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I want it to be true.
So when I finish in the bathroom, I climb into bed beside Alix. I spoon behind her, curling my arm over her belly. I kiss the nape of her neck and then the corner of her mouth as she smiles and worms a little closer.
She’s asleep before I tap the button that extinguishes the lights throughout the castle. Lying beside her, I listen to her breathe. I try to absorb her calm. Her trust.
But I’m still wide awake three hours later, when the ring of my burner phone shatters the darkness around us.
20
ALIX
* * *
“Fuck!” Trap shouts. “Goddamn motherfucking cocksuckers!”
My heart pounds and my stomach swirls with that special type of nausea when you’ve been startled awake from a deep, deep sleep. Or maybe it’s the second Dole Whip I had. On top of the egg rolls. And corn dog nuggets. And the crispy mac and cheese bites.
I’m tangled in sheets, snared in the silk sleeves of unfamiliar nightclothes. The only light in the room comes from Trap’s phone as he stares at its flickering screen.
“Goddamnit!” he shouts, and I realize he’s got someone on speaker. For just a moment I think he’s yelling at Mr. Samuelson, but that can’t be possible, because he’s demanding, “What the fuck happened?”
“We encountered substantial unexpected opposition.” The voice fills the room, careful and measured.
“You said you had this under control,” Trap says.
“They had more firepower than we anticipated.”
“I don’t know about you, but I anticipated a hell of a lot. The guard towers were the first fucking clue.”
Instead of responding, the other voice swirls into muffled conversation, like he’s covering his phone to address someone close by. There’s a barked command. Another. And then a deep breath, followed by a slow exhale before the man says, “I’ve got to go. I’ve still got four men unaccounted for. Will this number be active after noon?”
“No,” Trap says. “I’ll burn it. I’ll call you.”
The other man hangs up as shouts rise in the background on his side of the call. Trap stabs at one phone, cutting off the speaker. His eyes are still glued to the moving video on his other device.
“Who was that?” I ask.
“Sawyer Best,” Trap says.
I pull the sheets up to my chin, suddenly chilled despite my pajamas, despite the castle’s perfect air handling system. “Why was he calling?”
Trap doesn’t answer.
“What happened?” I push.
Trap pokes at his screen, restarting whatever video he’s staring at.
“What the hell is going on, Trap?”
When he looks at me, his face is pulled into planes by the moving light on the screen below him. I want him to laugh like a cartoon villain. To tell me a silly ghost story, like the one where the escaped lunatic’s hook gets caught in the teenagers’ car door or where Bloody Mary appears in the mirror. I want to laugh away the horror.
He swallows. Closes his eyes. Steels himself and manages to look at me.
“I hired Sawgrass to do some clean up.”
“I know,” I say, because they’re the ones who erased every shred of evidence that I murdered Klaus Herzog. “The dining room—”
“Not then,” Trap says. “Tonight.”
