Page 54 of Ravage
I check the time on my phone before hitting answer as a third round of the chorus begins. Just after one in the morning. Which means I’d barely been in bed for an hour.
“Portia?”
“Rae? Oh, thank goodness you’re okay!” She sounds relieved, but it’s the hushed tones that tell me something’s not right.
“What’s wrong? Are you okay?” I swipe my hand across where the wall and light switch should be and hit air. I shift closer, and my knees knock into something hard instead.
What the—
“There are people here looking for you, Rae,” Portia whispers.
I stop my hunt for the light and straighten. “Where are you?”
“At the club. They’re searching the crowd and asking around for you. Someone told them you work here,” she hisses. I’m shocked at the anger in her voice, especially because it’s on my behalf.
“Okay. I’ll be right down, and I’ll take care of it. Just pretend you know nothing about me and get out of there if anything happens.”
I can’t believe that GE would start a big commotion at a nightclub, so as long as she keeps working and doesn’t mention knowing me, there shouldn’t be an issue. I’ll just have to draw them out of there and figure out what to do after that.
“Hey, you!” I hear through the phone and freeze. “Is that her? I hear you’re friends with who we’re looking for.”
“Hm? Oh, no. Mm-mm. I’m talking to my…girlfriend. Not girl friend. But, like, this girl I’m seeing. You know?”
I drag my hand down my face in secondhand embarrassment. “We need to work on your cover-up skills,” I murmur softly into the phone.
“Oh yeah?” The male voice gets louder, and I hurry back to finding the light switch so I can get dressed. My fingers finally run across one on the other side of the room, and I’m momentarily blinded before an unfamiliar room is revealed.
Wait, not entirely unfamiliar.
“Well then, why did I just hear her on your phone?” he continues, and my stomach drops. “Trying to coach you on what to do?”
Does he have that good of hearing, or is he gifted?
“I’ve gotta go, babe. I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Wait, no—!” I shout into the phone just as she hangs up.
Dammit!
I look around Jackson’s room at the safehouse where he’d taken me to let me shower and clean my wounds. I must have fallen asleep at some point, and he’d moved me to his bed.
“Jack?!” I run through the safe house, checking each room in only a shirt of his that barely hits my thighs. I must have been thoroughly beat for him to have convinced me to wear this, but most of the night after the fight is a blur of pain and exhaustion. “Jackson!” I shout again.
Nothing.
He must still be out disposing of the bodies.
The washing machine has my bloody clothes in them, clean and washed but soaked.
I snatch a pair of sweatpants and a hoodie of Jackson’s and pull those on for now, rolling up the waistband on the pants to keep them around my waist. I get my guns and knives strapped beneath the clothes. Then I’m out the secret hatch through the roof that Jackson showed me last night, shimmying down the hidden steps and cutouts until I’m back on the ground.
It fucking figures that the one night I’m not in my apartment, right where I need to be to stay close to Portia, I’m not.
My body screams the entire sprint to the nightclub. I’d come away from the earlier fight in decent shape, considering my odds, but my torso, neck, and arms are bruised to shit. My arms are clawed up like I got into a fight with a cat and then there’s the pesky bullet wound on my shoulder, cleaned and taped over with gauze.
The hoodie hides it all, though, so aside from looking tiny in large, black clothes that cover me up more than a nun in church compared with what everyone else in the club is wearing, I don’t stand out too much.
“Portia?” I breathlessly ask the bartender—James, I think—while also looking around for any sign of the thugs. My eyes catch on something purple and shiny further down and behind the bar. The lights in the club reflect off of the person, making them stand out like a disco ball and instantly drawing my focus.
