Ethan tugs a bottle from the rucksack. It’s misted with condensation, but still holds water. Glorious water. When he holds the bottle to my lips, I take loud, clumsy glugs, forcing it down until I’m breathless.
“Ash…oh God, Aeron. He’s got them. Ash and Leo.” Ethan claws at his crispy mass of salted, sun-dried hair. He’s so far gone, I’m surprised he’s still upright—every word that comes out of his mouth drags with panic. “We have to get you out of here before he…you know what he does, fuck…I’m sorry. I’m sorry! It’s just taken us so long to find you, and—and—oh, fuck.”
A tiny rush of adrenaline licks at the sutures of my skull. “They’re okay? Alive?”
“Okay’s a stretch.” His chin wobbles, the black whiskers trembling. “And Harvey…he, uh, he definitely looks dead. There’s dead people in that home my Ma’s in, and they’ve got those empty frickin’ eyes just waiting to haunt you.”
I give a solemn nod. “Harvey definitely dead.”
“But yeah. We gotta get you out of here, somehow, we need to…”
“Need…knife. To cut tape.”
“I have a knife! Two knives!” he exclaims, half relieved, half terrified. A second later, he yanks two large kitchen blades out of the rucksack and proceeds to drop them on the floor with a shrill clatter. “Fuckin’ A. Stupid…things…okay.” He manages to grip the bread knife in his sweaty paw, and leans in to frown at the thick rounds of tape binding my upper half to the chair. “I just saw through, right? Like butterflying a chicken.”
This is what my life has come to, sports fans.
Fucking Ethan, the nanny, is carving me free.
“What fuck going on?” I manage.
He tries to loosen the tape by tucking his fingers under it, but quickly abandons that idea, instead focusing on the angle of the knife. “How much do you know?”
“Woke up here. All fucked.”
“Right. Not much.” He takes a big, shuddering breath. “Okay.”
“Help coming?”
“Help?” He laughs bitterly. “Gwen was trying to—I’ll start at the beginning. We got freaking drugged, Aeron. We don’t know how but he took you guys off the island—”
“Harvey,” I cut in. “Bribed.”
Ethan blinks. “I can’t even. I can’t.”
“Cut!” Dumbass! Fuck’s sake!
“I am, I’m trying not to cut you, I—”
“Cut me, goddam it, I don’t fucking care!” With every revelation, adrenaline pushes through the foggy space in my brain, waking me further. Pain streaks through my skull in washes of crimson, the edges singed with bright white.
Ethan gulps. Continues to carve. “He took everyone except me and Gwen. I don’t know if you know this, dude, but Gwen…uh…she, like, she knows Feds. She got ‘em straight away on Skype and they’re coming, they’re trying, but they’ve got no jurisdiction. Right now, we’re screwed.”
Gwen’s an informant. You know, I’d say this was typical, but I’m too busy trying to figure out how the fuck all this went down.
“Hassan brought me here,” Ethan goes on hurriedly. “We’ve been going around the islands for days. Mo…his son…we found his body on the beach. And there was no help coming, the island police don’t seem to give a fuck! I couldn’t stay there on the computer like Gwen.” He grits his teeth to stem a sob of frustration. “We didn’t think we’d find you guys. We’ve looked at like, twenty islands, and there are so many. I smell like I rolled through a sewer, I’m so sorry.” Beneath his blade, the tape cracks and baulks.
I can’t help it—I let out a grim moan.
Days. We’ve been gone for days, and there’s no help on the way. That’s how much power I have.
“The bastard took Ash,” Ethan spits. “He took him and he’s got Leo laid out on the other side of the island…on the beach…Ash is by a tree. Hell knows how we got around without them seeing.”
“How come you’re not dead? Gwen not dead?”
“We think Mo interrupted him. Scared him a bit. You know, until…Mo’s deadness.”