what I know about the Elixir, so you kind of need me.”
The two guys stared each other down.
“Fine,” I jumped in, “so we’ll all go to Connecticut together.”
“You say that like it’s simple,” Sage said. “You don’t think whoever has your father—or anyone looking for the Elixir—has their eye on your house? I’d be surprised if it hadn’t been searched for clues regularly since Grant first found the vials. Now that you’re involved too, the place will probably be crawling with people”