The Sphinx Project by Kate Hawkings Read Free Book Online Page A

food."
    "How come I can't get the clothes?" Briana asked, a scowl plastered across her face.
    "Because we don't have time for you to fuss around." Nicole focused on Briana properly for the first time, running her eyes over her stained clothes. Frowning, she turned to give us a once-over too.
    "Put this on." She bent down, pulling Guy's big jacket from the floor in front of the passenger seat and handing it to Briana.
    "Why me?"
    "Because you're the one covered in the most blood. I don't want anyone asking questions."
    "But it's horrible!"
    "You're never going to see any of these people ever again. You don't need to worry about being pretty."
    Briana snatched the jacket out of her hand, tugging it over her arms as she scowled. She gave up arguing—Nicole was in charge, whether Briana liked it or not; she always had been.
    Mouse extracted the notes from the wallet; separating them, she handed half to Nicole and kept the other half for herself.
    "Do you think we'll have enough for everything?" We walked to the sidewalk that ran along the front of the store, peering into each as we passed.
    "Not a clue," Nicole said.
    I peeked into the first store we came to, finding it full of strange objects.
    "There's ours," Nicole said, pointing to a small grocery store close by. "And that's yours." The clothing shop was on the other side of the parking lot. Nicole and Briana veered off toward their destination. Mouse and I continued onward.
    When we walked into the big building, there were racks of clothes everywhere. I wandered over to the silver frame closest to us, lifting the sleeve of a delicate dress. I scrunched up my nose, letting it drop.
    "What's with all the frilly stuff?" Mouse asked, rifling through a similar rack.
    "Surely all the bits and pieces hanging off would get in the way?" I turned, hearing footsteps approaching from behind.
    "Can I help you? Are you looking for something in particular?" a girl, not much older than us, asked. She ran her eyes over us, an expression similar to the one I often saw Briana wearing spread across her face.
    "We're after clothes we can run around in," Mouse said.
    The girl's eyes flicked over our dirty clothes, a slight curl twisting her lip. "Sure you are..."
    She led the way to the back of the store, where the clothes on the silver hangers were much plainer than those we had been inspecting.
    We pored over the garments, selecting four pairs of black pants and four gray T-shirts.
    I lifted a thick hooded sweatshirt. "Do you think we should each get one of these?"
    "Will we need them? I'm not cold."
    "Neither am I, but everyone outside seems to be. They're all wearing jackets."
    Mouse stared critically at the garment for a moment. "We probably should, then. We need to blend in."
    We took our selections to the counter, where the girl had disappeared to without a word. She looked at us strangely but didn't say anything as she processed our purchase.
    "That's ninety-five dollars and thirty-seven cents."
    Mouse pulled the folded stack of notes out of her pocket and the girl's eyes grew wide. She slid one of the pieces of paper from the pile, inspected it and placed it on the counter before doing the same with the next five. The girl deposited the notes in her till and counted out some little coins and other notes from the cash register. Mouse took them and folded them back into the wallet.
    Shopping in hand, we returned to the car. Briana and Nicole arrived soon after, the former with a stormy expression settled firmly upon her face. She didn't say anything, just selected an apple from the paper bag and bit into it.
    I took the driver's seat, navigating through the streets back to the hospital. I parked the car and waited. There, Nicole and I changed seats, since she volunteered to take a turn driving.
    I found a magazine in the glove compartment. I'd seen it when I'd been searching for the screwdrivers. It had lots of pictures and told some sort of story about a man with a mechanical suit who