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Stopping at the door when I bumped into the girl’s outstretched hand, I nodded when she whispered, “Walk calmly...stay with me,” and then we were slipping past the door and out of the room.
And it took everything to continue walking and not stop right there, rip the mask off, and look around in awe and horror.
Because where I’d expected a hallway inside a house, there was only a massive room that was easily the size of my apartment, filled with large metal tanks and containers.
Where the hell am I?
“This rival family you fell into,” the winking girl began as she slowed until she was by my side, “what are they like?”
“What?”
She turned her neon mask on me, her head listing in a creepily identical way to her brother. “What are they like?”
“I-I—” I pressed my lips tightly together, worrying over the repercussions of my answer. Worrying over why she was asking at all. “I don’t know,” I finally said, refusing to give her anything on them.
“You don’t know, but you want to get back to them,” she said dully, clearly not believing me. “Or are they just the lesser of two evils in this situation?”
When she planted herself directly in front of me, silently demanding my response, I asked, “Why are you doing this?” I gestured past her as if Diggs’ family would be standing there. “I hardly know them; I can’t give you whatever information y’all want. So, you might as well put me back in that room.”
“If I put you in that room, my brother will return soon. If you don’t give the answer he wants this time, he’ll start giving you reasons to beg him to trust you—starting with your parents and moving to that guy you won’t shut up about. Understand?”
I was thankful I hadn’t eaten the meals she’d brought me earlier because they would’ve come back up then.
I’d read her words. I’d believed her when she said Lachlan planned to kill everyone anyway. But my stomach heaved and my knees weakened at the realization of the immediate danger my parents were in...and I had no way of warning them.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” the winking girl said as she grabbed my forearm and pulled me with her, faster than before. Slipping her phone out of her pocket with her free hand as she did and tapping on the screen as she rushed me through the room, keeping us close to the exposed brick wall.
“Where are you taking me?”
“I already told you,” she said distractedly as we came to a stop in front of an oversized elevator.
“You didn’t—”
“Hush,” she snapped as she studied the brightly lit screen for a while longer, leaving me anxiously looking around at the containers, tanks, and neatly stacked supplies. Waiting for neon red to pop out from behind one of them at any moment.
With a steadying breath, the girl pocketed her phone and pressed the up button for the elevator, then looked at me with that unnerving head tilt before reaching for the bottom of my shirt and pulling it up.
I reared back and tried twisting away from her, slapping at her hands as I did. “What—no. What are you—oh my God, stop,” I ground out when she practically ripped the shirt off me—partially from embarrassment and confusion, partially from pain—and hurried to cover my bare breasts as I struggled to right the mask she’d nearly taken with her.
“Lachlan’s seen you in this.”
“So?”
“He’s dangerously perceptive,” she said as she quickly removed her own shirt and forced it over my head, inside out, as if I were a toddler. “But these are my clothes anyway, so...we might just pull this off.”
“Pull what off?”
“From here on out, stop asking questions. Better yet—stop talking,” she said as if she’d greatly prefer that, then hurried into the shirt I’d been in before. “Look like you belong. And just let whatever happens happen.”
A stunned sound punched from me. “What’s going to—”
“I said no,” she said over me when the wide doors opened behind her, her voice soft and with an edge of worry. “Look, you have two choices: You either go back in the room, and everyone you know starts dying, or you come with me, let the events of the night play out how they have to, and hope you can save everyone.”
“I can save everyone?”
“Jesus Christ,” she hissed as I followed her onto the elevator. “Do you ever stop asking questions? Don’t answer that,” she added quickly as she reached for the bottom of my shirt again to adjust it.
“No questions,” she reminded me as she started fluffing my hair, smacking the side of my head when I initially, instinctively tried shifting away from her. But the outright waver in her tone as the elevator climbed higher had me going still. “Act like you belong and have been there before, so don’t look around. Stay by my side no matter what.”
