Page 39 of Vicious King

12

Tatum

I could hardly sleepfrom excitement, but I forced myself to lie in bed until eight the next morning. If this plan had even a sliver of a chance at working, I needed all the rest I could get before I tried.

Once I was awake, I headed down the hall to the east wing dining room and served myself a heaping plate of food: scrambled eggs, toast, berries, oatmeal, sliced banana. I also had three cups of coffee and a glass of orange juice.

When I went to sit down, Pri joined me. All she had was a small bowl of oatmeal with brown sugar. Her eyes widened as she looked at my spread of food. “God, that’s a lot!” she said. “What are you gonna do with all that energy? Are you planning on running a marathon later?”

Sort of,I wanted to say. Instead I smiled nonchalantly. “I’m just really hungry today.”

I wished I could fill her in on the plan and take her with me, but it was too risky. For all I knew, I’d be killed if I was caught, just like all the others who’d tried to escape before me. I didn’t want to be responsible for getting Pri killed too.

I’d made my peace with the fact that I might die trying to get out of here, though. Of course I didn’t want to die, not like I did back on the island, but at the same time I had to accept that it was a possibility.

It wasn’t enough to stop me from trying.

I glanced over at a condiments tray by the wall. “Could you please pass me some salt and pepper?” I asked. Pri was closer than me.

She nodded and passed me two little sachets of each. I made a big show of using all the salt and one of the pepper sachets, and when she was distracted with a big mouthful of oatmeal, I slipped the second pepper sachet into my pocket.

Afterwards, Pri and I headed to our usual gym down the hall. We were expected to work out between nine and ten, but I didn’t do anything. I needed to conserve my energy. I loitered around the weight machines instead, occasionally pretending to be setting something up whenever someone walked past, and when Pri questioned me, I told her I was still way too full from breakfast to exercise.

When our session was over, I headed back to my room and into my little writing nook. I got out a notebook and pretended to write (in case anyone was watching me on the surveillance cameras) and then I opened up the pepper sachet on the blank pages before me.

Using two fingers, I scooped up some of the pepper and rubbed it right in my eyes.

“Oh, shit...” I grimaced and drew in a sharp breath before gritting my teeth to stop myself from screaming as my eyes began to water. I knew the pepper would sting a lot, but it was even worse than I expected. It felt like someone had taken a blowtorch to my eyeballs.

When the worst of the pain was over, I stumbled into the bathroom and washed my hands and face. It took a few minutes, but I was finally able to open my eyes all the way up again, and when I looked in the mirror, I saw that the whites were now bright red. Just as I expected.

I headed out into the hallway and followed it down to the end. Mellie had her own room here, and I’d recently discovered its location.

I knocked frantically on her door.

“What is it?” I heard her say from the other side, a sour note in her voice. She swung the door open, hands on her hips and a surly expression on her bare face. I’d never seen her without makeup before. She looked so similar to me without it that we could probably pass for sisters. “Jesus, what happened to your eyes?”

I arranged my face into a distressed expression and pretended to sniff loudly. “Elias had flowers delivered to me yesterday. I must be allergic to them. I leaned down to smell them about half an hour ago, and my eyes suddenly went itchy and red. My nose is running too.”

“Right. What do you want me to do about it?”

“Can you take me to one of the medical wings and get me some anti-allergy meds? Isn’t that part of your job now; to help the girls with stuff?”

She rolled her eyes. “Can’t you just get rid of the flowers? I’m sure the redness and itching will clear up as soon as you do,” she said before stifling a yawn. She was still in pajamas. I must’ve woken her up.

“No. He’ll be mad if I throw away a gift from him. And besides, he’s coming to see me tonight. I can’t look like this,” I said, motioning to my red eyes. “Please, Mellie, I don’t want to make him angry. You know it’s my job to please him.”

She pursed her lips, then sighed. “Fine. I’ll take you. Just give me a second.”

She went back into her room for a moment, then led me down another hall and slipped a keycard into an electronic lock. The door swung open to reveal a small room with shelves and drawers lining the white walls.

Mellie dug around in a few of the drawers before returning to me with a box of Benadryl and a little bottle of eye drops.

She handed me the bottle as she read the back of the box. “Okay, take one of these now,” she said, pushing out the foil packet and removing four tablets. “Another at lunch, and then two more before bed. Don’t take them all at once or it’ll knock you out for hours. You don’t want that if Elias is expecting to see you tonight. Oh, and use the eye drops for the redness.”

“Thanks.”

I went back to my room and headed into my writing nook again. Using another notebook as a cover, I crushed the four tablets into a fine powder with the end of a pen. Then I left it sitting there, covered by a folded piece of paper.

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