I smack myself in the head three times before spinning to face the women still huddled in the corner of the room. They stare at me like I’m crazy when in reality, they’re the ones who are deranged.
They don’t fight at all.
They just give in.
Like I did when my parents died.
Determined not to make the same mistake twice, I return to the door. I pry at the hinges with my fingernails and scratch at the steel material until my nails bleed, and terrifying silence fills my ears.
Silence isn’t good.
Usually, it only means one thing.
Death has arrived.
“No!” I scream in Czech again while banging on the door with my fist. “No, no, no!” I shout on repeat as tears stream down my face. I’m so sick of this happening. It isn’t fair. Yes, every action has a consequence, but instead of the backlash occurring to the people responsible for the injustice, it’s always shunted onto the undeserving half.
Trey doesn’t deserve this.
I tricked him into sleeping with me, not the other way around.
I lied.
It was me.
Everything happening is my fault.
My mini-breakdown gets a moment of reprieve when I pick up the faintest patter of a pair of boots. Anyone not trapped by their own thoughts for weeks on end wouldn’t hear the faintest tap of a person sneakily approaching them. I hear every step. I’m just praying their wish to keep their approach unknown puts them on my side of the team for once.
I send thanks to my parents when I spot the shadow of a man I’d guess to be around six foot two. Achim isn’t that tall. My father often said his lack of height was the reason he was always grumpy. He has short-man-stature syndrome.
A relieving sigh rattles in my chest when the body of Nikolai gobbles up the shadow I’m watching like a hawk a few seconds later. He has a gun in his hands, and a crinkle of determination is popped between his dark brows.
“There, down there,” I whisper to him in Czech, praying Achim won’t hear me. “They took them down there.”
It dawns on me that he can’t understand me when his eyes drop to the keyhole I’m glancing out of. “Where is she?” His voice is as soft as mine, his willpower just as notable.
“Tam dole. Pospeš si. Už je zranil. Trey krvácí.”
I beg for him to hurry again when he tilts so close to the door, I can no longer see his face. I don’t have a good sense of time since my head is still woozy from whatever murkiness is filtering through my veins, but it feels like almost an hour has passed since I last saw Trey.
If that’s true, we could be too late.
Trey may already be dead.
Tears burn my eyes when Nikolai pulls down a key from the lip above the door. When he slots it into the lock I’m peering out of, I scurry back since the door swings inward. After dropping his eyes to me for the quickest second, he shifts to the women cowering away from him like he’s one of the monsters in their nightmares.
He isn’t. He just didn’t know he wasn’t until he found hisAhren.
After returning his eyes to mine, Nikolai whispers, “Do you know where Justine is?” He touches his chest that’s splattered with blood while adding. “MyAhren.Do you know where they took her?” When I nod, he asks, “Can you show me?”
When I nod again, he squashes his index finger to his lips, demanding for me to be quiet. Aware sometimes silence is your only ally, I nod again before gesturing for him to follow me. My feet don’t make the clomping noises his boots do when we quietly tread down the corridor. I’m not just barefoot as I have been almost every day for six years, I learned the importance of soundless steps when Achim’s room was placed onto my list of quarters to take care of after my parents’ deaths. I was so quiet on my feet, I made up his room while he was still sleeping, only returning when he was having breakfast to make his bed.
After double-checking my bearings to ensure I have the right room, I point to the door across from a nick in the wall. It isn’t nail marks like the walls in my old prison cell. It’s too low for a fist and too high for a knee. It is more like the gun on someone’s hip accidentally grazed the drywall. It’s barely a scuff, but it was a great anchor point to keep me up to date on Trey’s location.
My tear-filled eyes stray to Nikolai when he whispers, “Justine is in there?”
While my throat works through its dryness, I nod.
