He felt himself spiraling, disbelief and horror fighting to take control of any rationality or calm he might try to hold on to in an attempt to figure his way out of this.
He gripped the bars again, shaking them with all his strength and letting out a feral roar. For a few minutes, he allowed himself to rage, to fight, even though he knew it would be fruitless when what he fought was steel and circumstance. Some ghastly plan, the meaning of which—so far—was beyond his understanding. Evan yelled and bellowed and shook the bars of his prison until his muscles weakened and his throat was raw. And still, no one came. Finally, depleted, he fell back against the bars, gripping his hair in his hand as his head dropped forward.
“Didn’t you already try that?” Noelle asked, her calm a contrast to his wildness.
Evan worked to catch his breath, a trickle of sweat moving slowly down his cheek. Yes. Yes, he had. He’d done the same thing when he’d woken the first time in the dark. He’d even fought when the faceless man had come into his cage to retrieve him and bring him here to this second cage. He’d flailed around like a drunk seal as the man had easily sidestepped him and swung his fists at Evan at each opportune moment. He’d knocked him out and then somehow transported him here to this room.
“Maybe your dad’s behind this,” he finally said. What other reason for this than some skewed sense of revenge?
“You asshole,” she hissed. “How dare you?” He still didn’t look up. He didn’t want to see her expression. “My father’s not the murderer.” She tossed the statement at him, and as though it were a spike, he felt it lodge in his flesh.
“He didn’t murder her. It was an accident.”
“Was ruining my mother’s name an accident too? Devastating my father? And me?”
He did raise his head then, his gaze meeting hers. She looked upset but defiant. The sight made his thoughts blur. A caged girl, eyes blazing. And for just a second, he was glad he’d brought that out in her, regardless of the cause. Because for this one moment, at least, her will had been too big to be contained. It didn’t last. She deflated against the bars, and they both sat facing each other in silence. He’d had this impression that she was meek. The way she walked, head down, arms always loaded with books. But there was fire inside her. Maybe it would help their cause.
“Why haven’t you ever asked me these questions before? Or any questions, for that matter. You’ve never even spoken to me, and we walk past each other almost every day,” he said. Maybe he should have spoken to her. But what would he say? And she’d always studiously avoided him, and so he let her be. He’d watched her without her knowing, though. He’d been . . . curious about her. Was that the right word? They hung out with completely different crowds. Not that she had a crowd around her, not like he did. As far as he could tell, she only had one friend, a mousy redhead. Both she and Noelle were from public schools and had been chosen for academic scholarships to attend the exclusive private academy. There were four scholarship recipients at Northland, and they were all treated like the outsiders they were.
“Talk to you?” She asked it as though he’d suggested she eat dirt. “There was never a point. I knew the answers then, and I know them now. I only brought it up because emotions are high. Understandably.” She waved her arm around her prison as though she needed to explain the cause of her current mental state.
“What, then? What are the answers?”
She let out a gust of breath. “Maybe you should be asking what the questions are, Evan. Why did your father have to ruin our lives rather than take responsibility for what he did?” She gave a small shrug. “Privilege. Entitlement. Opportunity.”
“Your mother was trespassing, Noelle,” he said softly. “Stalking him.”
That fire again as her eyes flared. She directed it to the wall, chewing at the inside of her cheek. “She wouldn’t have done that. And there was no evidence she was stalking him,” she bit out. “I’ve always thought he invited her over and then lied about it to cover up his own crime.”
“The jury thought otherwise.”
She stared at him for a minute, and he sensed something churning in her. But whatever it was, she held it back, obviously deciding that it didn’t matter or this was not the time. “Listen,” she said, “if we have any hope of getting out of here, we’ll need to work together. Anything else is pointless.”
He gave a nod, acknowledging that that was probably easier for him. She clearly held deep animosity toward his family, whereas he’d mostly been curious about her. To be perfectly honest, the thing that had decimated her life had been more of a tragic blip on the radar for him, an extremely unfortunate accident that his father had had to manage. He hadn’t even been at home that summer. He’d been staying with his mother in the Hamptons. And in any case, from his perspective, before the . . . tragedy, both her mother and his father had been at fault. Perhaps Noelle was right about privilege. He’d moved on, while she had not. Her mother died, though. “You’re right. We need to work together.”
Unfortunately, at that particular moment, there was no “work” to be done. No tools within their grasp. No person to appeal to. For the time being, all they could do was wait. For what, he had no idea.
CHAPTER FOUR
She was running along a path, following it as it twisted and turned, someone hot and heavy on her heels. Vegetation surrounded her. Not a forest, but a garden, full of bushes trimmed into monstrous shapes. She had the vague notion that they were watching her, whispering her whereabouts to whoever was chasing. She’d never get away. Not here, where there were eyes everywhere. Suddenly, something hot tore into her chest, agonizing pain ripping through her, and she was falling, falling—
“Noelle!”
She sat up with a jolt, a scream on her lips, looking around wildly as she attempted to get her bearings. Bars surrounded her. She lay back down, letting her head hit the cement floor. Oh God. This is real. I’m still here.
The horror that swept through her each time she woke would never diminish. How could it? Tears threatened. For a moment she considered praying to die. She’d had the thought several times since she’d first woken in darkness but stopped herself each time.
“Food delivery,” Evan said from beside her.
She sat up again, smoothing her hair back. She’d been dreaming of her mother. Of the night she died. She’d been her mother, a bullet tearing through her flesh. She pulled herself to her knees, looking at the tray sitting inside the small compartment on the wall behind her cage. The sound of the door opening had been what woke her from her dream. A quick glance told her Evan had a compartment just within his reach as well.
She crawled toward hers. This was the first time she’d been able to see her food, and unlike all the other times, when she’d reached for the bread and water, this “meal” came served on a tray made of soft plastic. A yellow children’s tray. She reached, grasping it with her fingertips, and then carefully pulled it forward, her hands confirming what her eyes had already told her. It had rounded corners, nothing that might be filed into a weapon, even if she broke it into pieces.
There was a slice of plain white bread, a paper cup half-filled with water in the corner, and sliced peaches in the portion of the tray that curved into a small bowl. Her eyes widened, and she put her other hand through the bars, dipping her finger into the pale-yellow peach juice and licking it off. She moaned, picking up one of the four pieces of soft, syrupy fruit and bringing it to her mouth. The sweet taste burst on her tongue, and she took a moment to savor it. It was the first thing she’d been served that contained any real flavor in what felt like years. She reached for another one, eyeing the white fabric napkin on the side of the tray. Her first peripheral glance had made her think it was unfolded and just sort of crumpled in a messy pile. But upon closer inspection, it appeared to be sloppily wrapped around something.