Page 8

Chapter Eight

Grey

L ightning strikes just outside the basement window that’s too small for me to squeeze through. Believe me. I tried. Thunder claps, and I jump from my skin at the sheer ferocity of the sound. The house seems to groan above me, mirroring my unease. The next flash of light is accompanied by a loud boom, followed by total darkness.

The power has gone out.

A door opens with a high-pitched whine, and footsteps creak on the stairs. Moments later, the second door swishes open and closes again, followed by the locks engaging. A flashlight kicks on, and the beam bounces around the room until it lands on me. I shuffle the chain connecting my legs to the wall to show her I’m still confined. Satisfied, she moves toward the breaker box and begins flipping switches, but nothing happens.

As she continues fiddling with the fuse box, I squat and gather the long chain in my hands, then turn my attention back to her. The flashlight’s beam offers just enough light that I can see how cute she looks in her dark leggings and an oversized sleep shirt that exposes her right shoulder.

Stop that. She’s not cute. She abducted you.

But must those things be mutually exclusive? Can’t she be both dangerous and adorable? And it’s not as if I’m one to talk. I committed a murder less than forty-eight hours ago, and I’ve yet to feel any genuine remorse for what I’ve done.

“The power’s out,” she finally says. “Maybe it’s best if you come upstairs for the night. I’m not going to get any sleep now, so you can take the bed. It’ll be better than that pile of blankets.” She motions to the folded fabric lying on the concrete floor.

Gripping the flashlight, she steps closer and pulls the gun from the back of her waistband, then aims it at me. She sets the flashlight on the ground, keeping the gun’s muzzle aimed at my abdomen as she goes to unlock the chain attaching me to the wall. Unfortunately, she can’t do this with only one hand. She sets the gun by her foot, and I listen for the sound of freedom as the lock disengages.

Before she can straighten herself to face me, I leap for her. The key clangs to the floor. I snatch the chain from her hand and wrap it around her neck, pulling her tight against my body. She doesn’t fight within my grasp, even as the pressure tightens around her throat.

“You won’t do this,” she pants. “You only hurt people who hurt you.”

“What makes you think that?”

She sucks in a breath. “It’s just a feeling, Grey. I can’t explain it. You won’t hurt me, and we both know it.”

I tighten my hold on the chain. “And what do you call chaining me to a wall, hmm? You’re holding me hostage.”

“I’m not . . . hurting you,” she grits out. “I’m keeping you safe.”

“Yeah, until the bidding gets high enough for your liking. Then you’ll trade me off for a wad of cash.” I release my hold on the chain, push her away from me, and go for the gun. “I don’t need you to protect me, little psycho.”

She stumbles forward a few steps, then turns to face me as she finds her footing. “You don’t understand. If I don’t do this, I’ll...”

“You’ll what?” I squat and grab the flashlight, then stand and shine it into her face. Are those tears?

“Just fucking shoot me,” she says. “I can’t lose this fucking house. I’m as good as dead if I do.”

I can’t deny the absolute defeat in her eyes. It’s an emotion I recognize because I’ve been in her shoes. I’ve done despicable things because of walking in those same footsteps.

“They’re threatening foreclosure?” I ask.

Her legs give out, and she collapses to the floor. “What do you care? We can’t both win here. I need the money, and you need your freedom. To be honest, I don’t think I could have turned you in, anyway.”

“Maybe we can figure something out. Maybe there’s some mutually beneficial solution we haven’t thought of.”

She shrugs. “My life is fucking over. It doesn’t matter, and this was a stupid idea on my part.” Her head thumps against the wall as she leans back. “Could you just give me one small thing?”

“What’s that?”

The silence stretches out, and then she takes a deep breath. “Tell me why you did it.”

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“Bullshit.” Her head pulls forward again, and she’s looking right at me. “You could have killed me just now, and you didn’t. You would have been justified, too. That tells me you had a very good reason for killing that bitch, and I want to know what it was.”

“What do you expect from me? The reasons don’t matter. Killing her didn’t fix anything. When people say that murder doesn’t solve problems, they aren’t lying. It solved nothing, and I feel worse for it.” I bite my inner lip. Maybe it won’t hurt to give her a tiny piece of the puzzle. “Remember those NINJA loans?”

“No income, no job, no assets,” we say in unison.

“It ruined my life,” I continue. “And not just my life...” My voice fades out as my heart begins to ache.

“Those loans ruined a lot of people’s lives,” Briar says. “When I was little, the bank tried to foreclose on our home.”

“How’d you guys manage?”

A sly grin slides onto her face, made almost eerie by the flashlight’s glow. “My dad robbed a bank to save the house.”

My jaw falls open, and I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “No fucking way. Did he get caught?”

She shakes her head, sending her red hair around her face. “He was never discovered, but he and my mother died in a car crash a couple of years later, so it didn’t matter anyway. They still lost the house, and I was placed in foster care.” She looks around the basement, then offers me a sad smile. “I got the house back, though.”

The pieces of the puzzle are fitting together now. Her desperation is understandable because it was once my desperation. It’s a desperation too many Americans have become familiar with. We are sold the American dream at a price they know we can’t afford.

I slide the gun across the floor to her. It bumps against her shoe, and she looks at it.

“What are you doing?” she asks, and I can’t answer her. Because I have no fucking clue.

I had the upper hand, and now I’m giving it back to her if for no other reason than I’m not the monster I need to be. She’s right. I’m not some hardened killer who takes a life for the sake of it.

“I really don’t want to go to fucking prison,” I say into the darkness. “If we can find some way to avoid that where you can still keep the house...”

And that’s when it hits me.

I still have access to the cams in Gloria’s house. Maybe the solution to her problem lies there. And if she has a solution, maybe I do too.

“Do you have a computer you’d let me use?” I ask. “I’d like to show you something.”

She motions toward the ceiling. “Yeah, but there’s no power. The Wi-Fi won’t work.”

“Your phone?”

Her hand goes into her pocket, and she pulls it out. “Dead. I kind of forgot to charge it when I was busy kidnapping a murderer. My bad.”

I let out a soft laugh. I can’t help it. She might be out of her fucking gourd, but she’s also likeable as hell.

“Well, I guess we can go upstairs now,” she says. “But if you think I’m letting you go, you’re sadly mistaken. I like you, Grey, but I like...” She hesitates, then says, “I like this house and the memories it holds a little more.” She plucks up the gun and stuffs it into her pants. At least she isn’t holding it on me anymore.

I nod and follow her upstairs, but I get the sneaking suspicion that she’s holding something back. Maybe I’m not the only person with secrets I’m not ready to share.