Chapter 96

Sarah POV

Zane and I had brought things to keep us busy during the “pencils and Scantrons” portion of the girls’ PPE. I couldn’t help but watch with Zane at my shoulder as the girls ran on their treadmills at increasingly steep inclines. The sense testing was actually fascinating and made me rethink how far away I needed to be from them if I didn’t want them to hear me.

Grace scored highest on smell, taste, and touch, whereas Chloe scored highest on sight and sound. I could tell from the body language of the people in white, doctor-like coats giving the tests that they were impressed and pleased by the girls’ performance, and slowly I felt some of my unease dissipate.

The girls were given a lunch break after that. Zane and I ate as well, still watching the girls through a one-way mirror as they talked to each other and played with a ball that could be turned inside out.

“The ball’s a test too, right?” I asked.

“Of course. They got the hang of it fast, but they need to see how to pull it apart.”

“Were they told to?”

“No. A good alpha is a curious alpha.”

I laughed when a surprised Grace watched the ball break into three pieces in her hands. “And a destructive alpha.”

“Well, now they need to see how to put it back together again.”

We watched for a few minutes, and soon enough, they had the ball back into its shape.

A beta came into the room shortly afterward and joined them at their table. She smiled at the girls and introduced herself as Mrs. Bunny-Steps.

“Do you like my name?” she asked.

“It’s fun,” Chloe said.

“It’s pretty,” Grace said, but she was frowning.

“Some people have made fun of my name.”

“That’s not nice,” Chloe said. She was frowning now too. Grace nodded.

“You think it’s bad to make fun of people’s names even when their name is odd?”

“I think it’s bad to lie,” Chloe said. “Especially when there’s no reason for it except to trick people.”

“Is it one of the tests?” Grace asked, which was quite bold for her.

I was immensely proud. Zane looked at me with a grin.

The beta nodded. “Yes, it was a test. My name is Cloris. Now, I’m going to ask you a few questions, and there won’t be any lies hidden in them, OK?”

“OK,” Grace said. Chloe nodded.

“What are three signs you know that your father is angry at someone who’s not you?”

They thought for a moment. “He smells angry,” Grace said.

“He goes into his study and doesn’t talk to anyone for a while,” Chloe said.

“And one more?”

“He won’t have any scotch. When he’s angry, he drinks water.”

Zane shot me a look of surprise. I had noticed that myself, so I just shrugged back.

“What’s a good sign it’s going to rain?”

“The weatherman says it will,” Chloe said, her eyes a little mischievous.

She gave Chloe the side-eye. “Apart from a weather report?”

“It smells like rain, but not after-rain,” Grace said. “And the sky gets dark.”

“If it’s going to rain hard, the birds take shelter,” Chloe said.

Cloris asked a few more such questions, finishing with, “What are signs that an alpha is about to get violent?” to which the girls responded that they didn’t know. She then told the girls they were very good and left the room.

I looked at Zane. “I think that went well.”

“Didn’t care for that last question,” he muttered.

“But they didn’t know.”

“Exactly. What would it say about me, about us, if they did?”

“Excuse me.”

We turned to the door to see the beta who’d given the girls that ball standing there. “We’re ready for the hunting test.” She gestured toward the doorway.

I followed Zane out into the hall, then into an elevator, and then into a sort of observation deck. Below us was a large room filled with bright, noisy, and I had a suspicion smelly things, an indoor jungle of distractions such as blooming plants, a machine that spun a wheel and made a clack-clack-clack sound, and a wobbly table that held some moldy-looking food.

“Alpha Zane,” the beta said. “I must ask you not to attempt to project to your children during the testing.”

“I understand.”

She smiled and left us.

“Nice of them to trust you,” I said,

“I’m sure there’s a Luna around here somewhere keeping tabs on me.”

“Makes sense,” I said.

After a few minutes, the door to the sensory overload room opened and Chloe walked in. She wrinkled her nose at the smells, scowled at the strobing light in the corner, and brought her shoulders up around her ears when she passed the clack-clack-clack machine. But then she stood still, closed her eyes, and obviously calmed her mind.

“Dr. Hayes did a good job showing Chloe that,” Zane said. “I could never quite get the hang of explaining the technique to others.”

Calmer now, Chloe opened her eyes and looked around, sniffing the air. She went to the moldy-looking food, examined it, and then picked up a grape.

“This is the thing I’d eat,” she announced to the room. “Do I actually have to eat it?”

No one answered her, and with a grimace she popped the grape into her mouth, barely chewed, and swallowed it.

She walked over to the strobe-lit area next and stared for a short time at the wall. Then she reached out and peeled what looked like a piece of the wall off. When she held it, I could tell it was a wall-colored sticker. She waited a beat and then put it back just where it had been on the wall.

Then she turned and went to a sandbox, standing just there at the edge. She looked at the ground for a good minute, then reached down and unerringly retrieved a small coin from under the sand. She looked up to the window and smiled at us, holding it up.

Zane and I gave her some thumbs-up. She laughed, and one of the testers came in to take the coin. Chloe left the room, and the tester put the coin back in the sand and then smoothed it down. He reached into a lab coat pocket to pull out a grape, which he carefully set down amid the moldy food.

He left, and in another moment Grace entered. Her movements were more subdued, but she reacted to the lights, the noises, and the smells with little winces. She then took the same turns around the room to find and eat (with less complaining) the grape, peel off the sticker, and locate the coin.

We gave her some thumbs-up too.

Then she turned and went over to the clack-clack-clack machine, looked at a moment, and pushed it over on its side so it went quiet.

“That’s right,” she told the now motionless machine quietly. “Pooh on you.”