NEARLY Trilogy

by Ashley, Devon

  It took everything I had to go down the hall again, making sure to go the opposite direction they were sweeping. I hugged the wall and avoided every camera as best I could. Waiting for each one to make its pass and turn in the opposite direction strained my heart. Though it probably wasn’t, it felt too slow. Like I was trapping myself out there to be picked up.

  Several more ducks and dips later, I caught the shape of someone as they slipped into the nearest room. She was so fast all I could see was a mess of long brown hair. Megan?

  I rushed through the hall, almost forgetting to watch for cameras.

  “Megan?” I called. When she turned I felt my chest cave in. It really was her! “Megan!”

  She ran towards me calling my name, the same amount of disbelief in her voice. We threw ourselves into each other, embracing a hug tighter than ever before. Not even Claire and I had ever hugged this hard. Tears streaming down both our cheeks, we smiled, neither of us sure what to say. Like we both had doubts this day would come.

  “You’re okay,” she murmured in my ear.

  “You shouldn’t have come,” I whined on a whisper. “It’s what Friggs wanted.”

  Megan pulled away, sweeping the tears off her face. “I know. I’ve always known. From the moment you disappeared and I read your journal I knew.”

  “I should’ve told someone.” I sighed heavily. “If only I hadn’t tried to keep everything private. I just–”

  “I know,” she interrupted. “Believe me, I understand not wanting to share certain things after everything that’s happened. But we have to get out of the open,” she added, looking behind her, like she expected someone to turn the corner that second. She grabbed my hand and tugged me hard, trying to lead me away.

  “Stop!” I cried, tugging equally back. Her eyes wide, she looked befuddled. “Thea!” she said urgently, “we have to go! Now!”

  “We’ll never get out of this house without help!” I argued.

  “I know. I have help. We just have to hide until it’s time.”

  “We have to find Finn. He’ll help us. He’s just been waiting for the right time to get me out.”

  She looked at me like I was crazy, shaking her head like no fucking way. “Thea, no. The right time? He’s not what you think. No one in this place is the good guy.”

  The house was definitely filled with its share of assholes, but Finn wasn’t like that. He was compassionate and protective. Trustworthy. Possibly in just as much trouble as us so long as that fortune was being handed his way. “Finn isn’t Charles or Zander or Friggs. He’s stuck here too!”

  “Zander fought for me!” she cried, throwing her hand over her heart. “He came into this fight with me. His ass is on the line as much as mine!” Her face fell before me, eyes falling to the floor. “Was,” she corrected. Whatever was going on she managed to swallow it down, looking up at me with even more resolve than ever before. For a second I didn’t even recognize her, not with anger defining her features. “His ass was on the line. But now he’s dead. And we’ll be too if we don’t find a place to hide. Think. This place is huge. Have you seen anyplace good we can get lost in?”

  “Yes,” I quietly admitted. But she wasn’t going to like it. “This way.”

  I led her through the corridors and down the stairs to the second floor, then past the door I knew so well. Finn’s room was empty, and I locked the door behind us.

  After taking in the apartment, her head whipped around to face me. She immediately asked with suspicion, “Where are we?”

  My hand cut through the air. “Just hear me out.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” she burst, fisting her hands at her sides.

  “Please trust me. If you’ve ever been able to trust me at all, then trust me now. Finn will help us.”

  “First tell me this,” she demanded, stepping up in a way that was surprisingly intimidating. “Did you ever at one point feel this strongly that Friggs was a good guy?”

  Aghast, I took a step back. I spit out a few useless syllables. This wasn’t the same thing! “Finn isn’t Friggs! He hates this goddamn place! He wasn’t raised here. His uncle was the only family he had to take him in.”

  “He’s lying, Thea! Just like Friggs did. It’s a fucking manipulation with these guys. Just one after another! They spin you in so many fucking circles you’re too dizzy to see what’s right in front of you!”

  I shook my head profusely. “No,” I stated firmly. “No! You have no idea how much he’s protected me!”

  “Thea, I have been wrapped up in this world far longer than you–”

  “Don’t give me that shit!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. “I have been through fucking hell here!”

  “Yet you seriously think you can trust one of them? After all that?”

  Both our heads whipped in the direction of the door. The lock was being jiggled. Hard. Megan put her hand out in front of me, then stepped in front of me, as if that single act could protect me.

  “Thea?” a familiar voice cried from the opposite side. “It’s me. Let me in.”

  “Finn?” I called on a gasp, my heart filling with relief. I stepped around Megan but she gripped my wrist. With fear in her eyes, she pleaded, “Don’t. Please. If you trust me at all, trust I’ll get you out of here without anyone else’s help.”

  “What can you do that he can’t?” I challenged.

  “Please don’t ask me to tell you that. They have ears everywhere. If they find out what I know, there’ll be no escape.”

  That sealed the deal for me. If her plan failed, we still had a backup. Finn.

  Firmly, I replied, “Then we definitely need him.” To her distress, I yanked myself free of her grip and hurried to the door, unlocking it. Finn dove through and slammed it shut behind him, locking it back up. Then he wrapped me up in his arms and squeezed the ever-loving life out of me. I could feel the pound-pound-pound of his chest pumping overtime.

  “Why the hell did you leave this room?” he asked in a panic. “I’ve been running these fucking halls! The doors were unlocked and you were gone. I thought they came and got you!”

  “Because,” I said, turning my head to look towards Megan. She had backed herself up all the way to the window and was now peeking beyond the curtain. “I heard on the radio that a girl was running loose.”

  That got her attention. With wide eyes, she inquired, “What radio?”

  I turned to point at the bar but the radio was no longer there.

  “I had it,” Finn quickly interjected. “I was listening in as I searched for you. I must have left it somewhere.”

  Megan’s head cocked sideways. With an unamused expression, she muttered, “Convenient.”

  After giving me a questionable look, she moved to the wooden barstool and picked it up. I gasped when I realized what she was doing, squeezing Finn’s hand with everything I had. The stool smashed against the floor, splintering off into several pieces. She quickly snatched the longest piece, then eyed the man I moved to step before.

  What the fuck was she thinking? “Megan! Stop! He’s not a fucking vampire!” I snapped.

  But she only had eyes for him. In a heartbeat she went from a dead cold glare to a look of complete surprise. “NO!” she screamed, though for what, I didn’t know.

  Thea’s body fell lifelessly to the floor, her look of confusion something that would be burned into my memory forever. The pole dropped to the floor as my hands formed a steeple over my nose and mouth. I screamed at the top of my lungs, so hard my muscles strained from mouth to belly.

  Thea hadn’t seen it. How Finn’s expression went completely dead behind her. How his hands moved to her neck without hesitation and snapped it. He was so fast. So fast I couldn’t even move before it was done. And all Thea could focus on was the fact that I was screaming, and she had no idea why.

  His cold, dark eyes looked from the floor to me with a single gut-cringing blink. I couldn’t breathe, yet I was moving the largest breaths in and out of my lungs
. My hands were shaking when they finally fell from my face, and I used them to brace my weight on the wall.

  “There. Now that that’s taken care of.”

  That was it for my body. Finn moved toward me, but instead of running, I collapsed, unable to take my eyes off the pair staring lifelessly at nothing. “Oh, my God,” I cried, choking on sobs.

  “Name’s Finn, actually, but I appreciate the comparison.” He kneeled before me, directly in my line of sight. “And I can strike that quickly against you, so get up. You’ve got someplace to be.”

  I shook my head infinitesimally. “Just kill me now,” I whispered.

  I had nothing left. No parents. No sister. I pushed Nick away, hopefully to someplace where he’d never be exposed to this. Even Zander was dead. I had nothing to fight for anymore.

  “Just kill me,” I repeated. I could die now. It would be so easy. Just let go and join everyone on the other side.

  Just let go, I told myself, closing my eyes with acceptance.

  “No can do,” he said, clamping my arms beneath my shoulders and roughly pulling me up. I was limp like a fucking rag doll, and had zero interest in being anything but. Forced to stand there and hold my weight, Finn added, “We’re not done with you yet. Your sister was fun, but she really only got to live this long so I could do that at just the right moment.”

  Pain shot down my spine like a lightning bolt. I felt sparks of life exploding everywhere, and suddenly I was pissed. Pissed that I was ever taken. Pissed that no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t escape these fucking psychos. Pissed at the fucker who just did what he did right in front of me. On purpose. For sport. Who the fuck did that?

  My eyes began to narrow as I slowly tipped my head at an angle, beginning to match his evil glare.

  Undeterred and unintimidated, he said, “Someone’s thinking things she shouldn’t be.”

  “You really think you’re the first man I’ve met thinking he’s the big, bad wolf?”

  His grin cocked up on the left. “Funny you should mention that. That whole huffing and puffing and blowing your house down?” He leaned in so we were eye to eye and whispered with a taunting voice, “‘Cause I’m the man who single-handedly took out your entire family.”

  Every muscle in my face just fell. Like I literally lost the wind in my sail. And it didn’t help my courage any the moment he began laughing at me, my reaction exactly what he was hoping for.

  “Mom. Dad. Big sis.” He chuckled in a creepy way as his head pulled back. “You didn’t see that coming, did you?”

  Hell. Fucking. No. He was too young to be that kind of person. And to get off on it? The guy was fucking psycho.

  “It’s a shame no one knew what you were really up to with Zander though, ‘cause I didn’t believe ole Mom and Pops when they said they didn’t know where you were. Incredibly selfless of you to spare them the heartache. But their deaths would’ve been so much swifter if they’d had something to tell me. But oh well. Now there’s just one more to go.” His right hand whipped out and snatched my neck, his grip far stronger than I could ever imagine. I gasped and gasped for air, but it was nearly impossible, and the way his fingers dug into my windpipe was excruciating. I brought my hands up and yanked on his forearms, even beat against them as best I could. But to no avail. Next I tried to squeeze my own hands between his and my neck, but his hold was solid. Something began rushing inside my head. Did blood even have access? Because the way my dizziness was stepping up its game, it felt like my blood was getting nowhere.

  “Not supposed to kill me yet though, are you?” I wheezed out between chokes.

  He rolled his eyes off to one side. I knew I was right long before he lessened his grip, which he took forever to do. I dropped hard to the ground, alternating heaves with coughs. Every part of my chest burned like wildfire, even my nose, eyes and throat.

  “Guess that answers my question of who’s really in charge around here.”

  All right. It was a really stupid thing to say to someone like him at that moment. But the slap across my face gave me the momentum I needed to roll farther across the floor. Finn mumbled something like fucking cunt as I pretended to lay there unconscious on my back. With my eyes looking through the barest of slivers, I waited until his hands wrapped completely around me to hoist me up. I snatched the piece of broken pole brushing against my fingertips and gave it everything I had.

  The wood smashed against the side of his face. Stunned, I had the tiniest of openings to stab and dig the fingernails of my free hand into his eyes. He roared and cursed me out, but threw himself backwards all the same. Every part of my body ached, from the inside out. But I had no choice but to physically fight my way out. There was no one here to help. If someone was actually coming, I’d be damned if I let Friggs and this motherfucker have any more fun before they got here.

  I groaned as I rolled onto my stomach and forced myself up, my arms shaking like after one of my workouts. This time I grabbed the intact bar stool. Finn was wincing tightly, his hand blindly held up in the air before him. My new favorite shade of red streamed down his face, watered down by excessive tears.

  He could hear my bare feet pad along the hardwood so he knew it was coming, but he couldn’t see well enough to know where and how. I let the stool fly and it cracked the same side of his head as before, pieces breaking just like the last. He collapsed to the ground, but I didn’t stop there. I knew all too well how easy it was to fake. I grabbed one of the legs and swung again. And again. And again. He didn’t move, not even flinch. A gash on his head soaked his hair with hot, sticky blood. Enough it left a metallic smell in the air.

  I wanted to check for a pulse, but figured it was suicidal to willingly put myself within his reach again. Orders or not, no way in hell he wouldn’t kill me right here and now if I gave him the chance. Instead I turned and crouched beside Thea, my already flowing tears increasing their numbers. I gently brushed and tucked her hair behind her ear. Her cheek was still flushed with warmth, and when I closed her eyes, I could swear she had just fallen asleep on me.

  “I’m so sorry,” I whispered, my voice cracking twice for those four syllables. “I was afraid I might lose you, but not like this.” I turned to check on Finn, but he was dead to the world. I made my way over to the sofa and pulled the throw off. I slowly draped it over Thea, leaving me one last moment to kiss her goodbye on the forehead. My tears were fucking rushing now, and mucous flooded my nose and down my throat.

  Don’t break now.

  Grieve later.

  I gasped several times, swallowing down bursts of air, trying to reverse the mournful chaos inside me. My legs, my arms…everything was seriously shaking, begging to collapse, ready to quit. I wanted to move her someplace safe, but I hadn’t the time nor the strength to do it, so I whispered my last goodbye. “I promise I’ll make him pay for this.”

  I pulled the blanket over her head and forced myself back on my feet. I didn’t look back when I closed the door behind me. Setting off with nothing more than a stick in my hand, I began my search for Friggs. I no longer cared if I died, so long as that fucker went with me.

  I searched in vain for a land line as I went. No luck, though. And nothing that would be a better weapon than what I already had in my hand. I maneuvered in and out of rooms, most of which were unused bedrooms or sitting rooms, and way too many offered equipment to tie people down with. If there was any doubt before what this twisted playhouse was used for, it was defined now. What windows I found were bolted down, and it was too dark outside on this side to see anything but black forest. Twice I had to hide until someone in the hall had passed me by. If it wasn’t Friggs, I wasn’t interested in fighting. When I found a set of stairs, I cautiously crept down floor by floor. Nothing was marked so I had no idea what floor I was on, or how many there were to begin with. This place was like a fucking hotel meets twisted fun house. None of the layout made sense.

  A whistle cut through the air. I whipped around and saw a guy standing d
own the hallway watching me. He brought a radio to his mouth and said, “Got her. First floor west end.”

  First? Did that mean ground level?

  I took off running and ran into the first room I found, locking and barricading it with the table next to the door. The door knob jiggled. I jumped with the first fist bang. Running out of time, I rushed to the window. Assuming it was bolted like every other window I’d tried, I immediately picked up an industrial metal desk chair and smashed it against the glass.

  The sound was enough to increase the man’s sense of urgency. He threw his body against the door, then said something into his radio again.

  Using my stick, I poked and swiped at the rest of the glass until it was mostly clear. The man threw his body against the door a second time. I yanked as hard as I could on the left drapery, ripping it down and throwing it over the shards on the floor. As the man hit a third time, I heard the door crack. I hurriedly pulled down the right drapery and threw it over the window sill. I stood on the chair and forced myself through the window just as the door broke.

  I screamed and fell when I landed, a large piece of glass cutting into the sole of my bare foot. I carefully ripped it out and rushed into the forest, hobbling my first few steps, the guy behind me already pushing himself through the window.

  Nothing I did was quiet. I constantly yipped as my feet stepped on hard and dried debris. I bounced off tree to tree, completely blind from lack of moonlight. Though I couldn’t see them, my exhalations had to be white steam, the air so cold it burned my unprotected skin. The guy pursuing me was getting closer, unhindered by bare feet and exhaustion. He constantly yelled for me to stop or to get back here. I still had the stick, but I kept running as hard and fast as I could, knowing it wouldn’t be enough to fight him off. There’d be no surprise swing in this fight.

  I screamed when I felt his hand grip my shoulder. It only took a few more steps for him to wrap his other arm around me and throw us to the ground. We tumbled, but he never let go of my waist. We stopped hard, both of us frozen and gasping for air. I moved first, trying to struggle free. He squeezed tighter. I think he felt the stick, because the next thing I knew he had ripped it from my grasp and flung it off into the darkness. He snatched my wrists and crisscrossed my arms in front of me, pulling so tight I screamed again. With nothing left in my arsenal, desperation took over. Praying I could knock him out, I cocked my head forward and slammed it back into his as hard as I could.