Page 57

CHAPTER

FORTY-ONE

AIDEN

At daybreak, an orderly throws Eli into our shared cell by the scruff of his neck. He staggers in, swaying on his feet, in a haze. His skin is sallow with a yellow hue, and he’s fighting to keep his eyes open. He’s lucid. Just about.

I spring up just in time to catch him as he slumps forward. Lex grabs his other arm, and we drag him to the bottom bunk before he sags to his knees.

Eli’s entire body shakes uncontrollably like he’s crying, but no tears fall from his bloodshot eyes.

What the fuck did Acacia do this time?

“Eli?” I kneel before him and give him a hard shake. “Can you hear me?”

No response.

“Move,” Lex says. “Let me.”

He rolls up his sleeves, then slaps Eli hard.

Eli’s face lolls to the side, staring vacantly ahead, looking right through us.

“Again,” I demand.

Lex keeps hitting him until Eli’s cheek is blazing red. Eli still doesn’t respond. He’s here in body, but his mind is elsewhere.

“Come on, Eli,” Lex growls, hitting him again, hard enough to bust his lip. “Snap out of it!”

Blood drips down Eli’s chin, coating his light stubble.

His head snaps up, finally seeing us, and I sigh in relief.

Thank fuck. He’s back. I’ve seen too many people reduced to brainless zombies at Acacia’s hands.

We can’t lose Eli. Not now that we’re so close.

After last night, I can almost taste freedom.

“Eli?” I say. “What happened?”

“Sarah,” Eli rasps. “She’s…”

“We were with her last night,” I say. “She’s okay.”

Her perfume still lingers on my skin, and I haven’t washed her sweet juices from my cock. If I try hard enough, I can even imagine exactly how she felt, how her toned thighs clamped around my head as she gushed over my tongue.

“Acacia found out she snuck out,” Eli mumbles. “He took me with him. He… made… me…”

He lies back and curls into a ball, drawing his trembling knees up to his chest.

“It was Erin!” Lex, hotheaded as usual, jumps straight to conclusions. “It had to be! Sarah always says Erin tells her father everything. She set her up. She must have called her to lure her home.”

“We don’t know that,” I say calmly. “What did he make you do, Eli?”

“Acacia fucked with my head,” he confesses, tears rolling down his face. “He’s been testing a new drug on me.”

“What does it do?” I ask.

His expression darkens. “It’s some kind of super drug that makes you do whatever he says.

First, he gave me an implant.” Eli brushes his wavy hair from his neck and pulls his skin taut to reveal a strange rectangular object lodged underneath the surface.

“After that, all he has to do is press a button to dose me.”

“Shit, man,” Lex groans. “That’s some seriously screwed-up shit.”

“I d-didn’t mean to…” Eli stammers. “I had no choice… I…”

“Just get to the fucking point,” Lex snaps, his patience waning. “Spit it out. What did you do?”

I glare at Lex and soften my voice. “It’s okay, Eli. You’re safe now. You can tell us what happened.”

“She’s dead. Sarah’s dead,” Eli whispers. “I didn’t want to… he made me…” He sobs into the pillow. “I killed her.”

“Call her,” I order Lex. “Right now.”

He’s already dialing.

“Well?” I demand.

Lex shakes his head. “She’s not answering.”

It’s perfectly plausible Eli’s mistaken. He’s not in his right mind. Right now, he’s acting more insane than Bea, and she eats razor blades for fun.

“Her body’s in the morgue,” Eli whimpers. “I’m a killer… I’m a killer…” He keeps repeating it. “I’m a killer.” He hits his forehead. “A killer. A killer.” He keeps going like a broken record while hurting himself. “A killer!”

I grab his wrist to stop him. “It’ll be okay,” I promise. “We’ll remove the implant.”

Lex climbs on top of our toilet to loosen the screws on the vent cover. “I’ll go to the morgue. I know the way.”

It’s not a good idea. The last time one of us snuck out solo, Acacia found Eli and took him hostage.

But I won’t stop him. Even if I order him to stay, he won’t listen.

Lex doesn’t show his emotions outwardly, but fear emanates from every pore in his body.

I can smell it. Visiting the morgue is the only way to corroborate Eli’s story. He has to go.

“Be careful,” I say.

Lex nods solemnly before scampering up the wall into the vent and disappearing.

“It’s my fault, Aiden,” Eli whimpers. “I loved her. I really fucking loved her.”

“I know,” I say, stroking his hair while sliding my other hand underneath the mattress.

I fumble around to find a shard of plastic that I’ve fashioned into a blade from a broken lunch tray. I always keep one stashed for special occasions and emergencies. This is one of those times.

“A killer,” Eli mumbles. “I’m a killer.”

I pull out the pillow from underneath his head.

“Bite down on this,” I instruct. “I’m getting that chip out of your neck.”

“Okay,” he says, looking up at me wide-eyed, with no hesitation.

Cutting his implant out without hitting an artery is going to be a challenge, but it’s better than leaving it in there. I won’t let him be used again. He’s better off dead than becoming Acacia’s puppet.

Eli winces when I make the initial cut.

“Don’t move,” I urge. “Stay really fucking still, okay?”

He freezes as I carefully pull back a flap of his skin. Blood spews down his neck, covering my hands. Judging by the volume, I’ve not hit anything important. I scrunch up my nose in concentration and take a deep breath before poking my finger into the hole and grappling for the alien object.

“There,” I declare, finally getting a grip on the metal tube. I yank it out in a flourish, like I’m ripping off a Band-Aid, and hurl it across the cell. “It’s gone.”

Eli cups his neck, nodding dazedly. He holds a blanket against his wound to stem the bleeding. He’s suffered worse injuries than this.

“Lie down,” I say, climbing into bed with him, the same way I did when we were kids.

I wrap my arms around him. He sobs into me, more hysterically this time, and I stroke his back. His tears soak through my shirt, mixing with his blood.

“What’re we gonna do next?” Eli says between sniffles.

As much as I want to tear out Acacia’s throat for what he’s done, I hold in my fury, locking it away in the little box in the back of my brain where I hold all my repressed feelings.

They exist as demons, lurking in the shadows of my subconscious, but I can’t face them.

Not yet. The others are depending on me to get them out of here.

“We’ll get revenge,” I say. “Acacia will pay for this and everything else he’s done. We’ll expose him as a monster, and we’ll get his beloved daughter to help us. We’ll turn Erin against him. She will be his undoing, and we won’t stop until we get what we want.”