Page 19

19

Lara

Slowly, the drug begins to wear off, thankfully. First, the ability to move my limbs returns, but as much as I want to get the hell away from this place, I don’t trust my legs to hold me up quite yet. Nash doesn’t seem to be trying to hurt me, so I might be safest right here for now.

I lift my left arm above my head and then lower it before lifting my right leg and setting it down onto the bed. Both sides of my body seem to be working. Now if only I could speak.

All of my other senses seem to be working fine. The woodsy scent of men’s deodorant fills my nose, and when I unsuccessfully try to start talking, I can actually taste the chemicals in my mouth. It’s disgusting, but at least it lets me know that sense is still functioning.

“It’ll be just another minute or so, I’m guessing, since you can finally move. Don’t force it. You’ll be back to normal in no time.”

I draw my eyebrows in and frown to let Nash know how I feel about his casual opinion on my recovery. I may not be able to speak, but I damn well want him to know I don’t appreciate how cavalier he’s being about this.

He doesn’t bother to say anything more or try to entertain me. Instead, he simply sits there watching me as if I’m some curiosity in a zoo or some shop that sells oddities.

Finally, my ability to speak returns out of nowhere. I open my mouth and words start coming out again.

“What the hell is going on here?” I croak out.

Nash reaches over to a table next to him for a bottle of water and hands it to me. “Drink this.”

As much as my throat is dying for even a drop of refreshing water, the last thing I want to do is consume anything more here. I throw the bottle back at him, disgusted with him and everyone else in this crazy place.

“No way. You drink it first, and then maybe I’ll trust it’s not laced with whatever they gave me before.”

The bottle bounces off his chest and drops to the floor with a thud. He bends over to pick it up without a word and holds it out for me again. His expression looks like he’s already tired of having to deal with me. Too bad. I wasn’t the one who shanghaied him and stole him away from his bed in the dark of night.

“I just took you out of that cabin because you were in danger. I could have done whatever I wanted to you for the last half hour and you couldn’t have done a damn thing about it. Does it make sense that I’d be trying to drug you now? Drink the water. It will make you feel better and flush the drug out of your system faster.”

What he says makes sense, but I’m still not sure I trust him. Then again, out of all the people in The Golden Light I’ve met so far, he’s the only one who doesn’t seem to want anything from me.

I take the bottle of water and tentatively bring it to my lips, hoping to God my guess about Nash isn’t wrong. After swallowing hard, I’m desperate for water, so I tip the bottle back and take a big gulp. It tastes like water should, although I would have said the same thing about those cakes and the lemonade.

Before long, I’ve finished the entire bottle, but I’m still parched. Nash grabs another bottle of water and hands it to me without saying a word.

He waits until I drink that one and set the empty bottle on the bed next to me before asking, “Who are you here to find?”

After a night of waking up terrified, being drugged into a zombie, and then rescued and brought here, that’s a hell of a question to start with. Nash waits for me to answer, but I’ve got a few of my own questions I want answered first.

“I’ll be happy to tell you if you explain to me what the hell is going on here. Why is anyone drugging us? And why am I in danger? Is it from Nadine? Micah gave me the impression that he was going to make sure she didn’t bother me again.”

Nash blows the air out of his mouth until there’s not a hint of breath left in his lungs. Staring up at the ceiling, he winces before lowering his head to look at me. “The drugs are to keep you all in line.”

And with that, he sighs, like we’ve just had a long discussion and he’s exhausted.

I wait for him to continue talking, but clearly he thinks we’re done. He’s wrong. I want some answers, and I want them right now.

“Uh, I’m not sure what’s going on with you, but that generic answer isn’t going to be enough.”

Then it dawns on me. Is he worried his room is bugged like the rest of this place?

Leaning over, I get as close as I can to him without falling off the bed and whisper, “Is it that there are cameras recording here too?”

I’m stunned when he shrugs and shakes his head yet doesn’t keep talking. So we can speak freely and still he thinks that lame explanation that told me little is going to cut it?

Nope. He’s going to have to give me more.

“Okay, let me see if I’ve got this straight. You don’t have any reason not to talk freely in this room, and still you plan to only give me that one sentence as an explanation? And you think I’m going to tell you anything?”

His expression falls as I stare at him waiting for him to start talking. It’s like he’s afraid of something, but if he isn’t being watched or recorded, what’s wrong?

Finally, he says, “I don’t know exactly what they put in the food and drink to keep control over all of you. No one has ever told me that. I just know they do it. Better?”

I can’t help but roll my eyes. I guess three sentences is better than one, but he still isn’t telling me much.

“A little. I don’t really need to know the exact drug, to be honest. I am curious about if everyone’s getting drugged, then why aren’t you ever dopey?”

He smiles and shakes his head. “They don’t drug the men. Only the women. Guards need to be able to take care of any problem that comes up, so having their reaction time dulled wouldn’t work.”

Makes sense. You don’t want your thugs to be slow on the draw. Someone might get mouthy and actually do some free thinking here.

“Must be nice. Okay, that explains the drugging. Who screamed? And don’t tell me nobody screamed. It woke me and everyone else out of a sound sleep.”

Nash shakes his head. “I don’t know.”

Something tells me he does know. Why won’t he say who the woman was?

“Is she okay now? At least let me know that.”

He says nothing, but in his eyes I can see the truth. He knows what happened to that woman. Maybe that’s the reason he brought me here. I’d love to think he was watching out for me, but I can’t know for sure.

“Well, if you can’t tell me that, then can you explain why the hell I’m in danger? Micah made me think he didn’t approve of what Nadine did. Was he lying?”

Tilting his head left and right, Nash groans. “Lying isn’t exactly what I’d call it. Micah believes. One hundred percent. All in. Toward that end, he just wants to make sure everyone gets what he thinks they deserve, but sometimes that means Nadine and her guards have to get involved.”

I level my gaze on his face in frustration. “You certainly have mastered the art of using a lot of words to say nothing.”

He exhales and says, “I don’t know if he lied. He can be unhappy with what Nadine does and still allow it.”

“So why am I in danger? I thought I convinced him I was a believer.”

That gets me a laugh. “Not exactly. I don’t know how much danger you’re in, but you’re definitely on his radar. He assigned me to watch you. That’s not a good thing.”

“Why? What did I do? All I did was say I wanted to grieve a girl’s death. What the hell is wrong with the people here that a girl can die and feeling bad about it is a damn problem?”

The expression on Nash’s face morphs into a look of confusion, and I know I’m wasting my time. Whether it’s because he’s a man or because he’s been a part of The Golden Light for too long, my sadness over Anna’s death doesn’t seem to register in his brain.

“Whatever. So I’m in danger. Great. All of this because I wanted to find Rina,” I say in defeat, sitting back on the pillow.

Suddenly, Nash seems interested in talking. Sitting forward, he asks, “Who’s Rina?”

Tired of playing this game with him, I close my eyes and sigh. “My sister. I found something in her apartment that made me think she was involved in your group here, so I went looking for her. Those two hippie chicks who smelled like weed approached me in Wilmington, and I asked them if they’d seen her. One of them thought she did, so I came here looking for her.”

“I don’t know any Rina,” he says, shaking his head slowly. “She might be at one of the other locations, though.”

That makes me sit bolt upright in the bed and stare at him in shock. “Other locations? Where? How many? Those two girls made it seem like this is the only place associated with The Golden Light.”

He stands up and pulls back the room darkening curtains to look out the window like he’s worried someone might be joining us soon. “No, there are a lot of places where people in The Golden Light can be sent. Anywhere Micah needs them to be to support the group.”

“Like where? Are there other farms like this? Because I could have sworn there was one right outside of the town where I live. I was there the other day because another girl in town working at The Golden Light office said my sister might be out there.”

Snapping the curtains closed, he spins around and stares at me with wildness in his eyes. “What farm? Were you in a blue Mazda?”

Now it’s my turn to stare at him. How could he know that about me?

“Yeah. How did you know?”

Before he answers, I figure it out. How could I have not picked up on his voice? “You were one of those guys out there, weren’t you? The other one was a real bastard. Is he one of Nadine’s men?”

Real fear fills his expression, and he sits down on the bed next to me. I see in his eyes he’s terrified, but of what?

“Listen to me, Lara. Don’t tell another soul what you just told me. You won’t live to get the hell away from here if you do.”

“Why? That guy is one of Nadine’s goons, isn’t he? It fits. He sounded like he wanted to kill someone. That dude needs anger management stat.”

“He did kill someone out there at that farm. Trust me, you don’t want to let anyone know what you saw there.”

“I didn’t see anything. I heard a little bit of your conversation while I was hiding in the downstairs closet. That guy’s a psycho.”

Nash nods, but it’s like he’s not even listening to me anymore. “Yeah, and he’s one of Micah’s men, not Nadine’s.”

I wait for him to say something else, but he seems lost in thought, so I shake his arm to get his attention back on the immediate problem of me getting the hell out of this place and hopefully finding my sister. “Hey, they took my phone when I arrived here. Can you get it for me?”

He turns to look at me, wincing as if he’s in pain. “Maybe. I don’t know. You can’t call anyone. The only place on the entire farm where you can hope to get a signal is in Micah’s cabin.”

“What about messages? Can I get them anywhere here other than his rooms?” I ask, thinking that if I can get a message to Mario that I might be able to get help for me and anyone else who wants to leave here.

“Sometimes. The internet is spotty at best here.”

“Nash, I need my phone.”

What I really need is to get the hell away from this place, but I get the sense that asking him to help me with that would be a waste of breath. Nash may not be as bad as the other people here, but he’s no angel. Why he’s helping me I have no idea, but I don’t want to stick around to find out.

“Okay, okay. Let me see what I can do. In the meantime, I need to get you back to your cabin and back in your bed.”

Pure terror rushes through me. He wants to do what?

“No way! I can’t go back there. Just get my phone, and I’ll figure out a way to sneak out of here tonight.”

He stands up and begins pacing back and forth from the bed to the door. It’s a small space, so his long legs barely get three strides before he turns around and comes back toward me.

“You won’t get away tonight. This farm is miles away from another house, and there are armed guards stationed at posts around the perimeter. They don’t bother to ask who goes there before they shoot.”

“Isn’t anyone worried about people dying out here? Someone is going to start asking questions at some point. Or aren’t they thinking about that?”

Nash stops in front of me and shakes his head. “Trust me. They’re worried about people dying, but that kind of death they could explain as a trespasser on private property. No, let me try to get your phone after I take you back to your cabin. If I can grab it, I’ll find a way to give it to you tomorrow.”

“But I’m in danger if I go back there. At the very least, they’re going to try to drug me again if I stay. And exactly how do you plan on explaining where I was for the past hour. Someone’s bound to have seen you bringing me back here.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got that covered. At least I think I do. You just need to get back to where you belong. What’s your phone look like?”

I describe my phone and the black and pink case it’s in as I silently pray he means he’s really going to try to find it. I need to trust him, but I’m still not sure about Nash. I can’t figure out why he’s helping me or if this is some ploy by Micah to trick me.

“Okay, let’s go.” Crouching down, he wraps his arms around my legs, so I jump away, shaking my head.

“I have to carry you back.”

“Why?”

“Because I do. Stop asking so many questions. I’m trying to help you here.”

He again moves to sweep me up in his arms, and this time I don’t react. Lifting me like I’m as light as a feather, he begins walking with me toward the door.

“Say nothing if anyone approaches us. Close your eyes if I tell you to.”

I don’t say anything to that because all I want to do is ask why. He knows these people better than I do, so I figure I should follow his lead, at least in this.

We head outside into the balmy night air, and I can’t help but notice how dark this place is at night. Micah’s cabin is lit up, but other than that, every other building is pitch black. I have no idea what time it is, and when I search the skies for any clue, all I see are stars.

Halfway across the compound, he tenses up against me, and I have to bite my tongue to stop myself from asking what’s wrong. I find out soon enough when I hear someone walk across the dirt, and before he orders me to close my eyes, I squeeze them shut.

“Pretend to be asleep,” he whispers, barely audibly.

“Who’s there?” a low voice gruffly asks.

“Nash.”

The man walks over to us, shuffling his feet across the ground so I imagine he’s leaving a trail of dust behind him. My eyes closed, I sense a light being shined on my face and try hard to remain still and not react.

“What’s up with this?” he asks with a chuckle. “Enjoying a little something on the side, Nash?”

I feel his chest expand against my body when Nash hums what sounds like disapproval at the man’s suggestion he’s been up to something with me. “You know that’s not allowed. Micah ordered me to keep an eye on this one. I found her stumbling around looking for the bathroom.”

That makes the man laugh out loud. Why, I have no idea, but maybe he thinks it’s amusing for someone to not know where to go in the dark. Sounds pretty twisted to me.

“Better get her back. The guards will be doing the midnight search at any minute. You don’t want to get yourself shot over little Miss Pisspants here.”

His snide crack makes me wish I could sit up and slap his face. Nash merely hums again and starts walking once more.

After a few steps, he whispers, “You did well there. Nice to know you can listen when you want to.”

When I don’t respond, he chuckles. “Good girl.”

That’s too much to bear, so I whisper, “Don’t push your luck.”

I feel him walk up stairs and open my eyes to see him open the door to my cabin. Nobody wakes when we enter, and a few seconds later, he sets me down on my bed. I don’t expect him to say anything more since we have no idea who may be listening, but in a gesture that makes me think I might be able to trust him, he cups my cheek, letting his palm rest against my face for a few moments before walking away.

The sound of the door closing makes me stiffen in fear that someone has heard him return me, but as the seconds tick by and no one says a word, I begin to relax. Closing my eyes, I hope he can find my phone and not get caught.

Nash is my only chance to get away from this place, but if Micah or Nadine thinks he’s helping me, neither one of us may be safe.