Page 4 of Prey for Me

I lurch to the window, this time bracing for impact, despite the crew members’ warnings to strap in, and press my face to the glass. To my horror, a massive explosion rocks the back half of Faith’s craft. It’s barely visible to me, and maybe it’s just part ofthe plane falling into the sea and burning up. But I can’t shake the bone-deep feeling that it’s—

“Faith!” I scream into my phone, but the screen remains pitch black, creaking and crunching beneath my fingers as it’s crushed under a rush of footsteps. I realize it’s a stampede of fleeing guests’ shoes blocking the camera, but then they’re no longer visible or audible as the video cuts out for good.

“What’s happening!” I shout, pushing against the beta flight attendants trying to hold me down.

“Strap in your highness, now!” a woman barks, and I sit back down because I can’t figure out what else to do but freak out and get in the way, praying they can rescue me by saving the plane.

Oxygen masks fall from the ceiling, and the same woman puts it over my head before securing her own, going against everything flight attendants have taught me to do over the years.

Bile rises in my throat, and it’s not from the chaos or the impending crash. Your highness? No one calls me that, not in America, at least, and not even in Europe, except for a select few. That means, more likely than not, the people on this airplane are not just employees of Wilder, Inc., butroyalistsloyal to their deposed king.

I strap in with shaky hands, praying that my deflated mask is pumping oxygen into my heaving chest. My stomach does extreme somersaults as we nosedive to the water’s surface. I don’t have time to decipher why and how royalists are onboard. One of the flight attendants wails as the pilot’s door suddenly swings open, revealing an empty seat. Something is beeping sharply, and the sound pierces my ears like nails.

The storage compartments overhead swing open as we drift hard to the right. Five carry-on suitcases slide out, and most of my life scatters and slams around this burning tin can like trash. More bags drop from the ceiling, and I realize the dizzinessI’m feeling is from losing air. So nothing is pumping into my battered lungs, hoarse from my terrified screeching.

My vision fades in and out, clutching the armrests so tightly I’m sure I’ve snapped all my French-tipped acrylic nails. Red seeps into my field of view, and I wonder if my skull has popped and my brain is oozing from the wound. But then, to my horror, I realize it’s blood—too much blood from such a minor head wound.

“Aaaah!” I wail as a severed head hits the cabin above the bathroom after a sickening snapping sound fills the air, and then the plane curves hard to the left again, without guidance. Freefalling. We’re freefalling out of the fucking sky!

I double over, sure I’ll vomit up the charcuterie and champagne I’ve been grazing on since we took off. We’re crashing into the sea, and I might be dead before I can ever find out what happened to Faith, Hoku, and their capsizing ship.

CHAPTER TWO

GRACE

“Haaah!”

I wake up in a contaminated fish bowl, and instantly choke on a flood of dirty water. I claw at the floor of the jet as water contaminated with blood and debris washes over me in waves. By the third time I go under and come back up for air, I realize I’m clawing at my seat cushion and the ceiling, not the floor of my jet. Below, I can make out faint lights that used to lead to the front and back of the plane flickering out one by one. I can smell smoke, and I know it won’t be long until there’s either an explosion or I suffocate on the carbon dioxide. The whole plane has flipped over, and it’s sinking fast.

“Help! Help!” I scream, even though I know there’s no one alive for miles and miles that can hear me, let alone rescue me. And I can’t even scream, my voice a hoarse whimper even to my ears despite my best attempts at pushing air through my lungs to yell.

As I stifle my tears, I do my best to calm my erratic breathing. Hanging upside down with blood rushing to my head isn’thelping, but I have to manage it somehow. I can’t figure out a plan if I’m so focused on not hyperventilating. As I regain as much composure as I can, slowly but surely, I get to work hatching an escape route. I struggle with my belt, which feels impossible to adjust. I can’t seem to figure out how to take it off. My hands are heavy like lead, and nothing makes sense anymore.

Nothing makes sense other than one sentence that thuds through my mind like a mantra.

I won’t die like this.

Faith needs me. Despite everything telling me she’s dead, I refuse to believe it. Not until I see it with my own eyes. After all, I’m still alive. Miracles do happen.

I hold my breath and focus all my efforts on my injured hands. I know that most of my body has some type of cut or bruise from the crash, and that’s also why I can’t focus, why nothing is working right. But I keep focused on my hands, peeling a finger back one at a time and then closing them over the belt buckle just as slowly. Before I press the latch, I brace for impact.

“Aaah!” I gasp from the shock of falling upside down, but more so from the impact of hitting the water.

I go under, and the world transforms into a swirling tsunami of polluted black muck. When I rise, I hack up so much water that my chest hurts. Emergency lights suddenly bathe the cabin in red. And there I float, disoriented and aching all over, eyes unfocused.

“What?” I murmur as I’m rocked against the wall of my sinking jet. I fight against the rising tide, before I’m slammed against the wall again, dangerously close to a cracked window and jagged glass.

Shit! I need to get out of here before I drown. But first,I need a life vest,I think, fighting my way to the top of the next wave as I yank at the seat cushion above my head with all my might to getto it.I have to live. I have to fight. I can’t leave Faith out there to die alone.

With a satisfying pop, I’m able to dislodge the vest and flick on the light after I pull the floating device over my head. Years of flight attendant instructions come back to me in flashes. I think of the royalist who tried to save me, going against her training. Then I freeze, the life vest straps dropping from my hands.

She’s staring right at me.

“Haaaah…” I release a shaky breath, face to face with a mangled corpse.

Her broken body twists at unnatural angles in ways that she’s almost beyond recognition, the limbs all wrong, bones jutting out in different directions. But her head is still facing forward, jaw slack, and eye sockets empty. I recognize what’s left of her uniform seared into her burnt skin. And the wisps of strawberry blonde hair on her head match the attendant’s. It’s then I puke, and I’m thankful I couldn’t hold down much of the steak because it’s mostly water and bile. I force myself to look back at her bloating body and slowly spiral out of control.

I’m not a doctor. Not even a murder podcast enthusiast. But a body wouldn’t bloat this fast, would it? Take on that sickly gray-blue hue and get so stiff? Would fish eat eyes out of their sockets in an hour or two?

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