Page 31

I took longer than usual to come around – or I thought it did, but I had no real way to tell. My head was fuzzy, and my left eye remained swollen shut, no matter how I tried to force it open. How the hell I’d ended up here – wherever here might be – was still a mystery, but my head pounded and my body ached with every movement, so I seemed to have put up a fight, at least. I tried letting the memories surface, but there were only flashes.

With only half of my vision intact, I tried shifting my position to get a better idea of where I was. Each movement sent little shocks of pain where what felt like zip ties cut into my wrists. My bare arms scraped against the wall behind me as I tested my bonds. A metal pipe dug sharply into my spine, the cold seeping through my thin vest.

Beneath me, my legs were dead and useless, pins and needles crackling through them when I tried to move. The rope around my ankles bit into flesh already rubbed raw. But they’d strapped me up so tightly, I stayed upright despite my body’s protests.

From what I could see in the semi-dark, there were cabinets and a sink unit across from me – it looked like an old, pre-war kitchen, shiny vinyl doors and all. The pipe I was tied to connected to a series of others, snaking along the wall to old-fashioned radiators – part of a central heating system. Which meant cast iron. And not a damn chance of breaking free.

A deep breath calmed my racing heart. There it was again – the hint of petrol in the air. Shit.

I ran a quick mental inventory, testing what still worked while I was still conscious. My shoulder – the one that was already injured – was either dislocated or fractured. Not good, but a familiar enough injury that I might be able to fix it if I could get loose. It wasn’t just my eye that was swollen either – the whole left side of my face felt tight and stiff, and I’d bitten my tongue at some point. Swallowing hurt. But there was no blood that I could see, and my skin seemed intact everywhere else.

All in all, not great, but not the worst state I could have been in. Though after all my big talk about being able to take care of myself, it seemed like I’d been taken from my bed. My own fucking house . The thought stung almost as much as my injuries.

I pushed down the anger – lashing out wasn’t going to get me anywhere. I was alone, that was something. The petrol scent lingered in the chilly air, but it didn’t seem to be getting any stronger. Which meant I might have a few minutes to think and hopefully plan a daring and spectacular escape – if only I had any clue where I was escaping from. Or where I was. Or even how long I’d been here .

Sifting through the flashes I could recall, a couple of things stood out. I’d been in my bed, with Nicholas sleeping beside me. I’d watched him for a while, and I vaguely recalled he’d got up to leave before the sunrise. I shivered, and allowed myself a moment of refuge in the memory of his lips brushing mine as he kissed me goodbye. I clung to the feeling, to the certainty that he would realise I was missing. That he would come for me.

After that though, things got blurry. I’d slept again. And then I was in the street. It had been bone-achingly cold, I remembered that much. And snowing again. How had I ended up outside? I squeezed my eyes closed, sifting through the images for some cohesion. Petrol. Something held over my mouth. Someone grabbed me, and I fought back – that was when I’d got the kick to the face. Then falling… through my bedroom window.

The memories slipped away with each throb of my temples, nausea building in my stomach. At least we’d been right about being drugged before my car went over the bridge – this felt almost exactly the same, minus the blinding sun and with the addition of a fucked-up shoulder.

That same petroleum smell was getting stronger, but I couldn’t pinpoint where it was coming from in the long room. The fumes made my nose burn, and my senses dull. I scanned the kitchen again, looking for anything useful.

It had been stripped bare. Its walls might have been yellow once, but they were grey with decades of grime now. Someone had boarded up the single narrow window with fresh planks, and stuffed fabric in the gaps – to block out the light, I assumed. Still, that meant of the two people who might have brought me here, at least one of them wasn’t a fan of the sun. And that was knowledge I could use.

I tried to focus my hearing, and cast my senses out beyond the kitchen, but everything felt wrong. My left ear was ringing like hell, but beyond that, all I caught was the creaking of the old walls as the temperature continued to drop outside. It really didn’t feel like anyone else was here, but something niggled at me. If I shut down everything else, there was something. Maybe.

Most of the cabinets in the opposite corner were missing their doors. The largest – a larder – drew my attention. A hoarse rattling came from within, barely audible. It took me a full minute to place the sound for what it was – someone else breathing.

“Hello?” I tried to make my voice carry, but it was an inaudible rasp. A floorboard groaned in the next room. Someone spoke from behind me, and I strained to see a silhouette in a doorway I hadn’t noticed.

“You’re awake.” A shadow fell across the floor in front of me, blocking out what little light I’d had to see by. I shuddered involuntarily, goosebumps prickling across my flesh. The voice was female. What had Adam said? Mary. émilie. Hélène. Sylvia.

“Who are you?” I managed to croak.

“What is it with everyone asking about me today?” Her voice was high and brittle, nothing like Isabel’s measured tone. She knelt, and I finally saw the face of the woman who’d been tormenting us for so many weeks.

At first glance, the resemblance was uncanny – she shared Isabel’s dark eyes, full mouth, angular face… But her dyed hair was lighter at the roots. Her eyes were sunken deep in her hollowed face, lashes and brows too pale to match Isabel’s colouring. A little contouring, some pouty lipstick. In the end, she was a cheap imitation trying too hard to be Izzie Misery.

“Everyone?” I repeated.

“Yes. Thomas asked so many questions.” As she stood, the awkwardness of her movements became apparent. Her left arm was clasped tightly to her chest, and as she turned, I saw her hand was missing below the wrist. Fresh blood darkened the dirty grey of her shirt – a recent injury then, though her healing abilities had already worked on the rough stump, raw pink skin closing the wound over.

I considered her words. She was trying to goad me, that was clear, but I was still concerned. Tom had walked out alone into the night. He should have been safe by now, but I’d told him to go… This might be my one chance to get information from her.

“What did he ask?”

“Oh, you know. Boring stuff. He was quite irate about Margaret,” she whispered, conspiratorially.

“You killed her.” I glared down at the dusty concrete, my shoulder throbbing in time with my pulse. The disgust in my gut was almost enough to override the pain.

“For the plan, yes! She looked a little like you – well before we emptied her out.” Her whisper turned gleeful. “You humans, you all look the same anyway. Especially when you’re dead.” She paused for effect. “I suppose that’s how you’ll look, too. If I let you get that far. ”

Her laugh filled the room, jarring and discordant. Every gesture felt rehearsed, like she was playing a role she hadn’t quite mastered.

“What happened to your hand?” I asked, my tone carefully neutral. “New injury, right?”

Her face twisted, a low sound catching in her throat. “That’s irrelevant.”

I forced a laugh, knowing it would get under her skin. “Come on, who did it? I’ll send flowers.”

She was in my face before I could blink, her breath like ice against my skin. The zip ties bit deeper as I instinctively tried to pull away, my shoulder screaming in protest.

“He’ll pay for it. You’ll see to that, or Murray will.” Her lips curled back from her teeth in a parody of a smile.

“Who? Who’ll pay?” I asked, glancing toward the cupboard in the corner.

“Weren’t you listening?” The words spilled out with malicious delight. “I’ve got your friends – Tommy and your precious Murray. They came running to save you like good little boys. As if they stood a chance.”

She dropped to a whisper. “When you think about it, we’re being generous. You get to choose between your friend… and your lover.”

My pulse sped up despite myself, fire flooding my veins. I tried to slow my breathing – I couldn’t afford for her to hear it. Though I had no way to know if she was lying, it made sense that my friends would try to find me… but Nicholas was almost four hundred years old – how the hell could they have ov erpowered him?

“I don’t believe you,” I lied, forcing the words out and trying again to pull my body into a more comfortable position, where I could regain the feeling in my legs. “It’s not possible. Nicholas is too strong.”

She prowled closer, circling the edges of the room, all hint of playfulness gone.

“Why would I lie? Clever little hunter girl, you must be able to sense that much?” Her voice dropped low as she assessed me, disdain twisting her features. She still clutched her arm near the stump. “Not that you’re up to much else right now.”

She was right. I couldn’t get out of my bonds, let alone fight her – but I also had no way of knowing which of them was in here with me. I could barely sense Nicholas in that way, especially not now, when my head was pounding.

“How do I know who’s in there?” I jerked my head towards the cabinet.

“Tommy and I are spending some quality time together.” Her words had a singsong lilt that made my skin crawl. “But I thought you might like to say your goodbyes to Lover Boy… since you finally let him have you.”

She swayed toward the cupboard, her movements precise. The door creaked open, and sparse light from the other room fell across his face. The figure was hunched awkwardly in the small space, features obscured by shadow. My eye throbbed, making it harder to focus in the dim light. I kept my face carefully blank.

“What do you want from us?” I asked. “Why are you doing this? ”

“Murray is supposed to die, that’s what we were told. And I want Isabel, so I can have the set, you know?” She counted the names out on her remaining fingers, eyes bright with an unsettling excitement. “I wouldn’t mind Tommy as well, but that one’s out of my hands.” She scowled and corrected herself. “Hand.”

“Supposed to die?” I frowned. “I don’t understand. Why? Who wants him dead?”

“It doesn’t matter if you understand.” She waved her stump dismissively. “This is bigger than you, little girl. And you have important decisions to agonise over, remember? Kill Nicholas, or I kill Tommy.” Her teeth flashed white in the dim light. “Who is it you can’t live without, Erin?”

“No,” I murmured. “No.” I wouldn’t choose.

“If you won’t, maybe I’ll let Tommy kill Murray instead – to save you, of course. He hates him, doesn’t he?” Her eyes narrowed. She was right – she wouldn’t have to give Tom much of a push.

“You won’t do that,” I argued. “You don’t have Tom.”

“Don’t you trust me?” Her voice was sharp with mockery.

“Erin…” A hoarse whisper from across the room. I jerked my head toward it like a lifeline.

“I won’t let you.” I twisted my hands behind me, trying to loosen the plastic ties. My skin, already sore from my struggling, finally broke.

She stiffened, her nostrils flaring as the scent of my blood reached her.

“We’ll see,” she spat, spinning on one foot as she left .

“Nicholas?” I called after a moment of silence.

“Just kill me.” His voice was barely there, strained with pain.

“No,” I choked. “Isabel will come. And Adam. We’re all in this together now. That was the plan, remember?”

“The sun’s coming. I can feel it. They won’t reach us in time.”

Something was wrong with his voice – the charm, the fire that made him Nicholas was missing. As he spoke, the petroleum odour grew stronger again.

“Adam will,” I insisted, almost to myself. “Adam will find us, and when it’s dark, he’ll get Isabel. We’ll get out of here.”

He didn’t reply. The chemical smell was overwhelming now, seeping through a grate behind me. My head grew heavy, thoughts turning sluggish.

“We can get out of this,” I mumbled, as consciousness slipped away.