“You better get yourself upstairs,” I told her.
“You’re a good person, Sunny O’Donnell. Don’t ever forget that,” Crystal said and hugged me before she left.
“You want to check her or should I?” Di asked. I raised my eyebrows in question. “To see if she’s dead or not.”
“I will,” I said, although I was pretty sure she was. I pulled back the sheet and nearly ran away screaming when I saw Madi’s eyes open wide and staring vacantly at me. I forced myself to check her pulse. There was none. “She’s dead,” I announced to Di.
“Well, that’s it then. What will we do with the body?” Di asked.
“I’ll get rid of it. I don’t want you to get involved any more than you are,” I told her.
“I hated that woman from the day I met her. I don’t mind helping to get rid of her,” Di said with determination.
“Look, I have nothing to lose here. I’m already wanted for execution. But you’re free. Don’t get involved in this,” I said, trying to dissuade her.
“Free?” Di said in surprise. “There’s not one person living down here who is free. Cull is just another word for execution and I’m due in less than a year. So stop being self-righteous and learn to accept help when it’s offered.”
I hadn’t expected that response from Di. She had always seemed so… tolerant of her situation. It surprised me that she might be fed up and angry too.
“Okay,” I agreed. “Help me get her in one of the laundry carts. Are you able to finish Crystal’s work and get it upstairs? I really don’t need anyone nosing around here tonight.”
“I can do that,” Di responded.
I retrieved a cart full of dirty laundry and wheeled it alongside Madi’s body. I took out some of the clothes and motioned for Di to grab her arms while I grabbed her legs. We hoisted her into the cart.
“Where are you going to dump her?” Di asked.
“Probably best I don’t say. That way when they find the body you can look genuinely surprised,” I said. I put the pile of dirty clothes on top of her and made sure no parts were showing. “I’ll be back as soon as I can to help you finish the ironing.”
“Best hurry up before she gets stiff in there or you’ll have a time getting her out,” Di warned me. I didn’t respond. The thought was gross enough.
I rolled the cart out of the laundry room and checked the halls to make sure they were clear. There was one guard lounging against the wall and I would have to walk past him to get to the mineshaft. I pulled my hat down over my eyes and strode purposefully past him.
“What do you have there?” he asked with mild interest. Was he one of Liberty’s guards?
“Laundry,” I said dryly, looking back at the room I just came from with the big “Laundry Room” sign over the door.
“Oh yeah,” he said and waved me on.
I was grateful he didn’t ask me where I was going. There was no reason to take a laundry cart down this hall. I continued on, rounding a corner, which took me out of view of the guard. Thankfully there were no more guards to be seen. Almost everyone in the Pit would be in the common rooms having dinner so it was the time of evening the guards took a break, which was lucky for me.
I pulled opened the door to the mineshaft and held it open with my hip as I pushed the cart through. I gently closed the door behind me trying not to make any noise and stood for a moment to let my eyes adjust to the darkness. Once I was able to see the edge clearly, I wheeled the cart closer. I thought about sending the whole thing over, but realized that would be a mistake. I might have a chance of getting away with this if I made it look like Madi had fallen down the shaft. I dug all the clothes out of the cart and piled them by the door. Then I turned the cart on its side and tipped it until I felt the body slide out. It was difficult work. Madi was a large person. The drop to the bottom was just slightly over two miles so it took a few seconds before I heard a distance thud. I put the clothes back in the cart and left the shaft.
The same guard was standing there when I returned. He gave me a questioning look when he saw I still had the cart full of clothes.
“I took the wrong cart,” I told him.
Di was almost finished the ironing when I came back. She was obviously experienced at it because she was a lot faster than either Crystal or me. I started loading a cart with the freshly laundered clothes.
“No problems?” Di asked.
“There’s a guard outside. You might want to mumble something about doing it yourself if you want it done right,” I advised her.
Di finished the last shirt and put it on top of the pile.
“Don’t come back here when you’re finished. If anyone asks why you’re bringing the laundry, you just say we’re short staffed after hours and you worked late to help out. I’m going to leave and not come back until tomorrow morning. In the morning, we’ll all just stand outside waiting for Madi like we always do. Okay?”
“Got it,” Di said. She sucked in a deep breath and wheeled the cart through the doors.
I tidied up the mess Madi and I had made when we were fighting and left too. I made my way to the fourth level common room, which was thankfully in the opposite direction of the guard I had passed earlier. There was another guard standing by the door outside of the common room.
“Good evening, ma’am,” he greeted me and opened the door. I didn’t think I was ever going to get used to being treated that way.
“Thank you,” I said and walked through the door.
The training session was already in full swing. Three guards stood with their rifle gripped in their hands while people lined up to take their turn to disarm them. I noticed with disappointment that there weren’t as many people tonight. Jack was correcting someone when he looked up and saw me come into the room. He shot me a questioning look, but I had no answer for him. He went back to his task. I took the opportunity to sit down. I think it was the first time I rested all day.
The shock of what I had just done was starting to set in. My hands were beginning to shake so I tucked them under my legs to try and make them still. Then my legs started shaking. Emotionally, I didn’t really feel anything at all, so I was angry that my body would betray me like this. I saw Jack motion for me to come over and help. Would my legs support me? I wasn’t sure. I shook my head no. Jack would have to do this on his own tonight.
The training session seemed to take forever, but finally Jack said it was time to wrap it up. Everyone thanked him and they filed out of the room. I stood up to go, but still wasn’t too sure about getting my legs to work. I took a few steps ignoring the weakness in my knees. Jack came over to me as soon as he was finished.
“Where were you?” Jack demanded in a low voice. “I’ve been going out of my mind! I sent a guard to look for you.”
“Was that an Alliance guard outside of the laundry room?” I asked.
“Is that where you’ve been? Working late? Was Madi on you again?” he kept demanding answers and I didn’t want to talk in the hallway.
“Can we talk about this at home?” I asked. My lack of sleep last night and current trauma of having just killed someone was starting to crash in on me. I wanted to curl up and go to sleep.
Jack put his hand at the small of my back and steered me toward the door.
“You’re shaking,” he stated.
He gave me a sidelong glance, but didn’t ask any more questions until we were safely inside our apartment.
“What happened?” he demanded as soon as he shut the door.
“I killed her,” I said and sat down heavily in the chair. There was no sense keeping it from Jack. He just stood staring at me, not saying a word. Maybe he didn’t hear me. “I killed Madi,” I repeated.
“You mean you killed her for real? She’s dead?” he asked in disbelief.
“I didn’t mean to kill her. She was beating Crystal, and I knew she was going to kill her and I just snapped. I went after her and we got into a fight. She had me pinned on the floor at one point
, but as soon as she let go of my arms I punched her. I got her here,” I pointed to the base of my neck.
“You throat punched her? Didn’t you know you could kill someone that way?” Jack asked incredulously.
“Well I do now!” I wailed. He gave me an apologetic look and sat down in the chair across from me.
“What did you do with the body?” he asked. I could almost see his mind trying to work out a plan to cover it up.
“I put her in a laundry cart, wheeled her to the mineshaft, and threw her body down the shaft. There was one guard who saw me with the cart. I’m hoping it was the one you sent to look for me,” I said.
“He didn’t see the body though?” he asked.
“No. She was covered up with dirty clothes,” I confirmed.
“What about any mess in the laundry room? Any blood?” he persisted.
“No blood and I picked up anything we knocked over during our fight,” I said.
“I’m impressed, Sunny. It sounds like you covered your tracks well,” he gave me a smile.
“I feel like I just made a mess of everything,” I admitted. “My life was already complicated enough without adding murder to the list.”
“Defending yourself against a crazy person isn’t murder,” Jack stated.
The lights went out and left us in darkness. I was exhausted, but I didn’t want to go to sleep. My numbed brain was still processing the events of the evening. Jack stood up and held his hand out to me. I knew he couldn’t find his way to the bedroom in the dark, so I took his hand and led him there. He crawled onto the bed and I took the heavy vest off before I laid down myself. He surprised me when he pulled me into the crook of his arm. I pulled back, but he firmly put my head on his shoulder.
“I’m not looking for anything, Sunny. I just think we could both use the human contact tonight,” he explained. “And besides, we both know you’re going to be all over me again as soon as you fall asleep,” he joked.
I couldn’t help but laugh at his comment. And after the day I had, it did feel good to be pressed against the length of him and feel his arms holding me.
“There weren’t as many people there tonight,” I commented.
“Some left when they saw you weren’t there. I almost cancelled the whole thing to go look for you myself. But I knew if I did that I would never get the few back that were interested in being there. You don’t know how worried I was.” His arm tightened around me, hugging me closer.
“Did you think Holt caught me?” I asked, curious about what had gone through his head when I didn’t show up.
“That was one scenario I imagined. I also thought maybe you suffered heat stroke and died. Or your supervisor was beating you to within an inch of your life,” Jack said. Then he laughed softly. “I can honestly say it never crossed my mind you killed her and dumped her body.”
“It’s not funny,” I said and playfully hit him in the chest. He caught my hand in his and held it.
“I don’t know how this rebellion of yours is going to work if we don’t get more people involved,” Jack said seriously.
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” I said in a thin, exhausted voice. “Our time here is running out. I guess it was a stupid idea.”
“It’s not a stupid idea. We’ll find a way to make it work,” Jack said in a determined voice.
As he talked, the rhythmic sound of his deep voice hypnotised me. I let go of all my fears and allowed myself to feel secure in his arms. Sleep took me almost instantly.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I bolted awake, my heart pounding fast, an image of Madi still burned into my mind. I dreamed that she wasn’t dead when I dumped her and she was climbing back up the mineshaft looking for me. Now that I was awake the dream seemed ridiculous. She was very dead when I sent her down there.
I realized I was all over Jack again, just as he had predicted. My legs were entwined with his and my arm was sprawled across his chest. He was snoring softly, so I gently eased myself away from him and got out of bed. My stomach was making it known that I missed dinner last night. I drank a glass of water to fill the emptiness.
I was wide awake now and I knew there was little chance I would get back to sleep. The back of my neck was tight with stress and I had a dull ache in my head. I decided to exercise. It always eased my stress whenever I worked out with Jack.
“Sunny?” I heard Jack call out from the bedroom.
“You’ll be happy to know I’m working out. You’ve taught me well, Jack,” I said between deep breaths. He stumbled his way into the living room and joined me.
“You couldn’t sleep?” he asked.
“Bad dreams,” I responded.
“You shouldn’t let it bother you. I bet a lot of people in the laundry room will be happy today when she doesn’t show up,” he said.
“It doesn’t bother me that Madi is dead. It bothers me that I killed her,” I said.
“And yet you want to start a rebellion. People always get killed when there’s a struggle for power,” he said thoughtfully. “No one’s going to miss a supervisor like Madi. They aren’t going to blame you for killing her. They’re going to respect you.”
“People aren’t going to know I killed her,” I reminded him.
“I thought there were other people in the room when it happened?” he questioned.
“Di and Crystal were, but they won’t say anything,” I assured him.
“Maybe not to a guard, but they’ll talk,” Jack said confidently.
The bong bongs rang out and the lights clicked on. Jack had taken off his t-shirt and there was a film of sweat on his muscular torso. I averted my eyes since I found the sight a little too appealing. I got up and filled the sink with cold water.
“I’ll give you some privacy if you want to get washed,” Jack announced and left the room. “Don’t drain the water,” he called out as he shut the door.
I bathed as quickly as I could, fearing he would come out into the room while I was naked, but he remained a gentleman. Then we exchanged rooms and I found more clean clothes in the bag Bron brought us. I put the hated vest on and went back out when Jack was done.
The line-up for breakfast was already getting long by the time we got to the common room. People greeted us cheerfully when we joined the cue. It shocked me that Jack and I had become so well known in such a short span of time. Just yesterday, I had been a stressed out ball of nerves waiting for guards to take us away at gunpoint and hand us over to President Holt. And today I was being addressed as ma’am by the guards and had complete strangers coming up to me to shake my hand. It all felt so foreign, but made me feel more confident that no one would turn us in.
Jack and I collected our food and water and found a seat alone together. Despite my nervousness at the thought of returning to the scene of the crime, I was starving.
“You want mine too?” Jack asked when he saw me gulping down my breakfast.
“No thank you,” I said, embarrassed for eating so fast. I was getting far too comfortable around him.
I looked around the room and saw Crystal get up and head for the door. She was leaving for work already. She walked with her head down, hiding her face behind the curtain of her long hair.
“Are you going to be okay this morning?” Jack asked with concern.
“I’ll do my best,” I said.
We pushed our chairs back and left the room, heading for our respective jobs. I tried to squelch the nervousness in my stomach, but it wouldn’t go away. Jack reached for my hand and held it as we walked along the hall to the stairs. I was grateful for his support. He kissed the top of my head before he left, as had become his habit. I watched him walk down the stairs until I couldn’t see him anymore, as had become mine. I climbed the few levels to the laundry room.
Crystal was already there, standing in front of the doors looking a little lost. The bruising on her face was worse today. One of her eyes was almost swollen shut. She had a hand protectively wrapped around her side where Ma
di had kicked her.
“I’m not sure what to do,” Crystal whispered when I walked up to her.
“Just stay here as if we’re waiting for her. That’s what we do every morning,” I advised.
“Okay,” she agreed. “By the way, I saw your friend last night.”
“Summer?” I asked. Crystal nodded. “You didn’t tell her what I did, did you?” I didn’t want Summer to know. I was worried about what she would think of me.
“No. I’m not going to tell anybody what we did,” she assured me. I didn’t miss that she had included herself in what I believed to be my crime. “I just told her what you wanted me to tell her. She says she misses you too. She also said that the President is getting really mad because you and Jack haven’t been found yet. He had a complete door-to-door search done in the Dome and didn’t find any sign of you. He’s finally beginning to think that maybe you’re hiding down here.”
“I’m surprised he hasn’t looked here yet,” I thought out loud. “I mean, what is it that makes him think we wouldn’t come here?”
“Because he still thinks of Jack as one of them. As much as the Kenners are hated by the Holts, their family still belongs to their elite group. None of them would ever be caught dead in the Pit, so they assume neither would Jack.”
“They must know I would come home though,” I said. Could the President really be that blinded by his own prejudices?
“Don’t forget, Leisel told her father that Jack married you for love and he believes that every good wife follows her husband. It’s never occurred to him that Jack would follow you. But he’s come up empty looking for you two in the Dome.”
“How much time do you think we have left?” I asked. I knew I should be grateful for the amount of time we have had, but it still made me anxious to know that my death was getting closer.
“I don’t know. Last night I overheard the President tell Mr. Forbes to put together a search team for the Pit. You might have a day or two at the most,” Crystal said almost apologetically. “Sunny, can I ask you a personal question?” she asked shyly. I nodded. “How did you and Jack end up married?”
Sunset Rising Page 26