Page 97 of Five Survive

“Maddy’s scared, she doesn’t want to do this!” she shouted back athim.

Oliver took one step forward, but then so did Red, closing the gap. Fuck it, they’d both lost their minds, they could do this dance together. Oliver didn’t listen to her last time, about the note, and two people died. He would listen to her this time. It was Maddy, and she was too damn important.

“Why are you making her do this, Oliver? You don’t know it will work. We don’t know why they let me live just then, but it’s not because I’m working with them, I’m not! I don’t care if you believe me, but we both care about Maddy! She is not expendable, just a pawn for you to use in one of your plans. How many of those have gone right for you tonight? Oh, that’s right, none of them! You can’t send her out there in front of a rifle. If Maddy doesn’t want to do this, then she doesn’t have to, and you can’t manipulate or bully her into it. Or throw her out like you did to me!”

Red’s words had sharpened too, razors dragging themselves up her throat as she threw them toward Oliver. He’d made her think her last thoughts, out there on her knees, and he wouldn’t do that toMaddy too. No. Enough was enough. Oliver’s eyes flashed, but so did hers, jaw clenched, hands still raised but now they were fists.

“Red, take your clothes off!” Oliver barked.

“Oliver, stop it!” Reyna shouted.

“RED?!”

“No,” Red said. “I won’t. I’m not listening to you anymore.”

If Maddy couldn’t refuse her brother, then Red could do it for both of them. She could do that. Maddy took care of her and now it was Red’s turn.

Oliver’s nostrils flared, eyes flickering as they jumped between Red and Maddy, head hinging on his neck. Dark circles in his eyes like fat beetles, legs skittering up his eyelashes. Red stepped forward again and Oliver moved back, legs knocking into the table. This time he would listen, he would—

Oliver checked behind him, down at the table. In the next second, he lunged for something, wrapping his fingers around it.

Red couldn’t see, not until he swung back, the jagged kitchen knife gripped in one hand. Sharp. Reflecting Oliver’s distorted face back up at him. Rivulets of sweat dripping down his skin.

Maddy gasped. Simon stepped back.

Oliver raised the knife and pointed it at Red’s throat.

“I will only ask you one more time!” he screamed, and the knife glinted at her. “Take off your clothes!”

“Put the knife down, Oliver!” Reyna’s voice rang out, louder than the screeching guitars and the thunderous, rifle-crack drums.

Red raised her chin, the tip of the knife only a few inches from her neck, shaking in Oliver’s grip. His eyes were wild, too much black, too much red where white should be, bloodshot where the sweat had trickled in.

She didn’t move, hands still raised. Red had known Oliver all her life, but she didn’t know this version of him, the person the red dot had turned him into, pushing him to the farthest point. But it must have always been there, somewhere inside, this Oliver. Dormant, waiting until he was needed. He didn’t even look like himself anymore, hair greasy with sweat, pushed back in chaotic clumps, skin red and blotchy, those puppet strings making his head hang sideways on his neck again as he studied Red back.

Her eyes trailed down the knife in his hands. And the thing was, Red wasn’t sure. She wasn’t sure this was just an act to get her to do what he wanted. There was a knife in his hands, and part of Red believed he would use it if he had to. He’d thrown her out of the RV once to save himself. She was expendable to him, disposable. And hereshe stood, in Oliver’s mind, between him and his survival. There wasn’t a choice.

“Fine,” Red said darkly, not loud enough over the music, but Oliver read the word on her lips.

He bared his teeth in a faltering smile that didn’t fit his face. He’d won, again.

“Now!” he barked, the knife moving up and down with his voice.

Red inhaled. “Can I at least get some clothes to change into first?”

She gestured with her head, at the overhead cupboards above the sofa, Maddy’s case inside with both of their things.

“No, not you!” Oliver said. “You might use it as a distraction to communicate with the sniper somehow. Hands where I can see them.”

“I’m not working with the sniper, Oliver,” Red snapped back. “I’m the witness, they’re here to kill me.”

“Except they didn’t, did they? When they had the chance.” Oliver’s eyes left her for a second. “Simon, you go. Get some of Red’s clothes out of Maddy’s case.”

Simon stiffened, looking instead at Red.

“It’s okay.” She nodded, and her arms were still raised, but she wasn’t sure she could feel them anymore. Fizzing, like they were made of static, and Red missed that, the quiet sizzle of the walkie-talkie.

Simon walked the three steps over to the sofa and stood up on it, the plastic creaking under his shifting weight as he opened the cupboard, ducking his head to swing the door fully open. He reached up, the angry wasp sound of the zipper on Maddy’s bag.

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