State of Alliance Read Online Free PDF Page B

will be all too happy to try to take me down.
    “Don’t worry,” Uriah says, seeing the look on my face. “You’re going to be fine.”
    “It’s not me I’m worried about,” I reply.
    And that’s the truth.
    I’d rather be killed than lose this war.
    I’m worried about our survival, not mine.
    We wind through boulevards that have been secured and blockaded. I watch the buildings roll by, empty edifices now turned into part of the massive National Guard and militia fortifications. Theboulevard dips under a huge underpass and we pop up by the Sacramento Courthouse, a large skyscraper with blue windows. To the left is a large, antique brick building.
    The sign out front reads, Amtrak , and beside it, a new sign has been erected:
    UNITED STATES MILITARY
    TRANSPORTATION CENTER
    We pull up through the parking lot – a maze of barricades and militia patrols. We stop at the front. Taxicabs used to sit on the curb here and wait for passengers who needed rides to their hotels. Now it is a military loading zone.
    I open the door. Uriah and Vera exit with me. I cast Vera a glance, gauging her mood. She is as steely as ever.
    I walk inside the station. The ceilings are huge, and every footstep and word echoes in the hollow chamber. Rows of old, wooden benches line the room. A huge mural of the breaking of the ground for the first transcontinental railroad is painted across the far wall.
    I see Chris with militia members in the far corner of the station. He sees me enter and says a quick few words to the men around him, then walks toward me.
    “Beautiful, isn’t it?” he asks, gesturing to the vaulted ceiling.
    “Yes,” I agree.
    “Hey, boss,” Uriah says.
    “Lieutenant True,” Chris nods. “Lieutenant Wright.”
    Vera doesn’t respond. Both Uriah and Vera head toward the other side of the building, leaving me alone with Chris.
    “What was she arguing with you about this morning?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.
    Chris shakes his head.
    “It doesn’t matter right now,” he says.
    “It does to me.”
    “Cassie…” He sighs.
    “Is she being a pain?” I demand. “Because I’ll tell her to knock it off if she is.”
    “Her mother just died. Cut her some slack,” Chris answers.
    “I know that. I held Angela’s hand while she was bleeding out on the sidewalk.” I take a sharp breath,realizing that my words came out harsher than I had originally intended. “I’m sorry. I’m just…I’m a little nervous, I guess. This whole negotiations thing has me wound tight.”
    “You’re not the only one,” Chris says.
    The thought occurs to me then that I should ask him right now about his wife. His former wife? His current wife? Whatever she is or was , I need to know the truth. Manny told me not to worry about it, but…
    “I couldn’t find my father,” I say instead.
    Chris’s expression conveys shock.
    “Did you search the whole hospital?” he asks.
    “Every room,” I answer. “Every bed. I didn’t see him. He’s not listed as a patient.”
    For the first time in a very long time, Chris looks genuinely sad.
    “I’m sorry, Cassie,” he says. “I’m so sorry.”
    I blink back tears and stare at the ground.
    “It is what it is,” I state, hollow.
    “If I could fix it-”
    “-But you can’t.” I swallow a lump in my throat.
    “Nobody can.”
    I tighten the strap of my backpack and nod toward Uriah and Vera, standing in the corner of the trainstation. Andrew is waiting there as well, and Sophia has popped up, too.
    “Let’s go,” I say.
    Chris says nothing. He merely nods and studies my face. So I stay in front of him. I don’t want him to see the hot tears burning in my eyes. Not today. I’m the Senator now, and I have to maintain the appearance of being totally calm and in control.
    To me, that is irony at its cruelest.
    The back of the building opens to a sprawling parking lot. Across the lot there are loading platforms for the Amtrak trains, but the directional signs have been