14

I was tucked into a dark corner of the janitor’s closet, which was actually a small room. The space was crammed with shelves of cleaning materials and buckets and mops, so it was relatively easy to make myself invisible.

The janitor had already been in here once, and he’d turned the light on. Thankfully the naked bulb was low wattage and he’d seemed to know exactly where and what he wanted. I doubt he’d even glanced beyond the first shelf. He definitely hadn’t seen my foot sticking out, and the moment the door closed behind him, I’d cramped myself into an even tighter ball.

This was the easiest part, and the hardest. Trapped. Waiting. If someone realized I’d never left the center for the evening, there’d be a search and they would find me. I was cornered by walls and a door, trapped by that single point of entry.

When an endless amount of time passed without incident, the tension unwound from my muscles. I dared to stretch out, but remained alert to the sound of the door opening so I could scrunch myself back into a ball.

So far, everything was on plan.

Earlier, I’d walked out with Belinda and then, as an afterthought, I’d remembered. “Axel asked me to stop by before I leave. He wants to talk about something.”

“That boy always has something to talk about,” Belinda said with a smile. We’d just swiped our cards and were passing through the door to reception. “Should I wait, my dear?”

I caught the door before it could close on me, shaking my head. “I don’t know how long it’ll take.”

The guard stood across the room, near the exit doors. He didn’t have his back to us, but he seemed bored, his gaze sweeping continually without hitching on anything in particular.

“You won’t want to miss the shuttle,” Belinda warned.

“If I do, I’ll take the next one.”

“Very well.” She slid her security card through the hatch on the wall, the deposit box where we returned our cards at the end of our shift. “If I don’t see you at the shuttle stop, I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Enjoy your evening.” I smiled at her, holding onto the door as I glanced between her, the guard, and the man at reception, who had his head down and his nose in a book.

I slipped back inside, allowing the door to swing closed behind me. If anyone went looking, my exit had been scanned and registered. If they looked harder, they’d discover that I’d never returned my security card for the evening, but that couldn’t be helped. I needed it, but they wouldn’t have a reason to check the deposit box unless the guard actively took note of the fact that I’d gone back inside and never came out again.

Now that an hour had passed and no one had raised the alarm, it was safe to say he hadn’t.

Moving slowly, carefully in the pitch blackness, I stood and stepped out from behind the fortress of heavy duty equipment stashed in the corner and picked a path toward the sliver of light shining in from beneath the door. There I bent low, holding my wrist to the light so I could check the time on my watch.

One hour down.

Another hour and a half to go.

I crept back into my corner to wait, nerves pinching my gut. There was fear, too, of course there was, but when had I ever let that stop me? Roman called me reckless. If I had to call my steely resolve anything, I’d call it Fear, a different kind of fear, fear of failing Daniel, fear of disappearing into a net of safety, fear of doing nothing.

I rested my head against the wall, shut down those thoughts, and my mind drifted in the utter darkness.

Maybe times have moved on, Daniel had said. Maybe there was another way.

It was another time, another way of thinking, another kind of life , Roman had said. Citizens had more rights and no one questioned it, not even the elected government.

Those are the thoughts that swirled inside my head, again and again, swirling everything I’d ever known, every thought and belief and hope together into a blended landscape of gray. My mind felt like a murky canvas without definition, not a blank slate, but a place where new writings could stand out stronger and brighter than what had come before.

Every now and then I moved to the door, to the light, to check the time. Five minutes before seven, I decided to go for it. Roman would be in place. The shift change would have settled.

I’d already prepped the tranquilizer gun with the first dart. I tucked the other three darts into the back pocket of my jeans for quick access, then I slung my purse across my chest and put my ear to the door. I couldn’t hear anything above my pounding heart.

Adjusting my grip on the gun, finger positioned on the trigger, I pushed the door open. Fluorescent light bathed the corridor, making it easy to see—easy to be seen. But Axel hadn’t exaggerated. The place was like a graveyard once the shift changed over to night. There was a constant, droning sound I’d never noticed during the day. It wasn’t loud, more like a white noise filling the air, making its presence known.

Focus.

My gaze scanned up and down the corridor. I didn’t see a soul. I wasn’t alone, though. A nurse could step out of one of the wards at any time. Not wasting another second, I darted left, the gun aimed chest level as Roman had shown me.

No one stepped out into the corridor, and I was at Ward X.

I sucked in a deep, steadying breath. Hesitating out here in the corridor held its own danger. That was the push I needed. I firmed my grip on the gun, but lowered my arm and moved my hand slightly behind my back.

Then I swiped my card and swung through the door with a breezy smile.

The nurse on duty was a stranger to me. He glanced up from where he perched behind the desk, curious at first, a half-formed smile on his bearded face, but that faded as I hurried across to him.

“Hi, I wonder if you can help me.”

“Um…” He didn’t know if I should be here. The rules were ever-changing and fuzzy since the Sisterhood had taken over. “Visitors aren’t allowed back here. How did you get in?”

“I’m not a visitor,” I said pleasantly, flashing him my security card. “I’m a volunteer. I’ve been working the day shift until now.”

He scratched at his beard, his hand inching toward the intercom. He wasn’t being sneaky, I didn’t think. He was still deciding.

“Here, take a closer look.” I leaned over the counter to shove my card in his face and brought my other hand up— slowly, steady —and before I could over-think it, before his brain caught up to what his eyes were seeing, I aimed the gun at the side of his neck and pulled the trigger.

He didn’t scream. I hadn’t even thought about that possibility until this very moment. But he didn’t scream.

He squeaked and slapped a hand to his neck, to the spot where the dart had gone in. His eyes rounded, then rolled back in their sockets until only the white was visible, and then he dropped, crumpled off his perch and to the floor with a horribly loud thud. Thank goodness there was only one night nurse on this ward, and each ward was isolated behind thick walls.

I glanced at my watch.

Just gone seven.

I scrambled around the counter, my pulse racing, and gasped when I saw the awkward position he’d fallen into behind the cramped station—half sprawled, half shoved up against the wall, his neck angled. He hadn’t broken it— No! I knelt before him and pressed two fingers to his throat, held my breath and stilled my mind…his pulse was slow, but strong.

I released that breath and sprang into action, patting down the pockets of his scrubs, then lifting his top and there it was, a ring hooked to the loops of his pants with a variety of keys. My fingers had developed tremors, and it took longer than it should have to work the key ring free from his pants.

I checked my watch.

How had that happened? Six minutes until Roman’s deadline.

I jumped up, the gun in one hand, my access card in the other with the keys. Another swipe took me through the door to the patient cubicles. There was no time to think or worry, only time to move. I’d taken a quick look after leaving Daniel earlier. I knew which rooms I needed to clear.

I bypassed the older man—team Otter—and went straight to Daniel. He knew to expect me, but he still looked slightly dumbfounded when I barged into his room.

I grinned. “What? You didn’t think I’d show?”

“I was expecting you to drop through the ceiling or come crawling in through the vent,” he drawled. “I did not expect you to waltz in through the front door.”

While he spoke, I tucked the gun into my back pocket and hurried to his side, where I worked my way through the keys. The third attempt unlocked his cuff—after a struggle. My hands were shaky, my fingers awkwardly handling the tiny silver key. It was also the only one of its kind. It had to be one key for all the cuffs.

I moved to the other side of the cot. “You sound much more alert than earlier. Did they not drug you again?”

“I didn’t swallow,” he said. “I held the pill under my tongue and spat it out once the nurse was gone.”

“Good thinking.”

“I’m not just a pretty face.”

I fit the key, turned, and snapped the other cuff off.

Daniel flung his legs over the rails of the cot. That’s when I noticed/remembered his sock-clad feet.

“Where are your shoes?”

He gave me a blank look.

I checked my watch. “We’re against the clock here. Five minutes to get all of you outside. But there’s a three hour walk ahead of us. You need shoes.”

I dropped to my knees to look under the bed.

“Here,” Daniel said. He’d yanked open the cabinet beside the cot and was already sliding his feet into his shoes.

We were down to four minutes when we entered the room I’d bypassed. The man was fast asleep. While I fumbled with his cuffs, Daniel shook him by the shoulders.

His eyes opened heavily. “What?”

Daniel gave him another shake. “Come on, we’re leaving. There’s no time to explain.”

The man’s eyes fluttered closed again. Either the evening sedative was stronger, or maybe it was a cumulative effect, and clearly he hadn’t been smart enough to spit it out. Then again, he hadn’t known about our little rescue operation.

I had both cuffs unlocked now.

Daniel cursed beneath his breath, and slapped the man’s cheek. Hard. “Hey, Gerald!”

Gerald stirred and lifted his head from the pillow.

I checked my watch.

Daniel saw. “Go. I’ll put his shoes on.”

I left them to it and hurried out. This stupid countdown was wrecking me. We should have allocated ourselves more time, but that would have been a danger within itself. It only took one person to come looking for the night nurse, one unanswered intercom call, one random enquiry...

The next room was Otter—or more accurately, the Otter heir. I didn’t know his first name, and from what I’d seen, he’d shown all the signs of turning out as vile as his father.

He was the oldest of the heirs, with a full beard and winged brows that gave him a permanent scowl. Not that he needed the brows for that.

He snarled at me when I slipped inside his room. “You’ve got some nerve, showing your face here, girl . You promised to get us out of that cell.”

You can’t leave him behind.

You can’t leave him behind.

“I’m getting you out now.” I worked one cuff loose, my hands steady, the tremor gone. We were almost there. This was almost done. I moved to the other cuff. “Put your shoes on and meet us at the end of the corridor, by the emergency exit. You won’t be able to open it, but don’t even try, or you could set off the alarm and then it’s all over.”

I unsnapped the cuff and stalked out without a backward glance. The man made the hairs on my body stand on end.

Daniel joined me and a short while later, with thirty seconds to spare, everyone was assembled by the emergency exit. Gerald was propped up between Otter and another older heir, Mark. The fifth heir was a friend of Daniel’s, a cheeky-looking, dark-haired guy called Kemirick.

Thankfully only Gerald seemed totally out of it. I wondered if he’d been particularly difficult at some point and earned himself an extra sedative dose.

I held my security card ready. “As soon as I scan this, the fire alarm will sound, so we have to hurry. Roman’s right outside. Jump onto the back of his truck. No questions, no stalling, or you’ll get left behind. Understood?”

No one answered.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” I swiped my card. The scanner blinked from red to green, but no alarm sounded. That’s not the way Axel had explained it.

My mouth went dry.

“What’s the hold up?” Otter, of course.

Ignoring him, I depressed the bar and shoved, and finally that high-pitched siren I’d been expecting pierced the night.

Tires squealed as Roman sped out from within the trees. He spun the wheel, all but sliding up alongside us.

“Everyone on the back,” Daniel barked out.

I removed the gun and darts from my back pockets and I slid into the front beside Roman.

Seconds later, we were tearing down the driveway of the institution. I glanced out the window, heart in my throat, waiting for the guard to come charging after us.

Roman sent me a grin. “I changed my mind about the guard. I took him out just before your time was up.”

That would buy us a little more time. I sank lower in the seat, the tremors back in full force now, every inch of skin and bones shaking.

“I can’t believe we did it,” I said as I stowed the gun and darts in my purse. “I can’t believe how smoothly it went.”

Roman took one hand off the wheel to rub my thigh. “We’re not done yet.”

I looked at him and rolled my eyes. We were already lost in the Quantum Zone’s grid of roads. Another couple of minutes, and we’d be hidden by the woods around the tunnel’s service hatch.

We were as good as done.