Page 14 of Secret (Chicago Underground 6)
“Okay. Have fun.”
There was a long pause. “What?”
Right. We were going now. I was sitting up…pretty sure. I stood and took a step forward and ended up slumping over in a graceless heap.
Luke caught me and hauled me back onto the bed. “Jesus, Shelly.”
“That’s not my name.” My words were slurred.
“It wasn’t just the adrenaline, was it? Oh fuck. What did you do? What did you take?”
“Don’t know.”
He was still talking to me, but all the sounds were like mush in my ears.
I opened my mouth to speak; I didn’t know if anything came out. Until I threw up, and then stuff came out all over the floor—that came out of my mouth.
Luke was there, behind me, supporting me, talking to me, saying urgent words that washed over me. I wanted to go to sleep. Didn’t he see that? I was tired. But then, bless him, he did understand. He tucked me into his arms and told me to close my eyes, don’t make a sound. Hah! As if I could. Nope, I would be right here. He carried me for what felt like hours, days, or maybe just seconds, and tucked me into the backseat of the SUV we had parked a mile outside the compound. But what about the other guys?
“Just wait here,” he said, and yes, I could do that. I closed my eyes and slept.
Chapter Seven
The first thing that registered was the shaking. I was going to vomit, rattling about like a loose bit of change. My eyelids felt heavy. I would have given up, just drifted off on the turbulent waves and crashed onto the waiting rocks, but for his voice. Not Luke.
Henri. Now I was really going to throw up.
My mouth felt like cotton as I tried to speak, to warn someone. Even though I knew it was too late. Even though I knew I was alone in the dragon’s lair. Luke wouldn’t be here. Not any of the men. They would have died first. Or they had let me go. Sometimes you had to give up a pawn to win the game.
I blinked, and everything came into a dreary focus, like looking out a rain-drenched window. Those weren’t raindrops; they were tears. Not the healing kind, not cleansing—they fell on barren land.
Henri stared straight ahead, though I had no doubt he’d registered my waking. He was all black-suited cloth and shadows except for the glint of a ruby-colored vest. He was a smart man, but not the smartest. Strong, but not the strongest. Instead, he had an animal instinct about things of a dark and violent nature. It gave him an unnatural advantage, sustaining his
position in the face of richer competitors. It must have been that, because he had been at the top since I had entered the scene.
“Where have you been, sweetheart?” he asked.
I shuddered, an involuntary response, inescapable remembrance.
There was a book in Philip’s stargazing room. It said that every planet, every moon was constantly leaving orbit—and constantly pulled back by the gravitational force. I couldn’t seem to escape Henri’s pull; I couldn’t seem to stop trying.
“With you.” My tongue felt thick. “Where else would I be?”
He laughed. “That’s a good answer, but it doesn’t quite distract me. I thought we had an agreement.”
“Luke didn’t leave me. You lied.”
“Of course,” he said simply. “What else would I do?”
My eyes drooped shut, and my head lolled against the leather seats as the SUV started to move. He spoke to me distantly, his thick voice washing over me in waves of nausea. I tried to focus, but whatever drug was affecting me was still in my system, clouding everything, even my thoughts.
Henri was talking, telling me about an angry man and a woman caught, but all I could see in my mind was my mother’s face speaking to me. She was telling me a bedtime story, I realized. Or a cautionary tale. Had she really done that? I couldn’t remember, but the picture seemed so clear, more refined now that I was drugged than it had ever been in my waking hours.
There was a king, and a queen so beautiful that none could equal her. On her deathbed, she made the king promise that he should only marry one as beautiful as she, one who had the same golden hair.
He grieved for her upon her passing but eventually scoured the land for a new wife who fulfilled his promise. Although many beautiful women were found, none could compare. The king’s daughter, on the other hand, had grown into a woman. She was beautiful like her mother, with the same golden hair.
So the king decided to marry her, despite the protests of his counselors. Determined to escape her fate, the princess ran away from the castle with only her gold and dresses. She traveled far, and when night came, she hid in the hollow of a tree.
