Page 8 of Watch Me Burn

How does Elise know? Why isn’t she freaking out? What’s going on? What is she doing here?

What amIdoing here?

“Where am I?” I ask. It’s the first question that blurts out, but now that I can finally see clearly again, I realize how pointless it is.

The room is about ten by ten, and much smaller than the bedroom in the apartment I rent with Elise. The only thing inside of it is the narrow cot with the cream-colored sheets and squashed pillow. The floor is cement. The walls are cinderblock.

And the door? Gleaming silver bars.

Where am I?

I’m in jail.

I’m in jail because I killed a guy.

Realization slams into me. No matter how I did it, I set that man on fire. I collapsed while he was burning. He must’ve died, and now I’m in jail because Iincineratedhim.

“Holy shit.” My chest seizes as the unholy screams he let out while he burned fill my head again. “Holyshit! That guy… hedied. I killed him.”

Elise sinks down on the cot next to me. Her hand lands on my thigh. “He’s not dead, Bridge.”

“He was onfire?—”

I want her to tell me that I’m wrong.

“Yes. And after Thorn and Jasper finish interrogating him, he’ll probably beg for death before they grant it. But, for now, he’s been sedated, tucked away in a secluded ward in the human hospital so he doesn’t die before the Cadre want him to.”

Human. Over the screaming in my head, I hear the way Elise says ‘human’ like that.

Like she’s not.

Like I might not be, either.

What kind of human shoots fire out of their hands like that?

My tongue darts out. I swipe it along my bottom lip, trying not to heave. My breath is shaky and raw. “He was on fire.”

“You were just defending yourself,” soothes Elise.

No denying that.

“I did it.” It’s a whisper, as though I’m sure someone is listening in but I just want Elise to hear my confession. “I don’t know how. It just… it justhappened. I didn’t mean it.”

“It’s okay.”

It’s not. “And you’re sure I didn’t kill him?”

Elise doesn’t answer me right away. For a second, I’m sure that I did and that she only told me I didn’t to spare me before, but then she purses her lips. “Thorn said I could stay with you until you woke up. I’m supposed to let him know when you do so he can get your side of what happened on Coronet Ave.”

“Thorn.” Oh, no. “You mean Thorn Wilkins? The head honcho of Clarity?”

She nods. “And my boss.”

That’s right. Technically, Elise works for the Cadre. I don’t know exactly what it is that she does, and when I would ask, she’d just tell me it was a boring pencil-pusher gig, but her office is on one of the lower floors of Homequarters.

“That’s why I’m here,” she continues. “Simon and Gilda were the ones who found you. They work for the Cadre, too. That… thatman… was screaming, rolling on the sidewalk, trying to put out the fire when Simon caught him. Gilda was there, too. She found you in a heap on the ground, wearing one shackle on your wrist.”

Hang on…

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