Chapter 25
ELLIE
“So do we have a plan B?” Reece asks, placing his hands on his thighs and heaving out a stuttered breath. We’ve been sprinting down the halls for the last ten minutes and still have not found an exit. We’re running out of time and options.
“Dude, we didn’t even have a plan A,” Zane responds. “We’re literally winging this as we go.”
“Maybe you just need to hide,” I suggest, nibbling on my nail. My thoughts froth as solution after solution pop to the forefront of my mind before instantly getting buried.
“They’ll find me.” Reece’s voice is nothing but a whisper, rife with fear.
“Maybe I could try to convince them to let you go,” I continue, trying to follow the thread my mind unraveled. “Maybe—”
“The Divine One will kill your men and torture you,” Reece interrupts. “She won’t allow herself to be undermined like that. Not even for you.”
“We can’t just stay here.” Dom begins to pace, his hands clenching and unclenching into fists by his sides. “We’re sitting ducks.”
“What options do we even have?” Beckett interrupts. “We can either help Reece survive the next fifteen minutes and pray The Divine One keeps her word—”
“Which she won’t,” I say, knowing that with unwavering certainty.
“Or we can hide Reece somewhere and return for him. We could fake his death,” Beckett continues. I can practically see the wheels turning in his head.
Reece swallows and turns his masked face in my direction. “Is it true? That The Divine One is your mother?”
“Apparently.” I can barely wrap my head around it myself.
“That won’t save you, you know,” he tells me, and his ominous words elicit a fresh round of goose bumps on my arms. “I have no idea what her end goal is, but it’s apparent that she lives and breathes this organization.”
“She doesn’t even believe in the damn religion,” Dom growls out, forking his fingers through his platinum-blond locks.
“She’s a psychopath, plain and simple,” Beckett agrees.
Silence blankets the air between us—the uncomfortable kind that grows fangs and claws, slicing and nipping at us. None of us can argue with Beckett’s assessment of her. Aria truly is a psychopath. My guys are, too, but somehow, she’s different. More calculated.
My guys kill to protect me.
She kills because she seems to enjoy it.
Or maybe it’s not the killing she enjoys but the power granted to her as The Divine One. She’s practically a god to these people. She decides who lives and who dies. I wonder if, once upon a time, she used to be normal. If she had dreams and hopes for the future.
I’ve seen power corrupt people before.
“We can’t just leave Reece to die,” I insist, my brain scattering in a thousand different directions, desperate to come up with a solution. Any solution.
Maybe I had the right idea when I suggested he hide in the ceiling. If he can get up there, and stay silent, then he might be able to remain hidden long enough to escape.
Before I can articulate the thought, however, I become aware of the sensation of eyes on the back of my head. Energy fires up my spine in a series of sporadic explosions, and I suck in a scorching breath.
Someone’s here.
Someone’s watching.
I immediately reach for my dagger, but my guys are already moving, stealthily slipping in front of me.
A ball of panic rises in the base of my throat.
“Show yourself,” I declare, grateful when my voice comes out steady.
Footsteps precede the masked figure as he exits the room directly to the right of us.
Zane pulls his arm back, preparing to throw his dagger, when the intruder says, “Stop! It’s me!”
“Doyle?” Dom’s brows form a knot in the center of his forehead.
Dom’s older brother removes his mask and allows it to hang limply at his side.
Doyle looks awful. Absolutely awful. He seems to have lost at least ten pounds since we last saw him, only a few days ago.
His brown hair hangs in disheveled, greasy clumps on his head.
Purplish smudges line both of his eyes, evidence that he hasn’t been sleeping, and his cheekbones stand out starkly.
Doyle sweeps his gaze over all of us before pausing on Reece, still disguised as a member of POP.
“I can help you,” Doyle tells us, his voice a rasp of sound.
Suspicion rakes its claws across Dom’s face. “Help us with what?” He keeps his voice nonchalant, as if we’re not attempting to do something damn near suicidal.
“I can get Reece out of here. I know a back door. Usually, it’s reserved for staff, but I can get us through.” Doyle glances in both directions, as if ensuring we’re still alone, before refocusing on us, his eyes laser sharp. “Are you coming?”
“Why should we trust you?” Dom demands.
Doyle’s expression doesn’t change, not even for a second. He doesn’t appear hurt or offended by Dom’s mistrust. He simply says, “Do you have a choice?”
“He told us about Ellie,” Beckett points out.
“Because The Divine One played him.” Zane narrows his eyes suspiciously, as if he’ll be able to decipher every one of Doyle’s secrets by glaring at him hard enough.
Worry swells behind my ribs. “That may be true, but we really don’t have a choice. Every other option ends with Reece’s death.”
“Wow. Thanks,” Reece deadpans.
Dom gives him an annoyed look. “You know that’s true.”
“Come on,” Doyle insists, gesturing us forward. “Before time runs out. We only have a few minutes left.”
I exchange anxious glances with my guys, but Doyle is right.
What choice do we have?
Relief and terror hold hands in my chest as I follow after Doyle.
Relief…because we might be able to free Senator Reece Whipers once and for all.
Terror…because this could be a trap.
I’m not sure yet what Doyle’s intentions are.
Is he on our side? A pawn The Divine One toys with?
I saw his face when he discovered his twin brother and stepmother had been murdered and mutilated.
There’s no faking that devastation, that heartbreak.
If The Divine One did that to someone I love, I would do everything in my power to take her down. Destroy her. Rip her limb from limb.
Apparently, the last few weeks have made me bloodthirsty.
Who would’ve thought?
“This way.” Doyle lowers his voice to a whisper, and I realize why a second later when I hear muffled voices and laughter.
I make the horrible mistake of glancing over my shoulder, toward the hallway we didn’t go down.
Bile burns my throat, and it takes every ounce of self-control I possess to wrangle my senses under control.
Four POP members are surrounding the fifth and final lamb—the crying man I haven’t seen yet in the maze of hallways.
Only…
He no longer looks remotely human.
He’s nothing but flesh, broken bones, and blood. I think they may have skinned him, but I can’t tell from this distance. I only know it’s him from that shock of dark hair on the top of his head and the white stripe streaking through it.
Am I mistaken, or does the lump of flesh whimper?
Oh god.
Is he still alive?
I’m suddenly nothing but a burning wick, flames curling through my veins, eating me alive. Tears prick my eyes, and oxygen wheezes out of my lungs.
“Don’t look,” Beckett whispers, stepping closer to me, his broad body blocking the macabre view. “Don’t fucking look, Ellie.”
I turn away.
Ignoring the tears streaming down my face and the erratic thumping of my heart, I follow the others down the hallway, through a door, then down a second hallway. Aria was right—this truly is a maze. I wonder how we’re supposed to find the exit once the time ends.
“Over here,” Doyle whispers as we enter a sparse room with beige carpeting, blue walls, and not a single piece of furniture. Then again, I haven’t seen any furniture in this entire labyrinth, as if everything has been built specifically with this game in mind.
Wouldn’t surprise me.
“How do you know about this so-called secret door?” Dominic demands. He folds his arms over his chest and scowls at Doyle’s back.
Doyle ignores him as he begins to run his hands up and down the wall.
Searching for something, perhaps?
“Dad showed it to me,” Doyle says, his voice detached, without any inflection or emotion whatsoever.
I exchange a glance with Beckett, who still stands beside me.
Is this another trick?
“When the game first started,” Doyle continues, “I told him I wanted nothing to do with it. He dragged me over here and told me if I was going to be a little bitch, then I could get the fuck out.”
“Is Harvey still here?” Dom asks, his scowl deepening, creating harsh lines in his artfully handsome face.
Doyle’s lips thin. “Probably.” He flicks his gaze in his brother’s direction before refocusing on his task. “You know how much he loves to hunt.”
A shudder reverberates through me.
Harvey is a disgusting, despicable man. Fortunately, he’s also delusional. He seems to genuinely believe that, sooner or later, Dominic will fall in line and become a loyal member of POP. That mentality is probably the only thing keeping Dom alive.
Satisfaction paints itself across Doyle’s face when he seems to find what he’s looking for. He clicks a tiny button—so minuscule it practically blends into the wall—and a panel swings open. Without even a single crack visible, I never would’ve noticed the door was there to begin with.
“This leads to the back tunnels,” Doyle says in a rush. “I don’t know who you’re going to face in there, but—”
“But it’ll be better than who I’ll face out here,” Reece finishes, his tone grave.
Doyle wordlessly nods.
“Give me a knife,” Reece demands, extending a hand in Dominic’s direction. Dom doesn’t hesitate before handing Reece the blade.
“One minute remaining,” a mechanical voice declares from a hidden speaker.
“You need to go,” I urge, practically shoving at Reece’s shoulders.
He doesn’t move. I can’t see his face with the mask on, but I have a feeling his eyes are on me, lasering in with intense focus.
“As soon as I’m free, I’ll do what I can to help,” he promises. “I have contacts. Resources. I was so close to taking down POP once. I can do it again.”