My door creaks open, and Rio rushes in. He stops in his tracks when he sees
Sydney on the ground and me straddling her, painted in crimson. It’s… warm. I
think I feel warm.
“Fuck, princesa. What did you do?”
I barely hear him, only interpreting his words from the way his lips move. I
point at her, and croak, “I killed her.”
He quietly steps in and shuts the door, but not before peeking out to see if anyone else is coming.
The soft click is inaudible to the typhoon raging in my ears. He keeps his steps light as he comes around the other side of the bed to get a better look. His lips form a circle, and he must whistle, but I don’t hear that either.
All I can do is stare.
“Come here,” he mouths, waving me towards him. Blinking, I stand on
quaking knees and manage a single step before slipping on the blood, barely catching myself on the bed. Rio’s hand grips my arm and pulls me up and away from the growing pool.
He grips my face in his palms, his dark eyes searching mine. And then he slaps me hard enough to knock my head to the side. The white noise bleeds into a sharp ring, and then all my senses come rushing back in. I hear, see, feel, taste, and smell everything.
Copper. That’s the first thing my senses notice. And then Rio is gripping my
face again, forcing my concentration back to him.
“Look at me, mamá. What the fuck are you going to do now, huh?”
I open my mouth, at a loss for words. Finally, I just say, “Escape.”
He shakes his head, drops his hands, and steps away. He stares at me, but as
usual, I can’t decipher the emotion churning in his irises.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” I whisper, realization dawning that he’s not going
to let me. Fuck. The situation catches up to me all at once, and I enter into panic
mode.
I killed Sydney because she was going to out my escape plan, and now I’m
going to be locked in a submarine somewhere, forced to live out my life alongside the fish.
With Rio catching me in the act—any chance of escape just went to complete
shit and now I’m never going to get the fuck out of here. Rio isn’t going to let
me go. There’s no fucking way. His sister is on the line.
“Shit,” I mutter, uncaring of my bloody hands and sliding them through my hair, pulling tight as I try to come to terms with being caught before I’ve even stepped foot out of the fucking house. “I can’t live with the fish, Rio. I don’t like sharks.”
Rio’s brows plunge. “The fuck are you talking about?”
“Shit, shit, shit. Fuck—”
Muttering something Spanish beneath his breath, he grabs my arms and
brings me in close.
“As much as I appreciate the vocabulary lesson, I’m going to need you to shut
the hell up,” he cuts in. “Look at me.”
I do, but my thoughts are elsewhere.
“You need to tell me how the hell you would even escape. Your two options
are acres of forest that you will get lost and probably die in or walk a road that
you can be easily found on.”
I drop my hands and clench them into fists in an attempt to abate the shaking.
The volcano has fucking erupted, and I’m still vibrating from the aftershocks.
“There’s an abandoned train somewhere out there. I found it the night of the
Culling. I was going to follow that out,” I say. In the back of my brain, my logical side is screaming at me to stop telling him my plans in case he betrays me. But the larger side of me wants to trust Rio. So fucking badly, just this once.
“And the guards outside?” he questions, voice low.
I shake my head, a tear wiggling free. “I don’t know,” I cry. “I don’t—there’s
no way—"
“Shut up, stúpido,” he barks again, keeping his voice quiet. “I’m going to go downstairs, and I’ll take care of the guards. I’ll leave the front door unlocked.
Whatever you decide to do, and wherever you go, that’s your decision.”
A knot forms between my brow, and it takes several seconds to wrangle my
scattered thoughts back into one direction.
“Rio, you can’t,” I protest. “You can’t risk your sister’s life for me.”
The muscle in his jaw pulsates, and his dark eyes bore into mine. I’ve no idea
what the hell he’s thinking.
He swallows. “I’ll figure something out with her. I think I know where she is.”
Then, it clicks.
“Let’s make a deal,” I rush out. “You help me get out of here, Z will save your sister. Tell me her name and where she is, and he will get her out.”
His mouth opens and closes, and for the first time, I’ve made Rio speechless.
“You have yourself a deal.”
“Wait, my tracking device. I-I can’t leave with it in me.”
“Turn around,” he demands, swirling his finger. Biting my lip, I do as he says,
shivering when he roughly sweeps my hair to the side.
“How are—” A sharp gasp cuts off my question when I feel something sharp
slice and dig into the back of my neck.
“Jesus, a fucking warning next time,” I spit, cringing as the tip of the blade digs into my skin.
“He’s not here, mamá, but I am. And I need you to stop wiggling.”
I huff, feeling warm liquid trailing down my back from the wound, and after
several painful seconds, the metal pops out. He flicks the device onto my bed and then leans in, his breath brushing across the shell of my ear.
“Katerina Sanchez, she’s fifteen years old. I believe she’s with a groomer by
the name of Lillian Berez. Last time I saw a picture of her was three months ago,
and she was standing in front of a sunflower field.”
He releases me, and steps away while I turn to face him. “Thank you,” I say
quietly. “I’ll make sure she’s safe.”
He gives me a look that tells me he’ll figure out a way to haunt me if I don’t.
Maybe he’ll come to Parsons and join the rest of the ghosts in my house.
“One of Rocco’s friends is sleeping on the couch. Be quiet, and it should be
fine. He’s out cold from the drugs.”
“Okay,” I nod, feeling a burst of gratitude that I’ve no idea how the fuck to
express. He’ll probably smack me if I try. Rio hates any type of appreciation as
much as he does attention. And maybe that’s more because he hates himself.
“Tell your man to give me a head start, yeah?” he says, backing away.