Chapter 41
LET IT ACHE
I wake up cold.
Not a simple chill of the air. The kind of cold that seeps straight into bone. I reach for my blanket and find a metal chain. I tug instinctively—no give. My arms and back throb, but I can’t place why. I try to force my eyes open, only to be hit with a light that sears my retinas.
I am certainly not in my room.
Antiseptic fills my lungs as the hum of the med bay closes in around me.
It’s familiar—which is odd, considering there isn’t much to recognize.
No furniture occupies the space beyond the bed I’m chained to and the monitors beside it.
An enforcer waits by the door, avoiding my gaze like I might carry a plague that’s only transmissible through sight.
My head reels as I sink into the flimsy pillow. The lull of sleep creeps at the edge of my mind, only to be trampled by approaching footsteps. I flutter my eyes open, already preparing for whatever lecture Mister M has in store for me.
“You’re dismissed.” The calmness of the order both startles and reassures me because that is not Mister M.
The guard vanishes without a word, leaving only V—a tray balanced in one hand, folded blanket in the other.
“Mister V—” My voice scrapes out in a pained whisper.
“Shhh.” He sets the tray in my lap, grabbing the small water cup from it. “You shouldn’t be speaking yet.” He holds it to my mouth. The cold rush of water surges through me until I feel like I can breathe again. V sets it down, pulling a key from his pocket and working on my wrist restraints.
“What are you doing here? What’s happening?” I rasp, not yet confident in my ability to talk without sounding like I’ve been run over.
“Try to eat something.” V frees one of my wrists, gesturing to the small plate on the tray. When I don’t move, his lips press into something between a frown and a grimace.
I wave him off and run a shaky hand through my tangled hair. My fingers snag on something unfamiliar, a ridge of skin pulled too tight. It’s a small scar, about an inch behind my right temple. The soreness radiating under my touch makes me wince. It’s new.
V doesn’t seem to notice. He’s muttering, more to himself than to me. “It’s so damn cold down here, and they wonder why girls keep getting sick.”
A sense of wrongness clamps down in my chest. It roils fast through my body until my vision snaps taut, pressure slamming against my eyes.
“June—” My breath stutters. “What happened to her?”
V stills. His eyes flick to the camera in the corner. Then back to me.
“She’s—” The word catches. His jaw goes tight. His gaze finds the floor. Whatever he was about to say retreats behind his eyes, sealed away.
“She’s getting the help she needs,” he says instead, voice careful.
My head throbs. I try to picture June’s face and get nothing but static. I press my fingers to my temple, rubbing at the aching skin.
“Something’s missing. Every time I think about it, it—” I falter. “It goes fuzzy.”
“That will pass,” he coaxes. The phrase lands wrong, a jagged edge I can’t ignore.
Not because I know it’s a lie—but because he does.
His face is calm. His posture perfect. But his eyes won’t stay on mine. He’s looking at his tablet, his shoes, the blank wall, anything but my face.
“You’re lying,” I whisper.
His jaw tenses. “I’m protecting you.” He adjusts the bandage at my temple with careful fingers. He presses a hand against my forehead. “Let me.”
I try again to reach for the memory. June on the floor.
A sound ripping the air to bits, too animalistic to be a scream.
Tiles smeared with… blood? No—paint, dripping to the floor in crimson ribbons.
My stomach pitches, and the image collapses in on itself.
V’s hand finds my shoulder, light but grounding.
“She’s getting the help she needs,” he repeats, firm.
A line in the sand that tells me it’s not up for discussion anymore.
His eyes find the monitor above my head. “Three doses,” he murmurs. “That dosage is reserved for full shutdown.”
He says it as if it scares him. Like he still doesn’t quite believe it.
I shake my head, wading through the muddle of thoughts. “Three doses—of what?” My words are slurred, but audible.
Not audible enough to be acknowledged.
“Eat,” he asserts instead, gesturing to the tray. I flash him a look of annoyance that goes unnoticed. “It’ll make tomorrow easier.”
“Slow down!” I snap, heat rushing to my face. “Sorry. This is all just a lot. What do you mean tomorrow?”
“The investors’ ball. Despite your recent condition, the board requested you to perform.” He’s frowning again, which only serves to confuse me further.
“That isn’t until—”
“It’s tomorrow.” He grabs the cup of water, offering it to me again. I pluck it from his hands, taking a long sip so he’ll back off. His words finally land.
“Wait, how long have I been asleep?”
He exhales slowly. “Two weeks. You were over-administered containment sedatives.”
I choke on the water. I was drugged. Not just drugged. I was overdosed and sent into—what? A coma for two weeks?
What did they do to me?
“Cruel, isn’t it?” he murmurs, eyes distant. “The world doesn’t wait—” He stops. His eyes find mine, raw and unarmored for a single breath. “Even when we need it to.” He adjusts his tie, fingers curling tight around the fabric like it’s suffocating him.
“I don’t understand.”
This is too much, I need to think—or breathe. Both, probably.
“You won’t,” V says softly. “Dwelling can’t change the past. Your only job now is to rest so you can wake up tomorrow ready to perform.”
The dismissal stings.
What an easy thing for him to say. I don’t think he cared about Juniper. Or maybe he did, and this is just what “caring” looks like on him. My stomach twists tight; bile creeps up my throat as my memories shift further from my grasp.
“I can’t!” I whisper-shout, exasperated. “I’m not ready!” Tears blur my vision. One of my only friends is gone, and he’s acting like her disappearance is a virus I can just sleep off.
V doesn’t flinch; he studies me with disappointment, like I’m failing whatever invisible test he’s set forth.
“You just have to fake it. That’s what the rest of us do,” he retorts, folding his arms. I cringe, watching the way his face falls in exasperation. “No one here has any idea what they’re doing. The ones who claim otherwise are either lying, arrogant, or already broken.”
“I can’t do it.” The response is automatic, but I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life. “I don’t—”
“Enough,” he exhales sharply. “You’re not ready. I get it, but you don’t get to give up here. You’ve worked too hard.” He says it like a fact, not a compliment. It doesn’t make me feel any better.
“Rest. I’ll handle it.” He takes the half-eaten tray from my lap, setting it aside before helping me ease back against the bed. He slips a syringe from his jacket pocket, holding it low, clearly hoping I won’t notice. I narrow my eyes.
“I won’t do it if you absolutely don’t want me to,” he says carefully, holding his free hand up in surrender.
“But when the enforcers come to move you tonight, you’ll need to be perfectly still.
You don’t want them dosing you again.” He tries for a reassuring smile, but it’s hollow, doing nothing to ease the tension between us.
My fingers dig into the blanket. “You don’t need to. It won’t work.”
“This one will,” he says calmly, as if my body’s already agreed.
My lungs constrict. “How would you know—”
“Because I do.”
Nerves twist my system. After a long moment, I offer my arm. “Just—make it quick.”
I don’t trust him. I can’t trust him. But I can’t let the enforcers touch me again, so I’m choosing the lesser of two evils.
V tears an antiseptic packet open with his teeth. The cool swipe raises a shiver along my skin. I grit my teeth until my expression goes slack. I’ve done this too many times before to whine over it.
The syringe catches the light, and I forget how to breathe. It’s unlike any sedative I’ve ever seen. The liquid is amber, not blue. Thick and dark and swirling like something alive.
“Wait—”
The injection hits its mark immediately. My muscles sag, breath locking in my chest as ice snakes down my body, replaced all too fast by insurmountable heat.
Then memory.
A piano chord, ringing dissonant. Hands guiding mine. Something warm, someone familiar.
“Don’t rush the third measure. Let it ache first.”
Glass clinks. Monitors beep. A distant voice calls a name I don’t recognize.
Not Maysie.
Not even 214.
“Chin up, my dove.”
A gold ribbon slips from my hair. Turns red.
A chandelier sways above me. Or maybe I’m swaying.
“You’re stabilizing,” a soft voice tells me. I lift a cup that isn’t in my hands. My dress digs at my skin, too tight across the shoulders.
Don’t look at him. You’ll remember.
A chair. A book. A hand brushing mine.
“Tell me the ending,”
“It didn’t have one.”
“Then it isn’t over.”
The floor tilts. My knees hit tile.
“Don’t remember me in red.”
The chandelier crashes.
And the world shatters.
The lights flicker—
White.
Red.
Gone.
My world slams back into view. I jerk against the blankets, still restrained. The feeling that’s swirling inside me is foreign, too painful to name.
V freezes, the blanket caught mid-motion between his fingers; I catch it in my periphery. A hitch in his breath, a flicker in his eyes like he felt it too.
Is that supposed to happen? I try to ask, but my throat doesn’t move.
Neither does the room. It’s still and clean, as if nothing’s wrong. Only, something is. There’s a weight behind my eyes now that couldn’t possibly be caused by the strange drug.
Recognition.
Of what, I don’t know.
“Are you okay?” V says softly. He’s watching me too closely. Not like I’m sick; like I’m about to say something important.
I try to meet his eyes, but they blur into a haze of blue fog. A sinking feeling washes over my chest, like I’m being dragged underwater.
“You saw something, didn’t you?”
I try to nod, but my head is cement.
The drug is winning now.
He exhales slowly through his nose, gaze dropping as he tucks the blanket into place. “It happens sometimes,” he says. “Memory fragments. Carr says it’s nothing.”
Carr says.
Not him.
He stands slowly, eyes lingering on my face like he’s seeing it for the first time. His fingers brush the edge of the wrist restraint, resting there for one extra second like he forgot how to let go.
“Get some rest now. I can’t afford to lose you again.”