Chapter 4
742 Words
When I came around again in the hospital, Jenna, Richard, and Gloria were all there.
Jenna had the butler bring in a box of food. "Heard you had another fall. Eat up. Get your strength back."
She held a piece of meat toward my mouth. I turned my head away without thinking.
Biscuit was nowhere in sight.
Jenna didn't seem bothered. She held up a small stuffed dog toy.
"Looking for this?" She nudged the food box closer. "She's right here."
My blood went cold.
I looked down, and I could feel it without looking up: that watching, amused stare from above. She was waiting to see whether she'd broken me.
I smiled. Tears ran down my face.
"Okay. You feed me."
Satisfaction flickered behind her eyes. She picked up a piece of meat and brought it to my lips.
Richard and Gloria smiled too.
I leaned forward, opened my mouth, and bit down on her face as hard as I could.
The taste of blood flooded my mouth instantly.
"She's insane! She's completely insane!"
A man's shout and a woman's scream filled the room. My mouth was full of iron and salt, and I felt, for just a moment, completely free.
Where are you? I can't hold on much longer.
They sedated me again. I fell back against the bed.
The psychiatric transport van arrived, siren wailing.
Jenna screamed at me to die.
The television reported that the Sullivan Corporation's reward for finding their heiress had climbed to five million dollars.
I couldn't hear any of it anymore.
When I woke again, I was still in a hospital bed. But I sensed it immediately: a cold, watchful presence somewhere in the room.
Run. I have to run.
On instinct, I bit down on the tip of my tongue to keep myself sharp, and I dragged myself toward the door on a broken leg.
I had nearly made it out through the first-floor window when a dark shape appeared behind the curtain around the bed. An arm rose, something glinting in its hand, and drove downward.
The pillow split open.
He realized I was already gone.
I pressed my hand over my mouth and pressed myself into the shadows along the building's edge, moving inch by inch.
The breathing behind me grew louder. Several times I came within a breath of being found.
By the time I'd dragged myself close to the hospital's front entrance, footsteps sounded at my back.
I flattened myself against the ground, my heart jammed in my throat.
The footsteps stopped.
A hand came down on my shoulder.
I turned my head slowly. That single second stretched out like a year.
A familiar face looked back at me.
Vic. Ethan's butler.
I was going to be okay.
"Miss! I've finally found you!" Vic pulled me upright with barely concealed relief and draped a towel around my shoulders. He half-carried me to a black car waiting nearby.
I saw the golden iris emblem on the door and felt something loosen in my chest.
"Take me home."
Vic nodded, and the car pulled away.
I watched the street outside blur and recede, my eyelids growing heavier. But sleep wouldn't come, and I didn't know why.
I kept staring out the window, and after a long moment, something settled into focus.
The direction we were heading was not the way to my brothers' home.
My heart seized.
I noticed Vic's phone light up where it rested near the steering wheel. The message was from a contact saved as Miss Laine.
Jenna. Vic had been bought.
The thought hit, and I moved without thinking, pressing the rear door's manual lock. Then I held my breath, and as the car crossed an overpass, I threw the door open and rolled out.
The broken bone in my left leg sent a scream of pain through my entire body. I bit into my sleeve and made no sound, crawling into the dark as fast as I could manage.
Then a beam of light found me and held.
The sky filled with noise. Helicopters hung in the air above. Luxury cars lined up end to end along the road, a wall of steel closing in around me from every direction. Doors opened, all at once, and people stepped out.
They parted without a word, clearing a path.
Several figures broke into a run from the far end of the road, coming straight toward me.
"Our girl!"
- Writer
