Page 105 of Their Little Ghost

“Help me!” I plead, thrashing against their firm grip. “He’s a monster!”

“This is for your own good,” Mom says.

I turn just in time to see a nurse on my left. She jams a needle into my neck, and my limbs go slack. I attempt to resist the sedative coursing through my veins, but it’s too strong, and I’m sucked into a black vortex of nothingness…

CHAPTER

THIRTY-ONE

ERIN

“Little Ghost,”Aiden’s purr cuts through the hazy abyss. “Oh, Little Ghost…”

A drowsy heaviness drags me down, tempting me to succumb to a blissful sleep, but his voice beckons me back.

“It’s time to get up.”

“Go away,” I groan. “I want to sleep.”

“Wake up,” he orders, pinching my cheeks. “Now.”

I ignore him, sinking deeper into the murky waters of my subconsciousness, until he prises my eyelids open.

“Ouch!” I wail, squinting up at his masked face poised behind a flashlight.

“Follow me,” he says.

I scramble to my knees from my fetal position on the floor and quickly assess my surroundings. I’m in a different cell. No bed or blankets, more locks on the door, and white padded walls.

My heart thunders. “Where am I?”

“Solitary confinement,” Aiden replies, then heaves me up. “Move it. We don’t have much time.”

“Time for what?” I ask.

“You’ll see,” he says cryptically. “Put it on.”

He hands me a soft, black balaclava. I stare at it blankly, turning the ribbed fabric in my hands until he scowls and snatches it back. He shoves it over my head. It’s tight, and the fabric sucks into my mouth with every breath.

My cell door creaks open.

“Hello, Little Ghost,” Lex says from the doorway. A black-and-white checkered bandana covers the lower half of his face, and an unmoving orderly lays at his feet.

“Is he dead?” I ask.

“No,” Lex says. “Unless you want him to be?”

“We have no time for games, Lex,” Aiden snaps, shoving past him and dragging me out of the room.

I step over the orderly’s body, and a noise from above draws my attention.

“Psst!”

A ceiling tile has been shifted to the left, revealing a gap where Eli crouches, waiting with outstretched arms.

“What—”

Before I finish my sentence, Aiden wraps his hands around my waist and hoists me into the air.