Page 5 of Bait
“At least Cord will be in the meeting and not hovering in the hallway.” Danika sent me a sympathetic look as I pushed past her and into the hallway. One of the members of the council had been showing a little too much interest in me as of late. He was nice enough, but I didn’t see him like that. Sometimes it worried me that I seemed devoid of any interest in the men in the bunker—well, any that weren’t the man accused of killing my brother and who tried to attack me. But thinking about Torch Bernal was the last thing I needed to do.
I was so lost in my thoughts, I didn’t even greet Leo, the elevator operator.
“What’s got you so enojada, Almita?” The older man asked with a trace of humor in his voice that went a long way to defuse some of my anger.
“Oh, the usual male nonsense, Leo.” He barked out a laugh and shook his head. Then offered me a fond look, which should’ve reminded me of my father. But my father had never been very fatherly. “I’m going to the kitchens.” He nodded at that and reluctantly pushed the button.
Leonel was likely in his fifties, which was quite old in the bunker. He was a first-generation dweller and probably knew more about the history of this place than anyone. Leo not only operated the elevators but maintained them. I knew he’d had a wife, but she’d passed when I was still little. His son Xavier was on the council guard. He was Becker’s man.
“Is something wrong?”
He shook his head at my question, but I could see that his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Just this machine getting fussy again.” He tapped the metal door of the elevator fondly, as if he was petting a skittish animal. “Now that Torch isn’t here to work his magic—” He stopped short when he realized what he’d said. Immediately his expression turned apologetic.
Torch was a bit of a sensitive topic. He’d been my brother’s best friend and personal guard. But his career had not started as an upper-level guard. Like his father, Torch was a born tradesman. Trained to be a mechanic, until his friendship with the son of the Corvados lifted him out. Like Leo, Torch was first gen, came to the bunker as a child with his father. I’d always had complicated feelings about Torch. He was older and not particularly nice to me, but I’d felt drawn to him. At first, I thought it was just curiosity. He was so brooding and serious, while my brother was gregarious and playful. But my interest in him never seemed to subside. Maybe it was my gut telling me to be careful around him.
I didn’t want to think about his betrayal. But it invaded my mind anyway, and instantly I was gripped by the horror of that night. It had been two months after my brother disappeared. I was distraught and alone. Grieving for the last family I’d had. Torch, who had promised my brother to protect me if anything ever happened to him, had barely spoken to me since the funeral. When he finally did come to me, it was in the middle of the night, and he was raving mad.
I woke up to him trying to pull me out of my bed. His breath rank with the smell of lower-level barley liquor. I pushed him away, demanded he get out, but he would not see reason. He tugged me hard by the arm. He kept screaming in my face as I fought him. Thinking back, I could see that I was angry at Torch. I felt abandoned by him. When I’d needed him most, he’d deserted me. So I ignored his pleas that I listen to him. When he wouldn’t leave, I pushed the alarm button, and the guards took him away. I never saw him again, and I was too much of a coward to investigate what happened to him.
“I’m sorry, Mija.” Leo whispered as we reached the first floor with a loud clang.
“Don’t worry, it’s fine.” Leo had seen us all be born and grow. One of the few dwellers who had access to all the levels.
“Do you ever think of the surface, Leo?” I asked before I could stop myself. I was out of the elevator now, with the little cart by my side. It was a bit of a faux pas to ask the OGs about life before. As kids it was drilled into us that remembering their past lives could trigger the dreaded cabin fever syndrome from which people could not recover. I’d never been particularly curious about life pre-Burst, but suddenly I needed to know.
Leo sighed and lifted his shoulder in a melancholy expression. “My Samira and I were barely twenty-three when we came down here. I’ll be fifty-four in a few weeks.” He looked up at the grated ceiling and flinched as if he was surprised not to find the sky there. “It’s a long time to not see the sun.” I nodded, as if I understood exactly what he meant, but the closest I’d gotten to the sun was my mandatory four hours a week of light therapy. “You know what I miss?” he finally asked in a conspiratorial voice. “I miss drying in the sun.”
“Like after a shower?” I asked, trying to picture it. I’d never seen an outdoor shower in any of the pre-Burst movies we had. He laughed and shook his head.
“After swimming in a lake or the ocean,” he explained, with a whimsical smile on his face. “Running out and just lying on the grass or the sand until you dried out.”
“That sounds nice.” I looked around the corridor with its concrete walls and concrete ceilings. The drab overhead lighting that flickered constantly and suppressed a sigh. I imagined myself doing it, coming out of my small shower stall after my once-a-week three-minute shower and just standing in my room to dry. It didn’t seem very appealing. We had a pool—which I used regularly—but it was underground and even the park with the gigantic solar lights didn’t quite warm you up. Now that I thought about it, I’d rarely ever been hot. The climate was controlled by ventilators and heaters. We were deep down in the ground, and it was naturally chilly, so heaters kept things mild. Even on the occasion they stopped working, temperatures rarely became uncomfortable. “Thanks for sharing that, Leo.” I waved goodbye before the elevators doors closed, and I walked down the corridor to the kitchen, without knowing that was the last time I’d ever see Leonel.
ChapterTwo
My wariness of Brenda A was unfounded in the end. The exchange went on without issues. Even though there were only around fourteen hundred dwellers left in the bunker, weeks, sometimes months could pass without seeing certain people. Especially if you were a few floors apart. I was on a higher floor and Brenda A was on the service staff level. But it was still a surprise to see how young she looked.
“This should last you six months or so,” I told her, pressing the envelope into her hand.
She sucked in a breath before sliding it into her pocket. For a second, I felt another one of those little frissons of fear, even though no one could see us. We were in one of the walk-in refrigerators. I’d claimed to need a tour since I’d never actually been in one. It was true I hadn’t been down here much and probably would’ve never come if I didn’t need an excuse to hand off the envelope discreetly.
“I don’t have enough for everyone.” In fact, my supplies were pretty low. I’d even considered stopping taking them myself, in order to give them to women who were not given a choice to delay breeding. But I couldn’t bring myself to stop when Cord kept making his interest so obvious. “This won’t help you avoid being bred forever, but it will give you a reprieve.” I didn’t like that women were being matched so young and were not even given a small window of time to get to know their partners.
“Okay.” She sounded so spooked. I would’ve hugged her, but touch was hard for me.
Brenda A was very thin, and she had that same bluish cast on her skin that most of the lighter skinned dwellers had. She was sweet. Her mother Benita had been the head of the morning meal crew ever since I could remember. She retired last year and became ill shortly after. Now that I thought about it, I hadn’t heard the news if she passed.
“Do you not like your match?” It was not uncommon for young women to be paired with much older men. The logic being that we could not be too picky if we were going to keep the bunker from dying out. But to my surprise, Brenda A shook her head in denial.
“I like him fine,” she said, making her pale face blush prettily. “I want to apply for a job in the greenhouses. I’m focusing on that right now.” The greenhouse staff lived on an upper floor and got more water and food rations. Sometimes it felt like in the bunker your fate was sealed from the moment you were born. Everyone had their place and their duty. It was nice seeing someone with some ambitions.
“That’s great, Brenda.” I gave her shoulder a light squeeze before we left the frigid walk-in. “I hope your match is good to you,” I whispered before stepping out, feeling slightly better after that talk with Leo and the ugly memories it brought up.
After leaving Brenda A back in the kitchen, I made my way to the elevator. But when I went to press the button, one of the guards told me it was out of service. I looked around for Leonel, but he must have gone back to his rooms for his break, since he had nothing to do until the mechanics came. I left the empty magazine cart with the guard, promising to come back for it when the elevator was working again, and made my way up the stairs. It was good exercise and since I’d used my gym time to come down to the kitchen, I took it in stride.
Thinking back, I should’ve known something was wrong the moment I arrived at the library level. There was usually no one around our corridor in the middle of the day. Especially not when the council was in a meeting. But there were three guards outside of the library. Something about the alert way they were standing, hands on their batons, told me they were on the lookout for someone. Then I saw Becker by the circulation desk talking to Danika. That definitely should’ve given me some clue. But I walked in without suspecting it was a trap. What a dummy.
