Page 112 of Riot House
ELODIE
The thing about Krav Maga?The system was designed to train the Israeli Defense Forces how to disarm an attacker with a weapon. Specifically, a gun, ora knife. I could take Fitzpatrick’s bowie knife from him in three short moves, but I’m biding my time. He’s so sure that he has complete control over the situation that he’s talking, spilling all his secrets like a villain in a goddamn Bond movie, and I want to learn as much as I can before I break his wrist and run.
Carina walks ahead of me, her hands tied behind her back. I’m restrained, too—the thin twine the English teacher used to bind us bites, cutting into my skin—though I’m not particularly worried about that just yet. I’m more concerned about where he’s taking us. “Let’s pick up the pace, ladies. We’ll be here ‘til dawn otherwise.”
He sounds chipper. He hasn’t forgotten what I told him earlier, though. He doesn’t believe that Wren confessed his love to me, and now he’s trying to convincemethat I’m wrong. “He was lying to you, y’know. He took your file from Dean Harcourt’s office. Stole your picture. He was planning on toying with you. Did you know that?”
“Yes, I knew that. He told me everything. I knowallabout his little obsession when we first met. Things changed, though. It became real. For both of us.” Maybe I should sound a little less bored. A fraction more scared? Don’t get me wrong; I’m absolutely shitting myself, but I’m also confident that I’ll be able to wrestle over control of the situation when the time comes. And I want to push the doc’s buttons a little. Nudge him over the other side of angry just far enough that he gets sloppy. Carina looks back at me, giving me a stern look that speaks volumes.What the fuck are you doing, girl? Don’t antagonize him. You’re gonna get us both killed!
“Eyes front, Carrie. Good girl. Wouldn’t want you tripping and breaking your neck, would we?” Fitz commands.
“He told me that I was the first person he’s ever loved. What we have is special,” I say in an airy tone. “I never thought a guy like Wren would go for a girl like me. But the way he looks at me sometimes…” I sigh dreamily. “We’re gonna live together when we go away to college. It’s gonna be amazing. We’ll—”
I go down hard. With my hands tied behind my back, I have no way of breaking the fall. The impact sends pain jangling through me from head to toe. Well, shit. Facedown in the dirt, I vaguely wonder if I’ve pushed a little too hard. Doctor Fitzpatrick looms over me, snarling in my ear. “Keep your slut mouth closed, Elodie. Unless you wanna wind up bleeding out in this dirt, right here and now.”
49
WREN
The momentI turn the first corner, I see a light up ahead. My hope soars. Maybe she didn’t hear me call out for some reason. Could be that Elodie’s just up ahead, killing time before she goes back to Wolf Hall. I stumble, tripping over unseen rocks that litter the narrow path, barely catching myself against the rough, sharp walls as I hurry onward.
“Elodie?” I should have fucking told her everything when I had the chance. It was so stupid of me to keep this from her. She needed to know the truth, so she could be prepared for what she was getting herself into. I was a coward, though. I was weak. It took so long to earn her trust. I was so convinced that we could make it to graduation without Fitz finding out about us. What a fool I was. “ELODIE!” The shout carries even further this time, bouncing around the inside of the cave.
Before I can suck down another breath and call for her again, I come out into an open, high-ceilinged cavern. The light I saw just now comes from a series of electric lamps, strung up along one side of the wall. Water runs down the roughhewn rock, gathering in filthy puddles on the ground. And there, right in the middle of the cavern, is a stone plinth, rising up out of the dirt.
Not a plinth.
An altar.
That’s what it seems to be, at least. I approach, my heart a clenched fist in my throat, and…Oh my god. A high-pitched buzzing sound floods my head. It’s Mara. She’s laid out on top of the altar, hands resting on top of her chest—nothing more than bone and matted, dull hair.
This is where she’s been.
All of this time…
The cops searched these woods. They never found her. They’ve been looking for her back in Florida where her parents live, plastering her face all over the sides of milk cartons and noticeboards, but she was here all along, quietly rotting away to dust.
“Holy…fuck.”
I reach out, my fingers hovering over the blackened skull—
“Oh my god!”
I pull my hand back, nearly jump out of my skin. Mercy stands in the opening of the cavern, staring at the body of the girl who used to be her friend. Shock distorts the planes of her face. Even in the dim lighting thrown off by the electric lamps, I can see how pale she is. “Jesus, you nearly gave me a heart attack!” I hiss.
She comes toward me on wobbly legs, reaching out, like the ground’s shifting underneath her and she’s fighting for balance. “I swear—” she whispers. “I swear I thought she was fine. I thought she’d just bailed. I guess she isn’t blowing frat boys in Cabo, after all.”
“No.” The word comes out clipped and hard. Mercy has a lot to answer for here. I won’t say it, because what would placing blame accomplish now? But Mara and I barely knew each other. We went out once, didn’t even make out, and I decided she wasn’t for me. Bastard that I was, she wasn’t innocent enough for my tastes. She was just as tainted and troubled as I was at the time, and I couldn’t even bother having a one-night stand with her. She’d pursued me at first, but then given up the chase. There’d been no bad blood between us. And then Mercy stuck her oar in and wound up getting Mara killed. Fitz wouldn’t have touched her if my sister hadn’t said what she did.
Mercy stands over Mara’s corpse, the muscles in her throat working. I think she’s beginning to understand now. It’s finally hitting home. Tears course down her face as she surveys the bones from the skull, down over the ribcage, pelvis, femur, tibia and fibula. “I wouldn’t have been chatting with him in the street if I really believed he was capable of this,” she whispers. “I just…I thought it was a game. I thought it was funny, the way he wouldn’t leave you be. I never thought—”
I wrap my arm around her shoulder, pulling her into my side. She’s been the cause of so much of my guilt over the past year, because Ididknow. I knew Fitz was this crazy. I feared he’d done something like this, but I had no way of proving it until now. Mercy’s hurting, though, and she’s still my fucking blood. She will have to deal with this for a long time to come, but for now I’ll comfort her, because that’s what brothers are supposed to do.
“We need to call the police,” she mumbles into my shirt.
“I know. We will. But first we need to find Elodie. I don’t want her to end up on this slab next to Mara. Let’s search the rest of the cave and—”
A loudCRACK!echoes down the passageway behind us—it sounds like a rock, skittering along the ground and hitting the wall. Mercy and I trade a stunned look. “Hide,” she hisses. But it’s too late. There is nowhere to hide. The cavern is where the cave ends, and it’s empty apart from the plinth.
