Page 52 of The Monster of Hotel No. 7
Someone moves in close, where Stein was.
They snatch the syringe from my hand even as I close my fingers around it.
“Fucking bitch,” I hear Rex snarl.
A shadow of something swooping down towards her catches my sight in the dark.
I close both arms around her, yanking her away from Rex and whoever was attacking her from behind as there are footsteps from the hall, then the glow of light, and I think Constance must have retreated to get another flashlight.
We don’t have time.
We don’t have time.
Karia is breathing loud, like she is in pain, a whimper leaving her lips, then the cluttering sound of something—perhaps the needle—dropping to the ground. I glide my hand up her back, to her skull, then squeeze tightly around the bones of Arthur’s wrist, his fingers jerking her hair back.
He lets out a groan as I stab his pressure point with my thumb, and I snatch her away, but the light and footfalls are nearer.
We have to run.
“We have to run.”I say it out loud, her body pressed so close to mine.
And she just says one word.“Go.”
The light is closer, flickering haphazardly down the hallway, but as I slide my hand down her arm and her fingers link with mine, we’re moving and still hidden under the cover of darkness. A body looms in front of me—I can sense one of Stein’s guards—but I shove him away with my elbow and Karia and I keep going, sprinting fast.
I know where the closet is. I am good with the dark.
And just as I hear Constance say, “Where are they?” and light gushes into the room, but not aimed our way, I pull Karia into the slip of space in the wall, the scent of bleach and must filling my nose.
We don’t stop.
The space is narrow, and the walls seem to press in around us, but Karia doesn’t stumble and she doesn’t let go of me.
“Go. Afterthem.”Stein snarls the words, and there are heavy footfalls and more light as I reach the sliver of space that leads to an underground network of tunnels I believe were created well before Stein inherited this property. It means he might not know of them, or where they lead. Then again, he knew all about my second lab—and my first—but that would involve merely following me once or twice, hidden in shadow.
Understanding the tunnels would mean more, and I can’t imagine he ever took time to traverse so deep into the dark. Although he is drenched in it, he pretends to be a patron of the fucking light.
I have to angle my body to squeeze into the gap of an entrance. Karia continues after me and we slip free of the closet, into a wider, impossiblydarkerspace. The ceiling is low, though, and I am crouched over as she grips my hand beside me.
And we don’t look at each other, and we don’t stop.
I am so glad you are here with me.
I don’t say that, though, my lungs compressing as we run, my body stiff from all the various wounds it has housed over the years. Sprinting is not ideal for me, but I keep going, and I say something else. Something that matters as we hear voices behind us, Stein and his men—the four people who have made my life a living hell—trying to figure out the closet exit.
“There will be a fork up ahead. Go left.”
“Where?” Karia gasps out, her voice thready and far-off sounding. “Where does it lead?” She doesn’t stop running, though. She doesn’t let go, either.
“Past the front gates. We can… I don’t know,” I admit, shaking my head in the dark, my spine stiff and thighs aching. Once, Stein sliced the muscle there on both legs so deeply he had to hire a nurse to look after the wounds lest they get infected, or my muscle slip from my skin. My only solace is he didn’t bring our family doctor in for that. I think even he knew what the doctor would do to me then. “But they won’t know the way.”
“Sullen,” she whispers, her hand squeezing mine tightly.
I swallow the dry lump in my throat. I don’t know if she feigned her crying when Stein entered the room or if she decided at the last minute to choose me, and I can’t bear for her to tell me if it was the latter. Not right now.
But she keeps talking, and my stomach drops all the same with her words: “One of them… They…they got the syringe. In my…chest.”
Fuck.
