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A ghost of a smile crossed her face. “You’re right,” she said, grabbing my hand. “We can dothis.”
16
Laney
Idreamed I was drowning,being dragged to the bottom of the lake at RFA by clutching hands. All I could see was murky water and swaying lake weeds, and all I knew was that someone wanted me dead. I had to escape these icy hands, but they kept multiplying, pulling me deeper and deeper until I knew there was no chance ofsurvival.
I woke up gasping. A thin sheen of sweat coated my face and neck, and for a few terrifying seconds, I thought it was actually water from thelake.
“It’s okay. I’m here.” Hunter’s arms were around me in seconds, pulling me into a tight, warm embrace. “Just a baddream.”
I exhaled deeply. “Am I ever going to sleep properlyagain?”
He stroked my hair and nodded. “As soon as this shit is over, you’ll sleep like ababy.”
“Pretty sure I’m sleeping like a baby right now,” I grumbled. “Waking up every few hoursscreaming.”
Hunter let out a soft chuckle and sat up straight, leaning his back against the soft bedhead. “I got the house manager to drop off some coffee and breakfast for us,” he said, motioning to the nightstand beside me. “Wantsome?”
“It’s morning already?” I said, smothering a yawn. “I can’t tell with these blackoutcurtains.”
“It’s half pastten.”
“Shit.” I sat bolt upright. “We’re late forschool!”
“We’re not going in. They’ve given you a couple of days off, for obvious reasons, and I told them I’m staying out to keep an eye onyou.”
“Oh.” My shoulders sagged with relief. “I honestly thought they’d make me go back right away. I was totally dreadingit.”
Hunter snorted. “Sanders probablywould’vemade you go back right away, but he’s gone now, so it’s cool. I talked to Ms. Flores, and she basically said you can go back whenever you’reready.”
“That’s good.” I yawned and reached upward, stretching my tired limbs. “I can’t believe I slept for solong.”
“I can.” Hunter’s face turned serious again. “Your whole system is inshock.”
“I guess so,” I said softly. “It still seems completely crazy to me. Like… someoneactually tried tokillme. It reallyhappened.”
“Well, they won’t get a chance to try again,” he replied, eyes narrowing. “Now that I know someone’s after you, I’m not taking any risks. I even tried all the food and coffee over there before you could have any of it, just incase.”
I raised a brow. “In case the staff poisonedit?”
“Yeah. I know it sounds paranoid as fuck, but we can’t trust anyone right now. Except eachother.”
“Well, you’re still alive, so I think we can trust your staff,” I said with a faint smile. I reached for the breakfast tray and brought it onto thebed.
As I sipped at my coffee, I snuggled up to Hunter. “Do you think everything happens for a reason?” I asked, tilting my head slightly to oneside.
“I think everything happensbecauseof a reason,yeah.”
“No, I mean… do you think everything in the universe ispredetermined?”
Hunter chuckled. “That’s kinda deep for breakfastconversation.”
“I know. I just can’t stop thinking about everything that’s been going on.” I paused to take another sip of coffee. “Like… you were only ever horrible to me in the past because you thought I hurt Lindsay. Then I decided to join the Medusas because I thought you put that video up, purely because of the way you’d treated me before. And then after that, we only started investigating the Medusas and the Network because we thoughttheymight’ve killed Lindsay and threatened to go after me.” I paused, brows furrowing. “We were wrong about everything. But if none of that stuff happened, and we didn’t think any of those things in the first place, then we wouldn’t have uncovered the whole sex ring. Your dad and all his gross perverted friends would still befree.”
“That’strue.”
“It’s crazy how stuff works out,” I said, browsknitting.
