Page 162 of Hidden

Natalie moved closer until she was right in front of me again, her hands finding mine for the second time that night.

“I’ll stay with your mum,” she said softly. “I swear to you, I will not leave her alone. I’ll keep taking care of her, I’ll keep getting food to her however I can, and if Nico so much as breathes too close to that basement door, I’ll know.”

My throat burned.

She squeezed my hands harder. “You get out. You get to Vienna. And then you come back for us.”

I stared at her for a long moment, seeing not just the woman in front of me but every version of her that had existed before this one. The girl who used to braid my hair. The friend who used to sneak cigarettes behind the clubhouse and swear blind she’dnever marry one of these idiots. The one person in this place who still felt like something from before.

“You swear?” I whispered.

She nodded immediately. “On my life.”

“You stay with her,” I said, my voice thick now, barely recognisable as my own. “If I go through with this, you stay with my mum.”

“I will.”

“You don’t let her think I’ve abandoned her.”

Natalie’s face broke properly then. “I won’t.”

“And if I get out…” My voice caught, and I had to force the rest of it through. “If I get out, I’ll come back. For both of you.”

“I know you will. I’ll wait here whilst you take it. I’ll be the one to tell Nico you’ve died. I’ll make the suggestions about what to do with your body. I’ll plant all the seeds… and then I’ll wait.”

The room went quiet after that.

Not peacefully.

Just in that horrible, suspended way things go quiet when a decision has been made and all that remains is carrying it out.

Natalie unfolded the packet slowly, carefully, and tipped a small amount of fine white powder into her palm.

It looked harmless.

Something so small.

Something so ordinary.

And yet it sat there between us, carrying the weight of my entire future.

My entire life.

Natalie looked up at me, her own breathing uneven now. “Once you take it, you need to let it happen. Don’t fight it. Don’t panic. Just let your body go where it needs to go.”

I looked at the powder.

Then at her.

Then somewhere beyond both of us, as though maybe there was still another option waiting to reveal itself if I stared hard enough.

But there wasn’t. There was only this.

I thought of my mother in that basement. I thought of Natalie standing in front of me, risking everything she had left. And then, because apparently I was incapable of not thinking of him even now, I thought of Vienna.

Of his face if I made it to him.

Of his hands.