Page 40

CHAPTER

TWENTY-SEVEN

ERIN

After my earlier encounter with Charlie, I avoid the cafeteria at lunch, but I can’t ignore my grumbling stomach when the siren yells again. I wait until the initial bustle subsides, hoping to slip in unnoticed while everyone’s eating.

My hopes are quickly dashed. As soon as I walk in, everyone turns to stare. At Stonybridge, I blended into the background, until Nate paid me attention. Here, I stick out.

I join the back of the food line, keeping my head down.

At first glance, it looks like any other school cafeteria.

However, on closer inspection, I notice that the tables and chairs are stuck to the floor, and everyone eats with silicone cutlery.

Patients can’t be trusted to eat unsupervised, so security staff watch from every corner of the room, and a nurse doles out pills with food trays.

I spot Charlie. Her eyes narrow in my direction as she jabs a piece of pasta with her fork, probably pretending it’s my face.

“Here.” The nurse thrusts a small cup of pills into my hands and watches me wash them down before I continue. “Good.”

“Next,” an angry woman in a grubby apron snaps impatiently.

Unlike Stonybridge, which offers fresh food that caters to every dietary requirement and preference, the woman doesn’t ask what I want to eat. There’s no choice. She spoons a glob of rice onto my tray alongside a dollop of chili that smells like dog food.

A guy with red hair and a broken-looking nose swipes his fingers across his throat and mimes ‘You’re dead’ to me across the room.

I gulp and try not to take it personally.

He must do that to everyone, right? I continue hunting for an empty table, or at least somewhere to sit where people don’t look like they want to kill me, but my options are limited.

On one table, a group of patients talk to themselves and yell at imaginary figures.

At another, an argument breaks out. A guy throws his tray and gets dragged off screaming by two white-coated men.

Next to them, a group of greasy-haired patients stare blankly ahead.

They chew with their mouths open and drool drips down their chins, too high on a cocktail of drugs to be aware of their surroundings or even know their own names.

At the next table, I recognize Bea. She sits among a group of guys with buzz cuts, who are busy comparing cuts on their arms. Everyone else in the room avoids looking at me, hoping that I don’t pick them to sit with.

Dad portrays Sunnycrest as a positive place that offers rehabilitation and a fresh start, but it’s a living hell.

My searching gaze stops on a guy at the back of the room.

The same guy who mistook me for Sarah earlier.

He tries to hide behind the broad shoulders of another patient, but it’s too late.

I weave through the tables toward him when, suddenly, a foot knocks my legs from underneath me.

I have no time to react. I topple over, landing straight on my sore knees and spray chili all over my front.

Laughter rings in my ears.

I look up to see Charlie, one hand propped on her hip in a sassy pose.

“You should be more careful,” she says, grinning smugly.

Even in asylums, you can’t get away from cliquey, mean girls.

I drop my tray with a clang and stand, wiping sauce off my chin.

My cheeks are ablaze, but to my surprise, not from embarrassment.

There it is again. The simmering rage. My nostrils flare in fury.

The violence and suddenness of the emotion surprises me, and I squeeze my nails into my palms to stop myself from wiping the smirk off her face. This place is getting to me.

Charlie backs away a little, her confidence waning as she senses a change in me. Something flickers behind her eyes. Fear, perhaps?

“Is there a problem?” A nurse appears. “We can get you another tray, Miss Acacia.”

Anyone who didn’t already know my identity does now, officially making me a social pariah and a potential target.

How many patients have been subjected to my father’s cruel experiments and seek revenge?

“There’s no problem,” I say through gritted teeth. “Is there, Charlie?”

She glares back and shakes her head. I wonder why she’s in Sunnycrest.

The woman beckons me away. “Come along.”

I stay where I am.

“I want to speak to my father,” I demand.

“Your father has given explicit instructions that you are to complete your treatment before you have visitors,” she replies.

“He’s not a visitor,” I hiss. “He runs this fucking place!”

I’m acting entitled, but I don’t care. This has gone on for long enough. I don’t belong here with these people. I need to go home.

Her face pales and she stammers. “I’m only following orders.”

“Relay my message,” I say coldly. “And I’m going to eat in my room.”

“We don’t let?—”

I shoot her a sharp ‘don’t mess with me’ look. “I’m Doctor Acacia’s daughter,” I say. If everyone already knows who I am, there’s no point in hiding it. “I’m sure you can make an exception this once. I expect a fresh tray waiting in my room after I shower.”

The nurse’s jaw drops, and I don’t wait for her permission before stomping out.

“Bitch,” Charlie mutters under her breath.

I rise above it… this time.

The same moody woman from this morning is monitoring the bathroom.

“Back again?” She looks down her nose at me. “You can only shower in the mornings.”

I narrow my eyes. “I’m showering now, unless you want to look for another job.”

She blinks hard, surprised by my transformation.

I hold out my hand. “Towel.”

She mumbles something I can’t make out, but hands me a towel, anyway.

“I want shampoo this time,” I say. “And clean clothes.”

She looks like she wants to tell me to stick the shampoo where the sun doesn’t shine.

“I told you this morning?—”

“I know you were lying,” I snarl, not backing down again.

She scowls and reluctantly hands me a clean uniform and a bottle from under the desk. The shampoo isn’t a luxury brand, but anything beats the smell of three-day stewed kidney beans. When I get home, I’ll never take Mom’s fancy toiletries from the spa for granted again.

As before, the water pressure is terrible, but I successfully wash the funk out of my hair and don’t make the mistake of hanging anything over the side of the door.

Suddenly, a deafening siren blares through the facility.

I put my hands to my ears, cringing as the sound vibrates my bones.

A flurry of activity in the hall follows the noise.

I peer around the door and watch two doctors race past, shouting over the alarm.

I hear the words ‘understaffed’ and ‘suicide’.

A security guard stops by the bathroom, requesting help from the towel bitch, who points in my direction, torn about leaving her post.

“I’m about to head to my room,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I’m sure I can make it a few steps without you watching me.”

She can’t hear me properly from her position, but seems to get the gist of what I’m saying. She hesitates for a second before following the guard.

A few minutes later, after drying and redressing, I hum as I step out of the cubicle, feeling victorious. As I do, the stall door on my left opens. Suddenly, freckled arms wrap around my neck and yank me inside it.

The redheaded asshole who threatened me earlier slams the door behind us, shutting us in the shower cubicle.

A maniacal grin spreads over his sharp features as he brandishes a shiv.

His blade is made from a jagged red plastic, likely from a broken lunch tray, and has been attached to a pencil with sticky tape.

“Your father has taken everything from me,” he spits. “It’s time I take something back. If you move, I’ll make sure you’ll bleed out.”

I try to push him away, but he’s deceptively strong. He swipes the plastic across the side of my throat. A warm trickle drips down my neck.

“Help!” I shout. “Someone help!”

No one will hear me over the noise, but it’s better than doing nothing.

“Don’t struggle,” he hisses. His rancid breath fanning my face makes me want to hurl. “It’ll only hurt more.”

“Please,” I beg. “You don’t have to do this.”

I raise my knee up to smash into his balls, but a slash of the blade against my neck makes me yelp.

“I said, don’t fucking move,” he warns. “I didn’t plan on killing you, but I will, if you fight back.”

He yanks my trackpants down, exposing my panties.

“Please, no,” I whimper.

“No one will hear you scream,” he says. “The doctors will be busy for a while. We’ve made sure of that.”

I don’t question who helped him. I’m sure Charlie will be behind this.

Tears spring to my eyes as his grimy, chewed fingernails paw my hips.

Separate your mind from your body, Erin.

Suddenly, the door flies open, and someone wrenches him out. The force causes me to lose my balance and land flat on my ass, leaving me face-to-face with a pair of biker boots.

A masked figure casts a shadow over my trembling attacker, whose face drains of color.

“Naughty, naughty,” Lex growls menacingly from under a Ghostface mask, “you touched our property.”

The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, as Lex wiggles his finger back and forth.

The boy cowers, his entire frame consumed by violent shakes. He knows he’s in deep shit.

“I…I … I didn’t know she was yours, Lex,” he stammers. “I did what I was told. She’s Acacia’s daughter. After everything he’s done, I thought?—”

“You thought wrong,” Lex replies. “If anyone touches a single hair on Miss Acacia’s head, they answer to us. Do you understand?”

“Yes.” He nods so vigorously that it looks like his head will snap straight off his neck. “I’ll make sure everyone knows. I’ll tell them.”

“They’ll find out for themselves,” Lex says. “After you pay for what you did.” Lex pulls off his mask and throws it at me, flashing me a hot lopsided grin that makes my stomach flutter. “Go to your room, Little Ghost.”

I grab his mask and stagger to my feet, pulling my pants back up.