Page 75 of Crushed
“What’s wrong with him?” Issac asked, noticing my slow movements.
“He’s working off a sedative.”
“Ah.”
The backyard had a large Olympic diving pool, with a few palm trees and a guest house in the back. A brick barbecue was on one side of the pool, and a cabana-styled shaded lounge on the other. This was likely a vacation home that Issac once rented out, until he began to occupy it himself.
An older woman with a long gray ponytail was strapped to one of the chairs. Lizzy. Black and blue bruises traveled down her body, concentrated on her legs.
“You live here alone?” Scarlett asked, looking around.
“It’s the only one I can afford these days.”
“It’s nice.”
Scarlett headed to her guardian, followed closely by Issac. I staggered behind the two of them.
“Do you have a knife?” Scarlett asked.
Issac handed her some scissors from the barbecue area, then put his hands on his hips as he turned to me. A sinister gleam flashed in his eyes, reflecting the pool water.
After unleashing Lizzy from the ropes, she moaned in pain. Her face was swollen, round like a cantaloupe. Scarlett asked, “What’s this?”
A metal brace was stuck in Lizzy’s jaw, making it so that she couldn’t shut her mouth. Metal clamped her tongue between two sheets, making her look like a monster’s prey. She wheezed like an animal, and whenever she swallowed, she gurgled.
Where the hell had Issac gotten a contraption like that?
“Get it off of her,” Scarlett said. “Now.”
“Not yet,” he said. “We have some business to discuss.”
Scarlett had said she was prepared to do business like this, but it seemed aggressive of her to be demanding so much so quickly. But seeing her family in a predicament like that, must have made her think otherwise. Jump to conclusions. Because Lizzy was family to her. Her only family, like Rose was to me. I understood that.
“We can discuss everything once you’ve gotten this cage off of her face,” Scarlett said.
Lizzy rubbed her arms and shoulders. A tear ran down her cheek. She glanced back, looking around, her eyes crossing over me, then turning back to Scarlett. Issac pointed to me.
“Not until he’s dead.” I blinked slowly but held my breath. This was part of the deal. To trust Scarlett to handle the worst of the situation. “Let’s talk,” Issac said, his voice carrying across the water.
“I brought him to you,” Scarlett said, her hands on her hips. “Like you said.”
“You didn’t complete the assignment,” he smirked. “Kill him.”
Scarlett tilted her head in defiance. “Are you really going to let me do a job that you should be doing?” She forced a smile. “Wouldn’t it be more satisfying to kill him with your bare hands?”
“It is intriguing,” he said. “There’s no doubt about that. And Icoulddo it, but that’s not why I paid SNC. And remember, Scarlett,” he paused, a smirk on his face, “I have the information you want. The truth behind your parents’ death.”
She stared at him for a moment.
“I don’t have a gun with me,” Scarlett said in a low voice.
“Lies,” he said.
“Fine.” She removed a gun from inside of her jacket and handed it to Lizzy, then nodded towards me. Lizzy limped over to my side, then pointed the gun at my head.
My entire body tensed. I had to trust Scarlett, that she wouldn’t let Lizzy kill me.
“It’s been years since they died,” Issac said. “Don’t you want to know what happened to them?”
