She took a step back from the door and felt her whole face. That had to be a mistake. She had been too shaken up to look at herself when it had happened; maybe it hadn’t been as bad as she’d first thought. Or perhaps it was like the time Monica and her friends had attacked her, or when the cut on her lower back had just healed on its own.
A chill went down her spine.
Not the time to be wondering what was real. She would try to make sense of it all later.
She put her ear back against the door and closed her eyes so she could focus. Some of the fuzziness in her head cleared, and the voices became more precise. So clear they could have been right next to her.
“I need you to find Layla’s mother.”
That had her snapping her head back.
What? Why would Jackson want to find her mother? Not once had he asked about her, and she never talked about her to anyone. Why would he want to know anything about that vile woman? Was this something to do with genetic defects again? Were they still trying to find out if she would pass anything down to the child?
She put her head back to the door quickly.
“We need to get rid of her, Jax. You’re not yourself, and it’s fucking everything up.”
This time she didn’t dare take her ear off the door. Her whole body felt cold. That statement should have had her running scared. Her heart should have been pounding and her body shaking, but she was as calm as ever, still on that fluffy cloud she had woken up on.
Dylan was talking about killing her, and she wasn’t reacting.
Drugs. They had to have drugged her again but how? She hadn’t gone to have another shot because she was trying to wean it out of her system. Why was she feeling okay now when she had been a mess before? When had they got to her again?
“Not yet,” Jackson said.
“So when? When will I get to kill her? Waiting for her to get pregnant isn’t an option.”
She stepped away from the door and walked back to the sofa.
So she had agreed to this deal thinking she was getting a better life for Brit, but she had actually condemned herself to death. Jackson, the man she had welcomed between her legs so many times, was okay with this.
He was okay with having her killed.
She put her hand over her still calm heart and waited for the two men to enter the room. It was the oddest sensation to know she was supposed to feel terrified but feel nothing.
Minutes passed, but no one came in.
And the dreaded sound of the turning key still hadn’t come.
Her eyes widened a second before she got up and rushed to the door. There wasn’t a sound out there. Slowly, she put her hand on the handle and lowered it. And the door swung open.
As she stepped out, she remembered what had happened the first time she’d tried to escape. She hadn’t had a plan then, and she didn’t have one now. But what if she never got a chance like this again?
She trod lightly down the hallway until she got to the stairs. There were never any people on Jackson’s floor, but she had to be careful once she got to the lobby. There was only one place she could think of going now.
If her counsellor or her dad had been there, they would have told her she wouldn’t find her imaginary, talking wolf. They would have told her to try to find her way out of this place instead.
But she ignored that logic as she snuck down the stairs. She was desperate. She didn’t want to die, and there were too many crazy things running through her mind.
When she made it down to the lobby, there was no one around again. A breath of relief escaped her lips as she looked towards the door. This was the easy part. She would have to make it unseen out to the woods.
She was almost at the door when it opened, and two men walked in, talking about someone being taken to the hospital. They stopped when they saw her. Huge men, like all of them, in shorts like the security guards she had seen going training. Her escape attempt had been thwarted before she had even tried. Jackson would kill her for this.
But once again, her heart remained calm.
She waited for the men to raise the alert and grab her, but they stood aside and nodded at her. Like normal people.
They were letting her through.