Page 72 of Maid for the Alien Prince

I turned my head left and right and noticed a narrow, horizontal crack of silver.

Moonlight. It was nighttime. The same night I’d been kidnapped? Probably.

Without the moonlight, the room would have been pitch black. It illuminated the mostly unremarkable concrete walls and brickwork beneath my hands that had the appearance of having been hastily put together.

I took the risk to sit up, and although my head swam, it had a noticeably smaller effect than the first time I had attempted to move.

I shut my eyes and focused on a single point on the wall—a single hairline crack. It became my guiding star.

I waited until the world stopped turning before moving my head once more. With each pass, the world slowed and then stopped spinning.

“Awake yet?” a familiar—but unwanted—voice said.

It was Ges.

Would I never be rid of him?

In my current state, I hadn’t noticed he’d been standing there in the corner of the room. No doubt watching and gauging my condition.

Despite my throbbing skull and painful headache, I was in good shape. My ability to focus was coming back and it was only a matter of time before I was capable of recalling this place and attempting another escape.

Ges drew up close to me so silently that it was only the rustle of his clothes that gave his position away. He zip-tied my hands behind my back and then my ankles.

So much for attempting my valiant escape!

“Why are you doing this?” I said groggily.

“You gave me no choice. You stole my future from me.”

I snorted. “I didn’t steal anything from you. You stole it from yourself. If you had done your job properly, there would have been no need to fire you.”

“Everything was fine until you arrived!” he spat.

Everything was certainly something, but it was not fine. Arguing with him this way at least bought me time to recover. I feared he might deal me another blow, knocking me out cold before I was able to reason with him.

Then, like a freight train, it hit me. I knew the location of this room.

I knew where I was!

I wasn’t tucked away in one of the forgotten and dilapidated barns. I hadn’t even been taken off the estate. I was locked up in one of the secret passageways!

An empty room that I had played in with Emma—no, maybe it wasn’t Emma, but one of my other childhood friends—and we had a monster game of hide and seek…

And this was where I had found her.

The bricks had been less green then, less slippery, and the crack that the moonlight shone through was north-facing, formed by subsidence in the foundations.

I wondered if I could shout and get the guards’ attention.

Possibly.

But I would only have one chance to do that, and did I really want to waste it by yelling randomly? Not if I had the opportunity to make another escape. I might only have one more chance to get help. If I was going to do something, I would need to do it soon.

Ges could strike me at any time, laying me out cold. Who knew where I might wake up then, and how dire my situation would be?

I hastily squirmed against the wall, my back coming to what felt like a thick metal pipe. I grasped at something—anything—that I could use to defend myself with.

Behind my back, my hands scrambled for a stone, a rock, anything… And came across something small and hard. I immediately tapped it against the metal pipe.

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