One last chink in the armor. Our last safe haven.
I don’t know his name, but I’ll remember his face from the way it twisted when I yelled for him to leave. I don’t bother remembering the old one’s names. By the time they’ve been here that long, their minds have already gone or are well on their way.
I don’t know what’s on the director’s agenda for today, but I have a nagging suspicion I’m not going to like it. Any further word of defiance isn’t going to bode well for the hierarchy around here.
“I guess it doesn’t matter,” Ives says, clearly not coming to the same conclusion I have. “We can’t act without Kingsley.”
A snarl pulls up the outer corner of my mouth. Of all the nights for Kingsley to switch, it had to be tonight. It had to be because of her.
Pale morning light has begun to spill out of the doorways with windows facing outward. Sure, without Kingsley we wouldn’t have been able to fulfill our full plans for Thalia last night anyway…but I’d hoped that a night stuck down in the darkness would have at least taught her to properly fear us.
Now we have the opposite problem on our hands.
Not only is Ives shifting uncomfortably on his feet, unable to fulfill the tawdry need that drives him—as it drives all of us—but we’ve missed out on a valuable opportunity to gain control, just when we need it most.
“We’re going to have to be careful, Ives,” I say. “Or else Thalia’s going to get the wrong idea.”
“Wrong idea of what?”
I turn, half disgusted, to glare at Bentley.
Kingsley’s alter ego steps out of the shadows, his calm demeanor so opposite of the man I’ve grown to know over the years here in the asylum. Whereas Kingsley I would trust with my very life, Bentley is another story entirely.
My lips press into a tight line. Ives steps to block the open door, his arms crossing dangerously in front of him. Bentley, however, completely disregards this. Again, unlike Kingsley, Bentley has never actually seen why Ives was put into the asylum. Or why he’s continued to earn his place here after so many years.
Bentley looks from me, to Ives, and finally to the door. It takes him a second, but I see recognition dawn across his stupid, innocent face.
“What did you do?”
He brushes past Ives to halt at the top of the stairs. Just looking in isn’t enough for Bentley, however. At the sight of the carnage below, he rushes down the creaking stairs and disappears for a moment in the dust down below.
When he re-emerges, his face is slowly coloring.
“Nothing,” I snap, glancing once more down past him at the truth of the matter. We did nothing.
Bentley steps out of the stairs and steps up into my face. He isn’t usually one for confrontation, but he’s balled up his fists in righteous indignation. Ives steps forward, but I wave for him to stop. There’s only one way to get Kingsley back, and violence isn’t the answer. Not unless we’re desperate…which we’re not. Not yet, anyway.
Still, I don’t step back.
Bentley’s breath is hot on my face. It smells of bile and vomit, one side effect of the sudden switch in his personalities.
“You leave the girl alone,” he growls. “Or I’ll ruin you.”
I take one lazy step back. “And how do you plan on doing that?”
Bentley shakes his head. “I remember things, some things,” he says, tapping the side of his head.
I roll my eyes, ready to dismiss the threat when suddenly Bentley grabs me by the wrist. For a second, both Ives and I freeze. Out of the corner of my eyes, I see the tremble start.
“You have to stop,” I say.
Bentley just grips harder. “I know something,” he says, simply. “Kingsley doesn’t know, but I do.”
Ives is shaking all over now, but Bentley’s words have me frozen in place.
“There’s no way—”
“Stay away from the girl,” Bentley says. “There’s something going on here at the asylum. Something even you don’t know.” Then he glances over at Ives and as quickly as he stepped up, he backs off. The easy-going look returns to his face and he shoves his hands deep in his pockets. “I see that now.”
Ives calms, but I still stand on a taught wire. That was close. In more than one way.
My palms have grown sweaty.
As soon as Bentley turns and ambles off, Ives steps up beside me.
“What did he mean by that? You think it has something to do with Kingsley, the other day when he—”
My eyes are trained on my traitorous friend’s back. I just shake my head.
“It’s nothing,” I snap, cutting him off. But it isn’t nothing. I feel a gnawing burn in the pit of my stomach. It takes everything in me to keep my emotions in check. “But we’re going to have to back off Thalia for a bit.”
“But—”
“Just until we have Kingsley back,” I say, cutting him off. I turn my back to him so he can’t see the way just saying her name affects me. Every part of my body burns at the thought of her.
But Ives is too smart. He catches the flash of my eyes in the reflection of a mirror on the wall and quickly looks away. I avert my own gaze, knowing all too well what I’ll find. The throbbing in my loins ensures that the transformation has already begun, despite my best efforts.
Ives’ voice is small for such a big man.
“You know all it would take to make her submit.”
I bristle. “But not without Kingsley. That wouldn’t be fair.”
Ives is watching me too closely. This isn’t the first time. I think he’s had his suspicions for a long time.
“So it’s true then,” he says. “You’re scared. The great Price Presley, scared of the new director.”
My head snaps to look at him. “Never,” I snarl, and for a moment, it sounds like I’m the animal instead of the other way around.
“Then why’re you acting like it?”
I pretend not to know what he means. I pretend not to think of the last time. I busy myself by straightening the lapel of my white jacket, focusing my thoughts on control, wrapping my mind around it like the grip of iron fingers I’ve felt stretching ever closer to my throat.
“Haven’t you felt it, Ives?” I ask, in way of answer.
He licks his lips. For one second, I watch his eyes shift over to where Bentley just disappeared.
“You think it’s the director?”
I tilt my head a bit to the side. “No. It was before him. Before the girl, even.”
There’s been scores of girls…but there’s no doubt which one I’m referring to. For the first time since the incident, mentioning it doesn’t make him start to shake.
For years we’ve been using the girls to control this asylum. But as of late things have been different. It was more than the last time, more than how the last girl ended up in a zipped-up-body bag instead of at my beck and call.
Somewhere not far off, there’s the sound of the rest of the asylum waking. It’ll be the kitchens first. Then the cleaners. Not long after, the rest of the guests will be pouring down the stairs and out onto the lawn to see what this new director has cooked up for us. Another grand gesture, I’m sure, that’ll ultimately end up falling flat.
“Something tells me we’ll find out what it is soon enough.”
Ives grunts, and I can tell he doesn’t agree. He’s a man of action. He doesn’t like to wait and find out. Well, that’s too bad. We’ve already tried the alternative…and turned up empty.
Ives glances down the hall where Bentley disappeared again. Other voices have started echoing towards us. He’s heard the asylum waking now too.
He stops beside me, his voice still low but gruff.
“I think we both know where this ends.” He looks at me. “Unless you’ve forgotten, no one ends up here at the asylum by mistake.”
I straighten up. “Maybe this time’s an exception.”
Ives scoffs. “Or maybe the delusions are finally getting to you too.” He brushes past
me towards the noise. “Don’t forget, Price, these walls aren’t just here to keep us in.” He stops and looks back. “They’re to keep them out too.”
I grimace at his retreating back. As much as I hate Ives for what he’s insinuating, I also know he’s right. What I want is forbidden for a reason. For the same reason I’ve never tried to escape.
Life in the outside world isn’t easy for a sex addict.
It’s even harder for an incubus.
15
Thalia
There’s no blood on the bedroom floor in the morning. No sign of the droplets that kept me from sleep.
See?
I close my eyes for one second, but the voice doesn’t disappear. It doesn’t float away into the ether as it did every time before.
You really do belong here. You really are mad.
When I finally pry my eyes open again, Adelaide sees me looking in her direction, but then quickly turns away.
She waits until I’ve gotten, sore and exhausted, off the metal frame of my bed before she says, quietly, “Even the sane go mad when left alone long enough.”
“Are you inside my head too?” I say grumpily back, groaning loud enough to wake the entire hall as I reach up to stretch my back. I mean it sarcastically, but a happy look flutters across Adelaide’s face that instantly makes me feel a little guilty.
How long has she been alone here? She never mentions having a roommate before…but I’ve gotten the feeling that she’s been at the asylum longer than most of the other residents.
I lean against my bare dresser while Adelaide fusses over her hair with a blunt comb. I’ve left mine to mostly turn to dreadlocks at this point. I always thought it would be a good look on me—though I wouldn’t know. This place doesn’t have any mirrors. At least, not any real ones. It’s hard to get a real look at myself in the once-polished metal sheets meant to serve as sorry replacements.
I take a second to examine my feet. Even though two of my toes are still sore, I don’t think either of them is actually broken after all.
I consider asking Adelaide about any previous tenants, but don’t want to risk her taking back her offer to try to sneak me to the meeting on the grounds. I’ve seen the way she shuts down before when I ask her questions. Better not risk it. Not today.
“Besides, I didn’t spend last night alone.”
She freezes in her spot.
Adelaide looks me over again, now seeming genuinely surprised to see me in the bed to her side. Or, at the very least, surprised to see I’m still in one piece.
“What?” I snap, when I catch her staring at me like I’ve grown a second head. I casually reach up with my free arm to check that I haven’t. I mean, I am trapped in an asylum for the insane . . . who knowns what crazy thing might happen next.
More likely, I realize as she shakes her head and takes a minute to carefully tuck the comb away in her drawer of plain white uniforms, she didn’t expect me here at all. Not after last night.
Price and the others probably make a habit of throwing all the “greenies” down the stairs at one point or another. And from the look on her face, they don’t usually return them in the middle of the night, practically unscathed.
I catch her looking longingly at her wrist next, but I’m grateful she doesn’t paint the inside of our bedroom blood-red first thing in the morning. My stomach is already grumbling and I’m not sure I’d be able to eat if I saw that sight right away.
And I can’t have her derailing us. Not this morning. Not until I find out what the director has to say that has this whole asylum turned upside down.
Oh, just you wait.
Adelaide isn’t the only one looking at me oddly this morning.
Another girl stands right outside our door as soon as I fling it open, startling the crap out of me.
She’s heavy set with a kind, plain face. She doesn’t so much as flinch, just smiles sweetly at me with this sort of weird, child-like look on her adult face. It makes it hard for me to tell how old she really is.
I try not to stare but can’t help myself. She’s either fifteen or fifty…no idea. She just keeps staring at me, so I stick out my hand and try to introduce myself. Her eyes flicker down at the gesture, and then up to the space behind my head without saying a word.
“This is Jane,” Adelaide whispers. “She doesn’t like to be touched, otherwise I’m sure she’d shake your hand. Also . . . she can’t speak.”
“Oh,” I say, as quietly as I can so I don’t draw even more attention from the other guests and nurses walking by—each one who seems to pause a second at the sight of me. “Are you . . . is she . . .” I don’t know if asking her if she’s mute is rude or not, so I ask the next even more insensitive question that pops into my mind instead, “is it that she can’t speak . . . or won’t?”
“Does it matter?”
Adelaide must sense the next question I’m about to ask, because she says flippantly over her shoulder as she passes by, “Jane was in treatment all week with Dr. Silver. You’ll get a lot of that here. People disappearing for a while…” and here, she looks over me again with a flutter of her lashes, “…and then suddenly just popping back up.”
The three of us make it halfway down the stairs before I have to stop and pull Adelaide into a corner to keep from running into a couple more confused-looking guests. Jane looks confused, but follows us, her hands clasped at the middle of her stomach, wringing anxiously.
The final straw is when a nurse stops and stares at me for a second, a look of shock and surprise on her face, before continuing on with her brisk walk back up the stairs and muttering something about how “…things have changed…”
“Alright,” I say, crossing my arms across my chest. “What’s going on. Why is everyone looking at me funny?”
Both Adelaide and Jane share a look.
“It’s just . . .” Adelaide says, “I didn’t expect you to look so . . . chipper . . . this morning. Not after what you said earlier, about last night.”
I scoff.
“Chipper? Hardly.” My eyes shift to the side. “I’m about one step away from . . .” I trail off. Normally I’d say some half-assed joke about murder . . . but isn’t that part of why I’m here in the asylum in the first place? I keep having to remind myself of that.
Also, despite the fact that I’m imprisoned here against my will, I do feel surprisingly okay this morning. You know, despite being thrown down the stairs late last night and left basically for dead in a forgotten secret storeroom. I don’t even want to begin to think about whatever it was I saw in that corner. Implements of torture, I think. Even if that’s not their original purpose, I have no doubt it’s what those boys planned to use them for.
I guess all the excitement did force me to actually fall asleep, at long last. Even if it was for just a couple hours I do feel surprisingly refreshed.
Finally, I glance up the stairs. If neither Adelaide nor anyone else wants to discuss the fact that whatever those boys did to me last night wasn’t as bad as it usually is, then it’s exactly what needs to be talked about.
“So last night…”
Adelaide’s eyes grow wide, only confirming my thoughts.
“The boys. Price, Ives, and Kingsley…is it? How the hell are they allowed to get away with this hazing shit?”
“But…” my roommate looks over me again, “I thought you were fine.”
“I wouldn’t say fine. I was locked in the basement for crying out loud.”
“And that’s it?”
I arch an eyebrow at her. We stop speaking while a couple more patients or guests, or whatever they want me to call them, slip by. One of the older ladies makes eye contact with me, and like all the others, frowns a little at my sight.
As soon as they’re gone, I lean back in a little closer and whisper, “You see that? What the fuck was supposed to happen last night that was so bad everyone’s surprised to still see me…well…alive?”
Adelaide shakes her head vigorously and J
ane keeps glancing over her shoulder, up the stairs, down the little space that looks down on the flight below, but neither will answer. I ask a couple more questions, but each one only makes them look more nervous.
Finally, Adelaide’s had enough.
“Stop!” she says, her voice loud enough to startle not only Jane but a doctor stepping out onto the landing below. She quickly lowers her voice, but the sternness still remains. “We can’t talk about this. Not now…at least.”
I can sense that I’m not going to get anywhere with her, so I just follow the two of them down the last few flights of stairs.
There’s a slight scent of mildew in the stairwell, but it’s nothing like the basement last night. My head still feels stuffy and swollen from the short time I spent down there. Well, by short, it could have been minutes…it could have been hours. There was really no way to tell.
I realize now that if I truly thought I was stuck here forever, I might be scared too.
After all, I’m not insane. I don’t belong here. In a few weeks I’m getting out. I just have to survive until then. And . . . I remind myself as I catch Adelaide chewing on a hangnail a little too vigorously . . . stay sane in the process. It’s a lot easier to fight back when there’s an end in sight.
And that’s something neither of them were ever offered, from the sound of it.
Ha. That little voice in my head chuckles. Sane? Since when?
I ignore it. If this voice keeps it up long enough, I’m going to have to give it a name.
Jane’s watching me funny, so I quickly clamp my mouth shut before I say something I’ll regret and just follow her and Adelaide back down the last few flights of stairs until we’re on the ground floor.
There’s still no sign of the boys at breakfast, though I continue to get my fair share of odd looks. A young woman runs past us as soon as we get in line for breakfast, her eyes wide and vacant, and her mouth held open in a soundless scream . . . yet I still catch more people looking at me than at her.
Asylum Bound Page 9
