chapter 3
1248 Words
The dress was heavier than it seemed.
Lace and silk, pearl and ivory. A fairytale costume--what a girl could have dreamed about one day. Before she was sold.
I faced the mirror, fastened the last button of my dress, my fingers still shaking from how he had looked at me.
Layer upon layer, the stuff rustled against me, as I moved, reminding me of what this dress was supposed to represent. A symbol of surrender. Of ownership. And the end of Carmela Russo.
I'd give him surrender, all right.
Just not the kind he expected.
The hallway outside was quiet.
My door guard was tall, trim, and silent as a statue; his eyes looked straight ahead. He was young, scarcely older than myself, with eyes too soft, and wore at his hip a gun which he evidently did not understand.
His name tag read *Luca.*
Poor Luca.
I'd been watching him through the crack beneath my door. He shifted his weight every twenty minutes. Checked his phone every hour. And most importantly—he looked away whenever the older guards walked past, like he was embarrassed to be there.
Weakness.
I could work with weakness.
I opened the door halfway and leaned out, voice trembling by design.
"I… I need help," I whispered. "I feel like I'm going to be sick. I can't walk down that aisle like this. I don't want him to see me this way."
The guard startled, clearly not expecting conversation. His professional mask slipped, just a little, and something almost human showed through.
"I-I'll call someone—"
"No!" I said quickly, feigning panic. "Please. I just need air. Just a minute to breathe before..."
I let my voice break on the words. Let him see the tears I'd been saving for this exact moment. Let him see a terrified girl in a wedding dress instead of a prisoner planning escape.
"Just to the balcony," I pleased. "Five minutes. Please. I'll come right back."
He looked down the empty corridor, then back at me. Whatever he saw in my face genuine terror mixed with careful manipulation made him step aside.
"Five minutes," he said quietly. "Then you go straight back to your room."
I nodded, eyes wide with gratitude.
The moment I turned the corner, I ran.
Not toward the balcony. Toward freedom.
Silent, barefoot on cold marble, my white gown trailing like a ghost. The dim passages merged together--walls of stone, sconces of gold, great shadows. The grand staircase was too bare and I crept up the little stairway holding my skirts so as not to fall.
My dress was a trap and disguise: a jittery bride-to-be. Five minutes until Luca’s next check, three minutes before lockdown. I had eight minutes to vanish.
I could work with eight minutes.
The corridor here was narrower, dimmer. Instead of elegant.
Then Staff quarters. Storage rooms. Laundry.
And there the kitchen door.
I pushed through, heart hammering against my ribs so hard I was sure the sound would wake the dead.
The kitchen was empty. Just like I'd hoped. Just shadows and the lingering smell of the dinner . My stomach growled—I hadn't eaten for hours.
Food would have to wait.
The back door stood across from me like salvation itself.
I ran for it, my bare feet slipping slightly on the polished tile.
My hand closed around the handle just as footsteps echoed in the corridor behind me.
*No.*
Not yet. Not when I was this close.
I twisted the handle.
Locked.
Of course it was locked. Nothing in this house existed without his permission.
I whirled, searching the kitchen eagerly. Keys. There had to be keys somewhere.
The footsteps grew louder, accompanied now by voices. Male voices, speaking in rapid Italian.
They'd found my room empty.
*There.* A key ring hanging beside the industrial stove.
My shaking hands tried each key, the metal clinking in the otherwise deadly silence.
First key: nothing.
Second key: nothing.
Third
The kitchen door swung open behind me.
"Check the grounds!" someone shouted in accented English. "Lock down the perimeter!"
I didn't look back. Couldn't. My entire world had narrowed to the lock in front of me and the keys in my trembling fingers.
Fourth key.
*Please.*
The lock clicked.
I threw the door open and burst into the night.
I ran.
Silk and lace streaming behind me, my bare feet slipping on the wet grass, I ran toward the tree line. The house subsided behind me and its gold windows lessened in size with each step.
I tasted freedom on my tongue.
Sweet and sharp and just exactly right.
Lights went on behind me. One might have heard shouts at the kitchen door. But I had more speed than they reckoned--a girl in a wedding dress was not supposed to be able to move as I did.
They had misjudged me.
The formal gardens were replaced with rougher landscaping. I came to a stone walk that curved further into the grounds, through ancient oaks and the trimmed hedges. In either case it went out of the house.
I turned into it, my breathing having come hard in the stagnant night air. My dress was all wet now, with dew and I myself. It scraped and cut my feet on the harsh stone and I did not mind.
I was going to have it.
I was in fact going to make it.
the route turned left sharply, and then right, then-
I stopped.
A wall. Eight feet of solid stone with razor wire that glistened like moonlit teeth.
*No.*
This couldn't be it. There had to be another way. A gate. A gap. Something.
On the base of the wall, I was running downwards with my hands, rubbing the stone trying to find a point of weakness. Razor wire crowned above me was smiling and daring me to climb.
I was snagged--by some sticking-out rock or other--and I heard my dress rip. However, I stopped caring about the dress. Didn't care about anything but to gain a door in through this wall.
There.
A maintenance gate. Tiny, and almost concealed by ivy, and yet real.
I took hold of the handle, and pulled.
Locked.
Of course.
But this lock was different. Older. Simpler.
I still had the key ring clutched in my fist. With shaking fingers, I tried each key again.
Behind me, the shouts were getting closer. Flashlight beams began sweeping through the trees.
*Come on, come on, come on.*
Fifth key.
Sixth.
Seventh—
*Click.*
The gate groaned open on rusty hinges which sounded like a scream in the night.
By the time it was open I was through and running.
Now there were trees around me. Not gardens, but real forest. The leaves were down, and it was softer to my bleeding feet on the ground. I heard some water somewhere in front--a stream or a river.
I did it.
I had really done it.
I tumped my skirts up and went into the water.
I was horribly cold, beyond appearance. The stream was tugging at the weighty material of my dress and trying to drag me down the river. Then I took a step or two--a cautious step here and there--until at last I moved deep in the running water.
Almost there.
Not many steps more.
It was then I heard it.
the click of polished shoes on stone.
I stood stunned with water going round my waist. My heartbeat pounded.
*No.*
- Writer
