Perfection (JL Spelbring) Read Online Free PDF Page B

fast-paced walk.
    Huffing, Ellyssa stopped and stooped, hands on knees. The stitch was bad, but the threat of her overly taxed muscles seizing up was worse. She let her hands fall between her feet and stretched before she made her way back to the edge of the farmland.
    From between two hickory trees, with limbs stretching over into a latticework of twigs and leaves, she peered out across the rolling field. The town was completely hidden, lying behind a canopy, except for one building with a steeple shooting free from the greenery.
    She wished her gift could extend to the train station to snatch the thoughts of her pursuers. Had they searched the train? Did they know she had jumped? Were they organizing a search party?
    Even though she couldn’t predict their exact plans, she knew they’d eventually resort to using dogs. She turned and disappeared into the foliage, looking for trees to help hide her scent.
    Depleted of the adrenaline rush and the sweet numb of endorphins, Ellyssa’s muscles and bruised flesh moaned under her sweat-sodden clothes. Her thigh sang a song of pain beneath the crimson-colored rip running along the seam of the jumpsuit. She gingerly poked the threadbare fabric and hissed.
    Ellyssa sat on a fallen log and extended her leg in front of her. The jagged tear ran from mid-thigh to her knee. Raw pink meat showed between the edges of the frayed material. She tried to pull the fabric free from the wound, but blood stuck the material to the tender flesh. She gave up and retrieved scissors from her bag, along with one of her two bottles of water.
    She’d broken two of the most important rules of her training. The first was, always come prepared for anything. But she hadn’t had the time after all the secrets she’d found. Her priority had been erasing her identity from the mainframe then disappearing.
    The second rule was to never underestimate the intelligence of the enemy.
    The thought surprised her. Was that how she thought of her father now? Ellyssa shook her head. Just over twenty-four hours ago, she’d been an unknowing participant in her father’s plan, doing as he instructed, trying to please him, although she could never show that. Now, she was running from him.
    Her heart ached, and Ellyssa let the feeling consume her while fishing out a tube of antiseptic, her only preparation for injury. Now was not the best time to entertain the feeling; she knew that. But she’d missed out on so much being locked away at The Center, away from all the inferior citizens. Being allowed to show emotions was just the tip.
    Ellyssa’s father had spent years structuring a program to rid his experiments of feelings. She was his unknown failure. Since the age of three, she’d bottled up everything she’d felt and worn an impassive mask. Although she didn’t realize it at the time, her ability to deceive had saved her.
    After the run-in with the dark-haired man, she’d accessed her father’s files and discovered what happened to subjects who’d failed to assimilate, along with finding her father’s secret agenda. The most basic instinct, the first lesson drilled into her, was the instinct to survive. After reading her father’s files, hers went into overdrive.
    The betterment of mankind . Ellyssa scoffed.
    Her father was the very enemy he’d warned her and her siblings about.
    A foreign smile slipped across her face as she snipped away the leg of her coveralls above the knee. Breathing in, she yanked the fabric free. Fresh blood pooled in the gash before flowing over and trickling down the sides of her thigh. She poured water over the wound and cleared away as much of the dirt and pebbles as she could. The cut was ugly, and more pebbles were embedded in the flesh, but the wound wasn’t disabling. She picked out the remaining debris, then swabbed on the pasty antiseptic cream. Using the pants leg as a makeshift bandage, she bound the wound.
    After wetting her mouth, she gathered her items and shoved