Page 86 of Blind Luck

Oh, hell.

“You didn’t…you didn’t actually try, did you?”

The tears flowed faster. “He broke the bathroom door off its hinges and forced my fingers down my throat until I threw everything up.” Selene hiccupped. “You should leave. I’m not saying that to be mean, and I realise he must be paying you a lot of money to work on the golf thing, but he’s a psycho.”

“I already know that.” Kelsey took a sip of coffee. “He drugged me on Friday.”

“What?” Selene’s hands began trembling, but this time, she put down the cup before she dropped it. Notably, she didn’t question the drugging assertion. “I’m so sorry. Are you okay?”

“He said it was a business meeting, but he insisted we visit the Funhouse. We ate dinner, and then I just… Everything went fuzzy. I can’t remember much.”

Selene had turned whiter, and she’d been pale to begin with. “He didn’t… Tell me he didn’t…”

“Some friends happened to be in the restaurant, and they got me out of there.”

“Sorry, I’m so sorry. Ohmigosh, I thought it was just mestuck in this nightmare. You need to get out of here. Please, you have to go.”

Kelsey took both of Selene’s hands in hers. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I don’t understand why you even came back. Why did you come back?”

“Because I’m worried about my job, and I couldn’t sleep from worrying about you.”

Selene’s trickle of tears turned into racking sobs, and Kelsey wrapped her up in a hug. Heck, I wanted to hug both of them. Selene was barely more than a kid, only twenty-two, and Jace was eight years older. They’d been married for three years now. Three years of hell.

“I’m so s-s-scared.”

“If I can find a way to get you out of here, will you come?”

“Jace will find me. He’ll find me, and he’ll kill me.”

“I have friends who will help. It’ll take some planning, but we’ll get you far away from here.”

My phone pinged, and when Kelsey glanced at her smartwatch, I knew she’d received the same message from Erin. Erin was on the back of Sin’s motorcycle, waiting outside Jace’s apartment building in the Arts District. They’d followed him there from the Neptune.

Erin

Jace just left.

“Will you come?” Kelsey asked again. “I can see you don’t want to stay here.”

Finally, Selene nodded. “I’ll come.”

That evening, I sat on the back deck with Dusk, the overhead fan whirring above us. It was still oppressively hot. One of the neighbours was having a party, and the sound of rock music and laughter drifted on the air, along with smoke from the grill and the aroma of burned burgers.

I’d spoken to Haven earlier, told her how much I missed her, and I couldn’t make up my mind whether to be relieved or disappointed when she told me she was having a great time without me. Nana was staying at the house while I was away, and Zach had fallen so easily into the role of stepdad that I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming some days.

But today had been a reminder that not every woman was so lucky.

“Do you really think we can get Selene out of there?” I asked Dusk.

“Sure. Jace is an easy kind of monster to deal with. Hotheaded, doesn’t think things through, distracted by shiny objects. And we’re the Choir.”

“Well, some of us.”

“Hey, you’ve worked two jobs with us now. We’ll call you Choir-adjacent.”

“I’m not sure whether to be thrilled or terrified by that.”

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