Page 196 of Everything Under the Sun

Drusilla shook her head.

“Kade and I made a deal when I first came here: He never forces me to watch those barbaric fights, and I don’t cut off his dick while he’s sleeping.”

I blinked, stunned.

“Now listen closely,” she told me, peering intensely into my face. “You exit the building the same way Kade brought you in—through the big glass doors—and then you slip past the school busses.” She grabbed my elbow and pulled me along to the window. “Do you see that building across the street?” She pointed, and I nodded. “Behind it—you can’t see it from here in the dark—but there’s a fork in the road. The street signs are gone, but the one you’ll want to take is the one with the old accounting office on the right; the building is blue.”

I listened carefully, drawing a map in my head using the things I’d already seen, and hoping the rest I would remember.

“Go one block down that road,” Drusilla continued, “and turn left. The building you’re looking for used to be a Humane Society. They keep the fighters locked in there, in the cages.”

Atticus is locked in a cage? I couldn’t bear the thought!

Kade entered the room behind us then, and Drusilla shuffled away from the window without looking the slightest bit guilty.

With frayed nerves making my palms sweat, I stood there for a moment, watching Kade as his eyes swept over me.

“You look good,” he said, nodding with approval.

I didn’t have it in me to respond; I was too overwhelmed with what would happen next. And it hadn’t gone unnoticed in my mind that before I could get to where Atticus was being kept, it would have to be after he had fought to the death. And it also didn’t go unnoticed that Drusilla had used the word “locked” regarding Atticus’ cage, but I’d have to figure out how to get him out of the cage when I got there. If I made it there. If Atticus made it back there.

“Are you sure you don’t want to join us this time?” Kade asked Drusilla, a hint of sarcasm in his tone.

She smiled back at him, but I could tell right away that, just like before, it was fake.

“Absolutely sure,” Drusilla answered. “I have work to finish here”—she waved a hand at the strips of fabric on the floor—“got two buyers this week, and one is coming by in an hour to pick up her order.”

Kade waved a dismissive hand. “Whatever,” he said, and then turned his attention to me, and the look in his eyes made me terribly uncomfortable. “I may sell you soon anyway,” he told Drusilla. “Replacements are easy to come by, and I need a companion who doesn’t complain so much.”

Slave, Kade, you mean to say slave.

“And one who can keep a fuckin’ room clean,” Kade added. “Look at this mess; you were supposed to clean it before I got back.” He gestured a hand at the room; he hadn’t noticed—or cared to acknowledge—Drusilla had cleaned everything else and left only the fabric where it was before.

“This is my work,” Drusilla told him. “It will be gone by the time you return from the fights.” My gut told me she was referring more to herself.

“It better be.” He took me by the hand and said, “I saved her from having to fight—she would’ve been killed that night, no doubt—and this is how she repays me.”

I said nothing.

Drusilla glowered at him with his back turned.

“Good-bye, Thais. I wish your love well, and that he is victorious tonight.”

I swallowed hard; tears stung the back of my eyes, but I was getting better at holding them down.

“Thank you,” I said.

I wanted to wish my friend farewell, and tell her I hoped her plans to escape would work out this time, but I could not say such things in front of Kade.

“I’ll see you later,” I said instead, and maybe Drusilla understood what I really meant.

The air was rife with smoke: cigarettes and trashcan fires and marijuana and something chemical and foul I could not place. The arena was so packed with people that the potent stench of heavy perfume and body odor and thick sweat made my stomach turn and my head swim. And as Kade led me to the bleachers, and I looked out at the crowd, I was awed by the number of people in attendance. Paducah still didn’t seem as populated as Lexington, but almost every single person that resided here I thought had to be present in the moment.

The ‘arena’ was the gym of an abandoned high school, with tall dingy brick walls with scaling bleachers on both sides that almost reached the ceiling. People packed every seat, and stood shoulder to shoulder beneath the bleachers and all around the room in every direction, even blocking the four exit doors. And they packed the gym floor, leaving just enough space for the fighters to battle it out.

The area was brightly-lit with several solar-powered balloon lights mounted on wheeled contraptions, set up all around the basketball court.

I sat with Kade fourth row from the bottom, and as Kade carried on conversations with those around us, I tried to keep a low profile by acting intimidated by all the noise, when, in truth, I was afraid only for Atticus, and he was all I could think about. Past the busses. Take the road with the accounting office on the right—blue building. One block, turn left. Humane Society. Fighters locked in cages. Locked in cages. Locked in cages—

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