Ed was relentless. And ruthless. “Tell me, and it ends. When will they be here?”
“Please”—I choked on the blood—“I don’t . . . know . . .”
Wrong answer.
He hit me with Lucy again. Only this time he didn’t just zap me once, he waited until I’d finished convulsing the first time, and then added one more for good measure. Two jolts for the price of one.
I got the sick feeling he was just getting warmed up.
I was already panting, my skin damp with a layer of sweat when the second bolt of electricity released me. l lay back, my eyes rolling skyward as I prayed they’d just knock me out again. Please God, just stick another needle in my neck.
“Answer me!” he grunted, only this time he wasn’t waiting for an answer. I saw the prod coming at me already, making its way toward me, and all I could think was Is he really going to shove that thing into my face?
But then I heard her voice, and he did too because his hand froze right where it was, just inches from my cheek.
It wasn’t Blondie who’d interrupted him. There was another girl here with us, and I swear, even in my state of utter pain and confusion, I knew who it was. If anyone was watching the monitor it had to be going crazy, because my heart was beating a thousand times a minute.
But when she stepped closer, away from the shadows and into my line of sight, it tripled.
“Eddie Ray, stop,” she said, right before her perfect hazel eyes fell on me.
Right before she gave the signal, and Blondie plunged something into a line I hadn’t noticed before, one that must lead to somewhere beneath my skin, because suddenly my vision tunneled and everything faded away.
Natty.
Natty was here at the asylum. With me.
I wanted to add that to my mental file but it was almost too weird to believe. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes . . . if I hadn’t heard her voice . . .
But I had. She was here, all right.
So did that mean Thom was here too?
Last I’d heard of him, we’d all been at Blackwater. Just after Thom had betrayed us by sending word to the Daylight Division so they could attack us.
He’d turned traitor.
Or maybe he’d always been a traitor. I had no way of knowing since he and Natty had vanished right afterward. We’d never had the chance to interrogate him. To find out if Natty had gone willingly, or if he’d kidnapped her.
I’d known about the two of them—their relationship, the one they’d worked so hard to keep under wraps, so it made sense that if Natty was here, Thom might be too.
But there was that other thing, this strange niggling thing somewhere in the back of my mind. The name Natty had mentioned just now: Eddie Ray. That’s what she’d called Ed—Eddie Ray.
I’d heard that name somewhere before, I was sure of it.
That drugged sensation made everything fuzzy, impossible to process. But the information was there, waiting for me to dredge it up. I just had to be patient . . . to wait for it.
“I know you’re awake.” It was Natty’s voice that intruded on my thoughts. I found it more than a little unsettling, the way they could do that, monitor my body’s reactions without either my awareness or permission.
I didn’t bother pretending the machine was mistaken, that there was some bug in their technology. I opened my eyes. “What are you doing here, Natty?” My voice sounded as if it was months out of practice, as rusty as the abandoned equipment surrounding us. “What do they want with me? Why are they holding me like this?” I glanced down at my cinched wrists to emphasize my point.
Natty’s shoes crunched across the gritty floor until she was looming above me. Her hair was still the same jet-black it had been after we’d dyed it in a gas station restroom, back when we’d gone on the run from the Daylighters. It was just as striking today against her perfect porcelain complexion as it had been then. But her hazel eyes seemed somehow colder, more intense.
“We have our reasons,” she stated flatly, like that was a real answer. A complete explanation.
We. Not they. And with that admission I added her to the list of accomplices to my kidnapping. To whatever they were up to here.
Blondie, the two as-yet-unnamed guys, Ed (aka Eddie Ray), and Natty. Five of them that I knew of, and possibly Thom.
At least one of them—Natty—was a Returned. But considering their youthful appearances, and the fact that none of them were taking any precautions to avoid my blood, they all must be.
More things to add to my mental notes.
“Why me? What did I ever do to you?” I didn’t mean for it to sound so pathetic but that’s the way it came out.
Natty had been my friend. Ever since Simon had dragged us to Thom’s camp at Silent Creek, where I’d met her. She’d been the one person to look after me, to take care of me. She’d stuck to me like glue, making sure I ate and that I was never lonely.
But what if I’d been wrong about her? What if it had never been about making sure I wasn’t lonely?