THEY LOCKED ME IN my room that night. Locked all of us in. For our own good, until they could move Nicole to a secured area. Really, it seemed like more of an excuse to keep us all in our rooms. With Hayley, Sam, and Rafe, they’d had three kids who wouldn’t trust one another to guard the bathroom door. They sure as hell weren’t going to plan an escape together. But now I was here, and Rafe and I were already whispering in corners. Time for a lockdown.
I think they added an extra layer of security in my bedtime hot chocolate. Sleeping pills. Otherwise there was no way I would have zonked out so fast.
My dreams came in fits and starts, as if they were being stifled by the pills. I’ll admit I was glad of that. What I saw was enough—images of Daniel being struck by a car, then Ash running into traffic while being pursued, then me chasing them, trying to warn them, but falling ever farther behind, unable to hear them, smell them, see them, my muscles seizing, reflexes slowing.
Then some cosmic force hit the rewind button, and I was in the lake with Serena again, seeing her pulled under the water, being pulled under myself. I tried to fight my way to her, but I couldn’t see her, couldn’t hear her, couldn’t breathe. I was drowning. Really drowning. I couldn’t get up. Couldn’t get free. The water was everywhere, blocking my nose, my mouth, the smell of chemical lemon, the taste of cotton—
Lemon? Cotton?
My sleeping brain was alert enough to know neither of those scents fit the scenario and started pulling me up from sleep. But it was like pushing up through the water. Something held me down and the more I struggled, the more I choked and sputtered. I kicked and punched until my fist made contact and I heard a gasp. The water receded just enough for me to catch half a breath. It was enough. I pushed through the thick, sticky water of sleep and surfaced.
My eyes opened to darkness. Something was pressed against my face—lemon-scented fabric, the smell and the cotton filling my mouth and blocking my nose and covering my eyes.
A pillow. There’s a pillow over my face.
I tried to claw the pillow away, but someone was on my chest, holding me down. I clawed at my attacker instead, convulsing and bucking and kicking. I grabbed fabric. Dug my nails into flesh beneath. Heard another gasp. The pillow loosened just enough for a breath. When it clamped down again, I stopped blindly flailing. I wedged my hands between my chest and my attacker, pulled up my knees and heaved.
My assailant flew off so fast I lay there another moment, frozen in surprise. Then I scrambled up, whipping the pillow to the floor and taking deep, shuddering breaths.
I looked around. Empty. My room was empty. I was alone.
Had I been imagining things? A weird waking dream from the drugs? I—
A figure leaped from the side, a blur in my peripheral vision. Hands grabbed for me. I rolled to the side, clear off the bed, landing on my feet.
I spun to my attacker, and I saw blond hair tangled around a thin face. Nicole.
She was crouched on the bed, her eyes so wide and wild they sent a chill through me. Not just crazy. Inhuman. She snarled and gnashed her teeth. Then she leaped.
I swung out of the way easily. She plowed into the wall with a thump that I swore I felt, but she only recovered and came at me again. Again I dodged. Again she missed, this time stumbling and hitting the floor, then she bounced back and charged.
I hit her this time. Part of me didn’t want to. She wasn’t a threat now—lumbering as blind and awkward as a newborn rhinoceros. And one look at her face told me that any trace of the Nicole I’d known was gone. She’d completely snapped, and as much as I hated her for what she’d done to Serena, when I looked at her now, I saw madness, not evil.
But I had to stop her. So I hit her. Hard. My fist plowed into her chest. As she stumbled back, a follow-up kick knocked her to the floor. The fact that I was able to do it so easily told me I wasn’t exactly fighting a worthy opponent.
When Nicole went down, I pinned her. That was harder. She might not know how to throw a punch, but whatever madness infected her was pumping adrenaline through her veins. She’d been strong enough to almost suffocate me. Now she was strong enough to fight like a wild animal, writhing and bucking and hissing and biting.
As I struggled to hold her down—and stay away from her teeth and nails—I felt the first licks of rage. Again, it confused me at first. I wasn’t truly angry, so why was my skin heating, the burn of rage building?
Then the rationalization came. Thoughts, images, whispers, swirling around me.
She killed Serena. Murdered your best friend. Tried to drown you twice. Almost suffocated you now. Of course you should be furious.
And how had this even happened? Wasn’t she supposed to be locked up? Wasn’t I supposed to be locked in?
And where the hell was Kenjii? My dog was gone. That couldn’t be a coincidence. Someone set this up. Someone here was trying to kill me.
They’d sworn to protect me. They hadn’t. They didn’t want to. It was up to me. Protect myself.
My hands started to pulse. The room tinged with red as my blood pounded in my ears.
Nicole was the enemy. To protect myself—to protect my friends—I had to eliminate the enemy. It was that simple.
My hands went to her throat. My nails had thickened to claws now and as my fingers wrapped around her throat the claws dug in. Droplets of blood popped up, bright red against her pale skin, the smell of it filling my nostrils, filling my head. Another smell, too. The stink of fear as I squeezed her neck.
She tried to fight harder. But she was already giving it everything she had and as my body started to shift, adrenaline pumped through me, too, and I held her easily. I kept squeezing. Blood dribbled down her neck. Her eyes bugged. She clawed at my hands, and I felt her nails dig in, but I just kept squeezing.
You’re dying, I thought. Strangling. Fighting for air that isn’t there. How does it feel? Are you thinking of Serena? Wondering if this was what she felt when you drowned her? What I felt when you put the pillow over my face? Do you regret it?
Nicole’s hands stopped clawing mine. Her eyes closed. Her body went limp. Still I kept squeezing.
She’s unconscious. You can stop. She’s not a threat now.
No, as long as she’s alive she’s a threat.
You’re killing her, Maya!
Good. It’s the same thing she tried to do to me. She deserves to die. I want her—
My fingers froze. I stared down at Nicole, lying beneath me, face turning blue, and I leaped off her so fast I stumbled back onto the bed. I furiously rubbed my face, the thick pads of my hands rasping against my skin.
This isn’t me. I’m not a killer.
Of course you are. You’re a cougar. A wild animal. A predator. That’s what they created. That’s what you are.
No, I’m not.
I looked down at Nicole and squeezed my hands into fists. As I did, I felt the rage subside, the shift reverse, like a tide ebbing, slow but steady.
I looked around. My bedroom door was ajar. I walked over, cracked it open, looked and listened. The hall was silent.
I could escape.
Escape where? The house is secured.
But Nicole had gotten out of her so-called secured room and into mine. We’d fought and no one had come running. No one even seemed to notice.
Nicole didn’t just wander into your room on her own. You know that. Someone let her in and took Kenjii and probably drugged Nicole to make her flip out like that.
Which meant that the “trap” had already sprung. I’d outwitted it and now the way was clear—or clear enough.
Was I sure of that? Of course not. But the alternative was to sit on my bed and wait for someone to come and find out I’d nearly killed Nicole.
I had to take a chance.