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The pool is still bright neon blue. The night air is heavy with moisture and heat. It’s quiet, except for the soft trickling of the pool waterfall.
Quiet hell…
I lower myself onto the terrace steps.
Droga comes up quietly, takes a seat next to me, and lights a cigarette too.
I don’t know why he’s here. Pity? I don’t need that. Obligation? They all want me well and alive because Zion’s well-being depends on it.
An hour ago, I felt angry, hopeless, maybe. Now I feel pathetic like I failed at one more thing—keeping my face.
Silence burns between us with a tobacco smell and a metallic taste in my mouth. When my cigarette is burned down to the filter, I light another one, inhale deeply, scorching my lungs and summoning the courage to talk about the incident that left everyone scarred a year ago. Kat doesn’t know the full story. But Droga should.
He’s quiet, like he’s waiting for something.
“There were two nights in the last year that were absolute hell,” I start the confession that I’ve done so many times in my mind.
The person next to me is the only one in this world who’d understand and hopefully forgive me for something that everyone considers my fault.
“We didn’t get to her on time,” I say quietly, not recognizing my voice, the memory of that night sending shivers down my spine.
Droga turns to look at me, but I don’t meet his eyes. “Who?”
“Olivia.”
When her name is brought up in occasional conversations among the guards, it’s still said in a low tone and with the heavy followed silence that swells with the horror of that night.
“The night Olivia was taken, we had a party,” I say, the words eerie in the night silence.
We’ve lost over a dozen people on Zion since the Change, but it’s Olivia’s story that’s the darkest.
“A big party,” I continue slowly. It’s hard to put words together like my mouth doesn’t belong to me. My brain is fuzzy. “Letting loose, you know, after being cooped up in this place for a year.”
I have to pause and take a deep breath to summon the thoughts and courage.
“When the surveillance team got ahold of me that night, we sent the boats to the Eastside. Within minutes, I was at the surveillance center, and when I watched the cameras…” I close my eyes, wanting to forget, but it has an adverse effect, only making those horrible images more vivid. So I open my eyes and stare at the blue water in the pool. “You guys had already found Olivia, so I called the team off.”
Droga shifts. My cigarette is burned down to the filter again, and I crush it between my fingers, letting the searing pain distract me for a second.
“We rewound the footage to the beginning of the attack on your village. Saw one of your guys getting shot. Then Olivia being dragged into the jungle. And then…”
The images from the footage still haunt me in my worst lows and drunk nightmares.
I inhale deeply, feeling my chest tighten so hard that I can’t breathe. “And then… Several Savages, who lost their moral compass a long time ago. One girl…” I don’t want to talk about it but have to. Droga has to know. “They didn’t even make it to the Ashlands, Droga. They did it”—I pause to search for words and can’t find them—“right there, in the jungle…”
My chest shakes. I rub my face with both hands, but it doesn’t erase the horror show in my mind. Never will.
Droga is quiet. A year ago, he and the other guys found Olivia’s body. They knew what was done to her.
“I couldn’t watch the footage, Droga,” I say almost in a whisper. “I couldn’t—”
“You don’t have to talk about it,” he says quietly.
“No. But I need to. I had apartythat night, Droga. I left my fucking phone at the bar. And security had instructions not to interfere with the Eastside unless it was an emergency. Itwasa fucking emergency!” I snap. “But it took them forever to get the clearance. BecauseIhad afuckingparty! Whileshe…”
I want to scream, but bile rises in my throat, and I hold my breath so I don’t vomit.
My eyes burn. The lump in my throat is the size of a golf ball.
