Page 24 of Ambition

The music is an asset.

My mind flips the thought just like that. The guard does not watch me carefully. Where am I supposed to go? The walls are temporary; erected partitions. So I could run past them; I’m not in chains. Two people brought me kicking and screaming tothisspot, but a gun in my face had kept me right here on the floor.

Likely unintentionally, the guard gave me a gift when he told me the truth. They took me to get to Von, and in turn, to get to Mads for whatever money or information or stolen power they wanted. Mads is the Duo of Writhe, and the leader, Stein, almost never lets his own son leave their house, so Von is the next best thing.

I’m not anything valuable in my kidnapper’s eyes, but even most professional criminals at leasthesitatebefore a homicide. And killing me would ensure Mads gave them nothing.

I don’t look at the guard dead on.

Only out of the corner of my eye, in brief glances. The pinpoint focus of slyly taking in his face gives me something to concentrate on that isn’t the music. It feels as if my eardrums are bleeding and my temples are throbbing, but my brain doesn’t have to zero in on the discomfort.

I sweep my gaze to my right, glancing at the few inches of space between the black partition and the granite concrete.

There is a thick handle beside the pitchfork, maybe to a shovel. I don’t know why the weapons are within reach. I don’t know where I am. But places like this usually come crashing down in smoke and flames after the crimes are committed.

I take a deep breath.

I imagine where I will bury those five tines on the guard’s body.

Another sly glance.

He is looking at his fucking phone.

Another inhale.

An exhale.

Then I spring up and sprint over toward my salvation.

“So that was weird, yeah?”Cosmo’s voice floats from the back seat of the BMW and I have to smile a little as I press my legs together on Karia’s passenger side. “I mean, I’ve seen the aftermath of you and Von years ago, but I’ve never heard him make you—”

“Can we not?” Karia interrupts, glancing at Cosmo in her rearview mirror.

I hide my smile with my hand and turn my head to look out her tinted window. The sky is dark plum, streaks of gray clouds heavy with rain. The paved driveways all wind up and back, homes set into the clutches of forest as Karia drives down the private street all of Writhe lives on.

Despite the fact the houses are hidden, I know what most of them look like.

This is what crime will steal for you.

One day, I want to move back to this street, in my own home. As it is, we pass my childhood house, and I don’t spare it a glance. There’s nothing to see but dark pavement anyway, but I don’t want to think of the ways my parents have coddled me since the kidnapping.

As if I didn’t getmyselfout of there.

But maybe they think that was Von.

Perhaps they’re scared of what I could do if I unleashed myself once again.

“He’s in love with you,” Cosmo continues in a low voice from behind me, but despite the words tome,I wonder if he’s talking more to Karia, the way his tone is almost faraway-like. “If you didn’t know.”

Karia shifts in her seat. “He does look at you like you hung the moon, Isa, I’m not gonna lie.”

I say nothing about that and instead focus on what I’m here for. “I’ll run in,” I tell Karia, folding my arms over my chest and sitting up straighter in the passenger seat. I’m in gray sweats, a cropped black sweatshirt that’s baggy and hangs to just under my ribs. Maybe I should have dressed up, but I feel most like myself intheseclothes.

Both Karia and Cosmo are quiet for a moment as she continues driving around a curve, trees swelling up on either side of the road. Ritual Drive goesfarback, the way all of Writhe and our colleagues need so muchspacefor their homes that are more like compounds.

Pop music plays in the background of our silence, and I force myself to focus on what I’m going to say to Mads when I get there.

Von shouldn’t get my assignments. He shouldn’t have the intel. Even when you brought this to me initially, you should have spoken to me in private. I could have told Von as little or as much as I wanted.

---