Page 42 of Of Sinners & Salvation
We haven’t even gotten a chance to catch our breath when a tap sounds at the window, and I look up to see a shadow of a man silhouetted against the dark glass.
fourteen
The Salvation
The phone in my hand chimes just as someone taps on the window. I glance down, then back to the bed, where my lambs lie in a blissed-out tangle.
“We have to go,” I say, catching the words on the screen.
SwiftCode001: Cameras restored, locks disengaged.
The tapping comes at the window again. I give the lovers a moment to hurry into their clothes before I open.
“Better get going,” Walker says, smiling through his swollen, purple lips.
“How’d you get down here?” I ask, frowning past him at the empty hallway.
“They let me go once they found out who I am,” Walker says. “Guess that Sincero blood has benefits after all.”
“I guess so.”
“Y’all won’t get so lucky,” he says. “We’d better make ourselves scarce before they realize you’re still here.”
“We’re coming,” Heath says, hopping on one foot as he tries to get his shoe on.
“Still?” Walker asks, arching a brow.
“You were watching?” Saint demands.
“Don’t get your panties in a twist,” Walker says, holding up both hands. “I just came down to warn you. I can’t help what you happened to be doing in plain sight when I got here.”
Saint takes a step towards him, but I give a quick shake of my head. “We don’t have time for that. We need to get Mercy to safety.”
“Or,” she says, pulling on a pair of cheap khaki pants from her closet. “I could stay here. They’re looking for me. They’ll come here eventually.”
“And then what?” Angel demands.
“And then we make our move.”
“No,” I say firmly. “There’s been enough bloodshed.”
My mouth forms the words, but my thoughts tell a different story. My pulse pounds with excitement at the thought of lying in wait, ambushing the guards or doctors, whatever sick fucks come for her. But if I saw them touch her, I wouldn’t be able to hold back. I’d snap like I did once before. This time, I wouldn’t stop at one man. This time, I’d make them all pay.
Mercy starts to argue, but I cut her off. “I’m not putting you in any more danger than you’ve already been in. We need to get you off this island. Now.”
“Fine,” she mutters. “But like you said, I’ve already been here.”
The four of them follow me out into the hallway. Walker steps out of the room last, just behind Mercy.
“When you told me you had boyfriends, I didn’t believe you,” he says, cracking a smile that looks painful. “But damn. You weren’t kidding.”
An alarm blares somewhere in the building, and Walker turns to Saint. “Give me back my phone.”
I hand it to him, and he thumbs it on and hits Nathaniel’s contact from his favorites. “Yo, Nate. Guide us out, cuz.”
“Bet that’s the first time you’ve asked for guidance in that direction,” Nathaniel says, grinning up from the screen.
“Fuck off or I’ll hang up on you.”
