Locked In: No Way Out Series - Book One

by Ryan, Shari J.

  "Well, why is he sitting in that tree?" Reese asks.

  I stop and turn toward her, gripping her shoulders. "Babe, everyone here is criminally insane." She looks confused by what I'm saying, like I hadn't said this to her already.

  "There’s a difference between a criminal and a person who has a psychological disorder," she states. "Why are they grouped together like this?"

  Here's another one of those instances where I feel like I'm dealing more with a fifteen-year-old than an eighteen-year-old. "Reese," I collect my thoughts, or try to, but her question is making me think of a logical answer. "Clearly, these people have proven that their criminal actions were the result of insanity." There. Yeah, that works. Is that what happened? Because, if that's the case, why was I sent to Applebrook?

  "That makes sense, I suppose," she says, looking from me over to Rooter. Walking past me, she makes her way to the base of the tree, seemingly studying the guy, intrigued almost.

  "Reese." Please don't do anything stupid.

  She ignores my voice as she examines the length of the tree. Oh, this is going to be great. Doing exactly what I assumed she was considering, she hops up and grabs ahold of two branches, while walking herself up the side of the tree until she can lift herself up on the level of branches. "For God's sake, Reese, get down here!" I shout up at her.

  Again, she ignores me. I fidget uncomfortably, watching her approach the height where Rooter is sitting. "Hi," she says sweetly to him, placing her hand over his back. "Are you okay?" Is she serious? Of course he's not okay. None of us are okay. Rooter looks over at Reese, but without shock or surprise. He's studying her eyes. She places her hand on his back and situates herself between two branches. "Do you need help?"

  Rooter nods his head, but doesn't break his gaze into her eyes. Which is really starting to piss me off right now. Maybe if Reese knew what I've heard—that Rooter used to run some kind of cult where they convinced people to kill themselves, she might feel differently. I guess once he was arrested and brought into custody, he refused to talk. From what I heard, he didn't blink or show much sign of life, aside from his moving chest and beating pulse. Because of this, they brought him to Applebrook. Evidently, they weren't able to break him either and they sent him over here to rot and die like the rest of us.

  The hopeless—that's what we are. We are the people who aren't counted as part of any population. We are considered dead, according to the records in Oklahoma. Why Jackson Crownwell doesn't just kill us before dropping us into this shithole, I still haven't figured out. I have to think there's some kind of reason to his madness.

  I can't hear much from down here, but I can see Rooter whispering something to Reese. My head is starting to spin with assumptions and I want to get up there, throw her over my shoulder and get her down. "Reese!" I shout up instead.

  She looks down at me, holding up one finger, telling me to hold on. Rooter looks down at me, too, as her head is still turned away from him. The second Rooter's lips twitch into a smirk, I pull myself up the tree quicker than I thought possible. "What are you saying to her? I thought you didn't talk," I seethe toward him.

  Rooter just stares at me and doesn't say a word. I know he said something to Reese though. "Sin, calm down," Reese scolds me. She's telling me to calm down? Me? I try to breathe in through my nose with hopes of calming my growing rage, but it isn't working.

  My aggression has grown at a rapid rate since Reese stepped into my life. I used to have the ability to control myself like no other, but for some reason, with her in the equation, I go from zero to sixty faster than I can blink. My heart starts pounding in my chest and it's like I can't breathe, but words bubble up my throat, making regret easy when all is said and done. It's one of the biggest reasons Reese keeps calling me an asshole. I know I've been an asshole to her, but in all honesty, I can't control myself. Maybe it's the fact that I haven't had a damn thing to fight for in five years, and now I feel like I have a purpose.

  "What did you say to her?" I ask Rooter. Knowing he isn't going to answer me, I climb a little higher, getting close enough to knock this asshole off his branch.

  "Sin, please calm down," Reese urges me again. "I know why he's sitting up here." She points behind me and I follow the length of her arm out into the distance. We're up against the property line of Chipley, and over the tree line is the outside world. There's nothing but flat open land with hay bales scattered around. I can probably see at least ten miles into the distance and there's nothing out there. Nothing. Not that it matters. The fact that there's no gate, fence, or dam beyond the trees pisses me off. I have heard rumors of another way, although it's likely just a tease. "How long would we have to survive if we could get across that water?"

  Rooter looks over at Reese at the same time I do and he nods his head frivolously. "Even if you make it across, the bacteria will have already seeped into your skin. You'd likely die within minutes," I tell her. "Plus, the top portion of the wall is electrically charged. That's why you saw all of those bodies at the bottom of the water."

  Yes, we're screwed.

  Reese looks over my head and back out at freedom. While I'd expect to see some kind of sadness or loss of hope in her eyes, there seems to be determination instead. That worries me. She doesn't think before acting or speaking. That'll get her killed here.

  "We'll see you soon," Reese says to Rooter. Another smile spreads across his face. With another deep breath, I lower myself to the ground, waiting for Reese to descend, too. Of course Rooter leans over to whisper something else to her and I swear to God, she has ten seconds before I really do pull her down.

  She pats him tenderly on the back and lowers herself down the tree, slipping a little on the way. Once she's on the ground, she walks on ahead of me without a word.

  Stalking up to her, I take her by the arm and fling her around. "What the hell was that?"

  "What was what?" she asks, asserting an attitude.

  "Hmm, I don't know. The suicide whisperer wants to be your friend. That's so great, Reese. I don't know why I didn't suggest that idea myself."

  "Suicide whisperer?" she asks. She doesn't look put off by this, but rather fascinated.

  "Should I remind you again as to what reason all of these people are in here?" I say.

  "No, but why don't you tell me why you were removed from Applebrook and brought here? As you said yourself, the hopeless and the dangerous criminals are the ones who are brought here. Surely, you would never stoop so low as to appear hopeless, Sin. So, what is it that made you appear so dangerous?"

  I look at her, waiting for her to blink or get that fearful look she gets in her eyes every time she presses me with questions about my past. Questions she knows she doesn't truly want answers for. This time, there's no fear, there's just pure anger. I tilt my head to the side a little without breaking eye contact. "I tried to kill Jackson Crownwell." And if I ever see that bastard again, I won't fail twice.

  "It's a shame you didn't succeed," she says. "I'm here because of you, right? Isn't that what your dad said to me?"

  "You know you've been snapping at me for days for having mood swings, and now you're kind of acting like a bitch." I'm going to go ahead and assume she just put the pieces together and realized I'm the person to blame for all of this—for the demise of her life.

  "Maybe you're a little confused, but I'm not the one who dragged you out of Applebrook and then threw you into the back of a van," I tell her. That wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault that she went looking for trouble that day.

  "How did you know I was thrown into the van?" she snaps back.

  "I saw you." I let out a long sigh, hating to have to admit all of this to her. "I watched from a window as he threw you in."

  "You knew?"

  "Yes. I watched as you were thrown into the darkness. I saw the fear in your eyes. I witnessed the exact moment your innocence was torn away from you. I wanted to tell you how sorry I was for what you were about to go through, but I was restrained."
/>
  "Your father has kidnapped others?"

  "No. He took you because your mother took me." I swallow the bile rising up my throat, feeling the hatred toward myself while again admitting what I've caused this poor girl.

  "My mother took you?" she asks. Confusion forces lines across her forehead, and I hate that I have to be more detailed with my explanation.

  "I was blamed for my Mother's death, Reese. I was taken away because of it and detained in Applebrook after being diagnosed with psychosis. Because I was a minor, and they didn't have any real proof, they sentenced me to two years and then a probation program following that." Freedom was just around the corner for me. "I was supposed to be released the day you saw me getting dragged off down the hall, but Mr. Crownwell had other plans for me." Reese has this look on her face like I'm telling her the world ended last year. Although, would I even know if it did?

  "What happened then?" she asks, appearing to have trouble swallowing her thoughts.

  "Unfortunately for me, I had overheard a conversation Mr. Crownwell was having over the phone about Chipley. I was sent to his office for my discharge papers and I found myself frozen at his door as I listened to his plans, what he had rolled out, and how he was laundering the state's money by maintaining Chipley as an overflow project for Applebrook." Mom had always told me that Chipley was a place where sick people could become well again. I believed her. Now I know it's a place where the hopeless come to rot. "I was still in shock when he turned to find me listening to his conversation. I had caught him. He employed my mother and he knew I had lived in Chipley for almost two years before my mother—I wasn't supposed to know the truth."

  "Wait, you lived here before?"

  "Yes, my mother was a caretaker. Things were different then." Or I was just on the other side and never saw what was actually happening. "Anyway, because of everything I heard, Mr. Crownwell had me re-detained for 'trying to kill him.' He couldn't release me back into the public with the information I had." I was supposed to be released back to my home town—the normal life I had before Chipley. Mom planned it all out. Her death. My arrest. And my freedom.

  "So, you really did nothing to be here?"

  "No. I'm innocent. Like you."

  19

  Chapter Seven

  REESE

  "You said I was taken because of you. What do I have to do with you?" I ask him. I feel like I need more air. I can hardly breathe, even with the vast open space of nothing but trees and oxygen surrounding us.

  "Reese," he stops the conversation. He needs to tell me the rest. I need to hear it all. The questions that have been burning through my mind for the past three years have answers and I need them all.

  "Please," I beg.

  "Your mother was the nurse who had to inform my father of my continued sentence and that I would be held in solitary confinement for an indefinite amount of time. Not only did my father lose my mother, he lost me too. And for some screwed up reason, even though he was convinced I was the one who killed my mother, 'the love of his freaking life', he still wanted to be near me. He was obsessed with my mother and me. Obsessed. He went crazy. He had already gone crazy."

  I think I've come to figure that out. A sane person wouldn't lock a fifteen-year-old up in a shed. "I can see that," I say softly, backing up, needing some space. Needing space from myself at this point. I drop down against a tree, pulling a bottle of water out of my backpack, grateful for Sin raiding Snatcher's fridge before we left. "Keep going."

  "My father inflicts pain onto others as they have done to him. You were the retribution—the revenge on your mother for taking me from him," he says. "He took you from her."

  "I was taken as a punishment to my mother—the woman who wanted nothing but to devote her life to helping others?" I confirm, mostly for myself. This senseless purpose for my condemning is because someone wanted revenge against Mom. Not me.

  "I don't understand this. If you didn't kill your mother, then—" His chest heaves in and out as if he's contemplating the answer to the question he's hoped I wouldn't ask. "Who did?"

  "No one killed her," he tells me. "She's not dead; although, she might as well be. I'll likely never see her again. And if I did, I'm not sure how I'd feel, facing the fact that she is alive and I've been held here as a prisoner for five years."

  The wind has been stolen from my lungs. The words melted on my tongue, and my thoughts are spinning like a top. She's alive. No one killed her. And no one knows this?

  "You said she was buried behind the shed," I remind him.

  "She is. I buried some of her belongings--things that made her still feel like she existed—into the dirt, so I could forget about her. She isn't buried in a literal sense, but the thought of her as a mother is buried behind the shed." What mother does this to her child?

  "Sin, if she isn't dead, where is she?"

  "I don't know. She abandoned me here with nothing but a fucking note—a note telling me to bury some of her belongings and then inform my father that I had found her dead. She said he would blame me for her death and I would be removed from Chipley and tried as a minor. She told me to plead innocent. Instead, I was diagnosed with psychosis and held in solitary confinement at Applebrook. She thought her plan would work. She thought an apology for bringing me to Chipley would make me feel better. She thought that if she admitted her mistakes, I would forgive her. She admitted that everything she had done was wrong, but that her plan was the only way both of us could survive."

  I'm trying my hardest to comprehend all of this, but I can't. Why couldn't his mother just leave on her own and take Sin with her? If she was a caretaker, she should have been able to come and go as she pleased. "If she wasn't a prisoner, then why?"

  "She knew too much. When she asked to leave, Jackson Crownwell made a deal with her. Her plan that she left me on that note was part of that deal. The plan revolved around no one finding out about Chipley." Sin takes a seat beside me and wraps his arm around my neck, placing a kiss on my temple.

  "That's why your father assumed you murdered her?" I ask, leaning my head against his chest.

  "Once I was brought back to Chipley after another three-year sentence at Applebrook, I found my father. I unleashed on him. I blamed him for everything. I told him he was the reason she was dead. I tried to convince him that he murdered her. It was my form of revenge on him, I guess. My mother brought us to Chipley in the first place so we could get away from him. Then he found us, and I still don't know how." He closes his eyes and nods his head, like he's trying to get his thoughts straight. "You know, when you lose your mind, you become weak enough to be convinced of something you didn't do? That's what I did to him. Because he deserved it."

  "Everyone still thinks your mother is dead?" I ask.

  "Yes, and no one will ever know anything differently."

  "I'm sorry," I tell him. I'm sorry because he's just like me. He didn't ask for this. He was more or less taken against his will, too.

  "You shouldn't be sorry. I should be sorry and you should hate me."

  Hate? This wasn't his fault. He didn't ask for his. I didn't ask for this. Life was stripped away from both of us and I can't hate him for that. "Then why do I think I love you?" I ask.

  "Love? What the hell is love? Abandonment? Is that love? No, you don't. You don't love someone after a week. I know that much. You love that you're not alone. You love that you're no longer in the dark. You love that there is some kind of screwed up light of hope out there. But, let me assure you, Reese, you don't love me. No one can love me."

  "Stop," I yell. "Love is when someone will put their life on the line for someone else. Love is offering food to someone when you're starving. Love is giving someone hope, even when we both know there is none. Maybe this kind of love isn't the type where I can't eat, can't sleep, can't breathe, but this love is one I don't think I could survive without. It doesn't matter what you say to me, you won't change the way I feel."

  Sin grabs his bag and throws it over his s
houlders, angered and unsettled. He doesn't look at me and if he wants to get offended by the truth, he can. "Don't let your feelings get you killed," he spouts off, spitting a mouthful into the dirt. "Love gets people killed."

  "Like who?" I run up to his side and step in front of him, continuing my strides backwards. "Who did love get killed?"

  "Look around, Reese!"

  "Yeah, we're surrounded by nothing except hundreds of criminally insane assholes fifteen miles away. So again, who was killed in the name of love?"

  "Romeo and Juliet, Cleopatra and Mark Antony, and Orpheus and Eurydice. That's who."

  I can't help but to laugh, partially because in what world could he compare us to Romeo and Juliet? This is no romance. This is love growing from boredom of hatred. "Who are Orpheus and Eurydice?"

  "Don't worry about it." He takes me by the shoulders and pushes me off to the side so he can continue walking.

  "You know one second you're pounding me into the dirt, moaning in my ear and the next you're—you're…you know what, screw this. Screw you. Screw this goddamn town and everything and everyone in it. If you want to be an asshole, go be an asshole, but I'm not going to be following you around like a lost puppy while you do." He continues walking as if I didn't say anything. As if I don't matter. We're probably going to die out here and I can't even die next to someone who knows how to be a decent human being.

  I stop. I'm done. I don't even know what we're walking toward. Is it the simple idea that there might be living animals out here? Because I haven't even heard a single bird or cricket chirp. I haven't seen an insect or any sign that they exist. The trees are thinning out and I only see open space ahead—something I've grown to hate. After being confined for so long, all I dreamt about was open space, but now it's like there's too much of it and I feel like I'm free falling into oblivion. Being contained felt safe, secure, and presumable. Maybe I'm just losing my mind.