Page 58 of The Monster of Hotel No. 7
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“This isthe parking garage for Medici Mall.” I say it out loud after he sets me down near the entrance doors of the shopping center, everything dark inside.
I am not dreaming.
It is wonderful and horrifying, all at once.
I try to get my bearings, taking in the expansive parking garage accessible only by a ramp, which Sullen walked up, carrying me because I couldn’t yet feel my limbs while I slowly came awake. As it is, I am dizzy and nauseous andoff,but at least I can stand.
I feel filthy, like there’s a film coating my skin, and I know it isn’t from the rain still dropping from the night sky beyond the edges of the parking lot.
I assume it’s from the tunnel despite the fact I can barely remember it. All of those moments beforehand, too, are so strangled with thready gaps.
What Idoknow is there’s pressure building on my bladder, and I desperately need to pee. I glance back at the glass double doors leading into a boutique store I don’t like—their dresses are horrendous and fit horribly; the mall will be locked, though.
As it is, I’ve never seen Medici Mall’s parking this empty. A few quiet cars are slotted into spaces under the cement awnings and levels above us, but for the most part, it’s deserted.
“Why did you come here?” I spin to take in Sullen.
He is standing with his back to the stone wall of the building, chin tilted down.
He carried me all this way. He didn’t leave me in the tunnel.
I had a dream that he did. A nightmare he was offered so much more to abandon me. A life like he’d never known, but…he didn’t betray me.
His hands are in the pocket of his hoodie, hood pulled over his hair, dark eyes watching me warily, like he’s worried I might bolt, and he’ll have to lunge for me.
“I…” he starts, then turns his head from me and I trail my gaze over the defined line of his jaw, the stubble there, dark and…hot.
And he saved me.
Us.
He saved us. Maybe he loves me or maybe I’m delusional.
Don’t think that right now. Focus, Karia. You can marvel over the fact you’re on the run with your childhood crush later.
I try to gather the facts I know inside my head. Stein… I hit at him with a flashlight. But the soreness just below my collarbone… one of his men attacked me with the syringe.
“There were the most lights here,” Sullen finally says, answering my question. “Everything else is closed. I was headed this way when you started to come to. I…” He clears his throat. “I didn’t want you to wake up in the dark.” He doesn’t look at me at all.
Immediately, I think of the green glow around the wet specimens. I don’t know anything about taxidermy really, but I don’t think the lighting is necessary. Does he hate the dark? Does it scare him? What happened to him there? Did Stein torment him with it?
A rush of hot anger collides under my skin like a train derailed.
I wanted to kill Stein.
Unlike with Cosmo, I didn’t hold back when I hit him. But I’m not a trained fighter like Von and Isadora. Mom was right. I hated self-defense. I did the bare minimum, the requirements for a child of Writhe. And I’ve never regretted that fact until now.
“Thank you,” I say, trying to keep the anger and regret at bay. It won’t help us now.
Sullen darts his eyes toward me, then looks away again. He says nothing else. And I know no matter how much I am in awe of this moment we cannot stay here forever. We are out in the open. Too exposed.
“The doors will open around dawn. I mean, you probably know that, I just—”
“I’ve never been inside.”
I stop short in my rambling plan, narrowing my gaze on him. “What?” I don’t understand. I know I’m barelyhere,hardly awake, but his words don’t make sense to me. “Aside from this crappy store,” I gesture to the one in front of us, “it’s Alexandria’sbestmall. They even have Gucci here.” My cheeks flame as I say it, taking in his hoodie and black jeans and those circles and sunken lines beneath his eyes as he fixes a glare on me, one high-top sneaker pressing into the wall behind him.
