Page 59 of Corpse Roads

These brave human beings were all my sisters. I never had a family, but somehow, I found kindred spirits in the darkness of my captivity. We were bound by tragedy rather than blood.

I’m the only one that knows what happened to them. The weight of responsibility is crushing me to death. I have to remember all of them, even if it kills me.

“Do you know these women?”

I look up, and the world snaps back into focus. I know these people. Hunter. Enzo. Leighton. My brain stumbles, attempting to reorientate itself. It’s excruciating, the way reality punches into me.

“Harlow?” Hunter repeats.

All I can do is nod.

“I’m sorry, but I need you to say it out loud for the record.”

I stroke my fingertips over Christie’s braid, her photograph pinned a few metres down from Tia’s. She didn’t like me much, preferring to shiver and weep alone in a curled-up ball.

I kept her company regardless, whispering whatever comfort I could. She died as silently as she lived. I hate myself for admitting that I was glad in some way. It made it easier to watch her violent death.

“Yes.”

“How?” he demands.

Turning to face them all again, I gulp hard. “There was a cage next to mine in the basement where I was kept. It was rarely empty.”

Hunter looks away, shuffling through papers on his desk with his scruff-covered jaw set in an unyielding line. Conversely, Enzo refuses to look anywhere but straight at me.

His expression is even more murderous than usual, borderline animalistic. He looks ready to tear the entire office apart with his bare hands. Seeming calmer, Leighton smooths his hair in an absent-minded fashion.

“All of them?” Hunter clarifies.

“Yes,” I make myself say. “Some of them I recognise, but I don’t remember exactly what happened. There were so many.”

Hunter and Enzo take seats on the opposite side of the table. There’s no sign of the doctor from the hospital or the mysterious Theo. I take my seat, feeling small beneath their brutal gazes.

Hunter places his phone in the middle of the table. It’s already recording, but he repeats today’s date and all of their names. I’m startled to find that it’s nearly November.

“Introduce yourself,” he orders firmly.

I clear my throat. “Harlow.”

“Surname?”

The name Michaels doesn’t fit, even if it’s the name my parents used. If I prescribe it to myself, I will be nothing more than their daughter.

Just another cruel, malicious joke from God that inflicts misery on others. I have to be more than that. If I could strip my skin off and burn it to escape them, I would.

“I don’t… ah, know. I can’t remember.”

Hunter nods, his pen poised. “Tell us everything.”

CHAPTER 13

THEO

SCAVENGERS (ACOUSTIC) - THRICE

Fingertips flying across my keyboard, I squint at the breadcrumb trail I’ve been tracking for the past week. It’s painstaking work, using a mixture of CCTV footage, private feeds and traffic cams.

I’m tracking the path of the victim to London—Harlow, I should say. She is a person, after all. I’m not great with those.

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