Page 124 of Fire Fight

My stomach twists with dread, thinking of how Cadence must have immediately called Arnold. And my dad, the man I now believe is a killer framing me for his crime, drove her home to her mentally ill addict of a mother.

A woman who can barely fend for herself, let alone protect her daughter.

I have to make it home to her.

I should be there already.

Panic makes my palms sweaty, and I rub my fingertips dry against my pants, gripping the small tool firmly. If I drop it, the game’s lost. There’s no way I can bend with the restraints.

My mind clears.

My eyes focus.

And I put the trick I learned at boot camp to the test. How to unlock an individual prisoner transport cage using a paperclip.

One shot.

Don’t fuck it up.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

CADENCE

I slowly return to consciousness,feeling groggy.

My shoulder convulses with pain as Arnold twists it behind me, but I trap the sound behind clenched lips.

If he wants me to scream, he’ll have to try harder.

“Are you okay, Mum?”

She mumbles something unintelligible around her gag, and I take it as a good sign.

We’re awake. We’re aware. We’re alive.

Between us, we have a hope of getting out of this jam.

“You don’t need to restrain us, Arnold. We’ll do what you tell us to.”

He snorts, moving in front of me with a roll of packaging tape in hand. For a second, the sensation of déjà vu is so strong, I’m dizzy.

Cracks have appeared in his neat appearance. His shirt is crumpled, thinning hair dishevelled. Thin lines run down one side of his neck, and I think they’re scrapes where his fingernails dug into the flesh.

His eyes are cold, darker and more manic than I’ve ever seen, his gaze lancing through me. A snarl twists his lips, and he moves in fits and starts like a run-down tin robot.

Gone is any sign of the mild-mannered workaholic who greeted me on the first day.

This man is the killer who hid behind that docile shield.

“We’ll do anything you want,” I say, my voice cracking to betray my frazzled emotions. The desperation. “You know Mum adores you, don’t you?”

Arnold unrolls a short length of tape and slaps it across my mouth. So much for trying to bond with my attacker.

This is going about as well as my attempts to fend off his son.

Except, unlike with Drake, there isn’t a pathway to a relationship at the end of this. Whatever Arnold has planned, if we can’t defend ourselves, he can and will destroy us.

I want to believe that’s my pessimism talking.

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