Page 215 of Like Grim Death: Part One
And I hate him for those last two words because they aren’t his own. They’re stolen from me, and he wants to fuck with my heart. Maybe he wants to keep the leash he has on my emotions tight, even as we grow apart in some ways.
But all the same, I know I need to go back to Ella, the one who really has a chokehold on everything I am now.
I wakeup on the floor.
My entire body aches. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth, and even my teeth feel dry. I don’t know if that’s a possibility, but when I part my lips, I taste iron, and I think they’re cracked.
Even still, I feel something wet on my face, and as I push up, my palms against a hard floor, I realize saliva is dripping down from my mouth. I swallow, the motion painful in my throat. Sitting after I spin around, I massage my neck, my body stiff.
Blinking in the darkness, I don’t know where I am, or what day it is, or time, or…anything. I just feel nauseatingly tired, and the last thing I remember is… is…
“We can’t hide here forever.”
I flinch, scooting against a wall in the dark, my heart racing hard. I can’t see anything, I’m scared to move, but… “Atlas?” My voice is hoarse, shaky too, threaded with nerves.
The last thing I remember…he… “You… you drugged me.” I gasp on the last word, making myself small against the wall, backing up as far as I can, turning my head right, to left, and back again. Where is he?
All I remember is Maverick walking out, then Atlas giving me a drink after I used the bathroom, as I cried and I didn’t want it but he said I needed to stay hydrated and…and…
“He’s looking for you.” Atlas’s words seem to come from the night itself.
I take a deep breath, inhaling the scent of spearmint Atlas seems to drag along with him wherever he goes. “What did you do to me?” The words come out broken. Why did I not follow Maverick? Why didn’t I run for him? Why am I so fucking stupid?
Silence answers me.
Then a light flicks on.
A soft glow floods the room, and the first thing I see is Atlas, sitting in a chair set in the corner of the room, his high-top sneakers flat on the floor, elbows on his knees, palms together. His hat is on backward, eyes on me in the dim light from the salt lamp beside him, on the floor.
With wild eyes, I scan the room.
It’s plain. Big. Airy, with high ceilings, but nothing in it, save for the chair Atlas is on like a throne, and a door to my left, at the end of a hallway. “Where am I?”
Atlas smiles. It’s eerie, how even though his smiles aren’t warm, they look that way. As if he’s mastered every human emotion by repeated imitation, and he can fake anything.
“Cain and I saved you. He helped me bring you in here.”
My teeth grind together, a cold sweat breaking out over my neck. “You fuckingdruggedme. Where are we? Why are we—”
“I wanted to keep you safe, Ella. Remember how I tried to warn you? Remember how I wanted totellyou? Do you remember, someone at The Madilyn? Or do you only ever think about Maverick’sdick?”
I blink at him, confused. “I don’t understand. This isn’t your room. What did you want to warn me about? Why did you bring me here?” My questions rise in pitch, higher and higher as my panic climbs.
Atlas closes his eyes, a shadow crossing his face. “I fucked up.”
My heart sinks. “What? How did you—”
“I tried to do the right thing, Ella.” His voice is low, his words soft, and they scare me more. “I tried to help you fight, you know? I tried to warn you. And no one knows about this room, save for me and Cain. We found it once at the same time, when we were younger. He was grieving and I was running. I saved you by bringing you here. But it doesn’t matter. They’ll still find you, and it’ll be worse, when they do.”
Chills crawl down my spine. I sit up straighter, my palms on the floor on either side of my hips. “Atlas. What are you talking about?” Does he know the other things I’ve done? Does he know?
“I needed help too.” It could sound like an admission, but it doesn’t. There’s nothing vulnerable in it at all. It’s selfish, if anything. “Last night, I needed you too.”
“Why?”
He slowly opens his eyes. “You’re not the only one hurting.”
I grasp at straws. “What happened with Natalie?”
