Page 94 of Cruel Pleasures

“Imani!” I shout after her.

We enter the brisk December night where tiny flakes of snow have begun to flutter down. I leap down the last few stone steps and manage to cut her off before she can make it to the gardens. Ryu’s not far behind, though he remains several feet away.

More of a lurker to our moment than anything.

“Is this about what she said?” I ask.

“Don’t come near me! Either of you!”

“We were tasked with watching you?—”

“Yes, I know!” she shouts back. “Which is exactly why I said don’t fucking come near me! I want off this property! I want off this isle! NOW!”

“You’re being hysterical?—”

“Hysterical?” She hacks out a mad laugh. “I’m being hysterical? What about the crazy lady in some fucking porcelain doll mask who just leaped across a table and tried to stab you a hundred times? What about the body you just got done dismembering like it was just another fucking hobby? I want off this isle! Get me out of this place!”

“I told you what I was. You helped me.”

“You made me!”

I take a bold step toward her. “You were turned on.”

“Get away from me, Archer!”

“She tasked us to watch you. She was aware—as the rest of the club is—that you’re digging around for answers. Don’t you see these people would do anything to keep their skeletons in the closet? Be pissed with me and Ryu all you want, Imani. But we were never your problem. The rest of the club is!”

“Not a problem as you, what? Stalk me? Lie to me? Report back to your boss to… to tear me to pieces? Isn’t that what you said!” She momentarily redirects her ire at a point past my shoulder.

I realize half a second later it’s Ryu. She’s equally as furious with him as she is with me.

For this moment, I’m the outsider. I’m the lurker intruding on a telepathic glare exchanged between her and Ryu.

The same rampant jealousy I’d felt the other night begins to stir. The hotheaded violent urges rise.

Imani snaps back to me. “I don’t want anything to do with either of you. So you can stop pretending there’s anything between us. There’s nothing. Do you understand? I came here to find my friend, but now that I’ve discovered you’re all fucking crazy, I’m gone. Tonight.”

“You’re never getting off this isle. Not like you think you are.”

“I’ll find a way.”

“She’ll have you killed.”

“You mean like she just tried to kill you? What do I have to lose?” She throws her arms up in the air in indifference.

“I mean you need to calm the hell down and think strategically,” I grit out, taking yet another step toward her. “As fucked in the head as she is, this is all a game to her. The only way you’re getting out of here alive is if you play better than she does and outsmart her. You think what she tried to do to me in there was terrible? She wasn’t going to kill me, no matter how bad that looked. You’re a different story.”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why wouldn’t she kill you?”

I forget about my temper, giving a shrug. “Because,” I say. “She’s my mother.”

22. Ryu

Bones of Man - Equador and Bo Bruce