66. Staying Alive
STAYING ALIVE
Idon’t sleep. The lights are too bright, and I’m too terrified to turn them off and be alone in the dark. I don’t trust that Nico isn’t waiting to strike the second I appear to let my guard down.
I move around what I guess is every few hours, drinking some water straight from the sink’s tap, using a bucket for a bathroom, stretching.
I run through the routine of sit-ups, push-ups, crunches, and planks that I’ve become accustomed to doing every morning.
I should be conserving energy, not burning calories, but the movement makes me feel stronger.
Counting reps in my head offers a few blissful minutes where I can pretend I’m in Serebryanovo’s gym, not Nico Morello’s torture chamber.
I searched the men after dragging them to a corner. One’s phone was saturated with blood. The other’s was still functional but locked. No cell service. The battery died a few hours ago and there’s no clock anywhere. I have no idea what time it is. How long I’ve been in here.
The constant glare of the lights mimics an endless day. I try to trick myself into thinking it hasn’t been long as a tactic to retain some sanity.
Truthfully, I’m not sure I want out of here.
Both of Nico’s men were carrying the same type of gun, each containing fifteen rounds.
I used six from one magazine, killing them, which means I have twenty-four bullets left.
When that door opens—and I know it’s a when, not if—my only option will be to fire until I’m out of ammunition.
Hopefully, I’ll hit Nico, but he knows I’m armed. He’ll send an army in to subdue me first. And then …
I can’t think about what might happen then.
I stand again, cracking my back and rolling my neck.
My stomach rumbles, but one glance at the corner where the two bodies lie eradicates any appetite.
I wish there were blankets, newspapers, anything I could use to cover the corpses, but there’s nothing.
Maybe this is my penance for being a murderer—having to stare at the grisly proof.
I circle ten laps around the room, then sink back down in the same spot, as far away from the men as possible. I think they’re starting to smell, but maybe that’s my overactive imagination.
My eyes feel gritty and dry. I pulled one all-nighter in college, turned in an assignment at eleven a.m., then slept the rest of the day and the next night. I think I’m well into a second day awake, based on how sluggish and sleep-deprived I feel.
How long until they realized I was missing?
How long until they realize who took me?
I rest my chin on my knees, staring at the steel door. It’s perfectly flat and smooth. So unyielding.
Nico hasn’t spoken to me again. I don’t know what that means.
What his objective is. He’s intentionally made a powerful enemy—enemies—and he’s never struck me as suicidal.
He must have been monitoring Isabella, ready to act whenever I contacted her.
So he could rape me? Kill me? Does he know Lev is in Italy, or was that a miscalculation?
I’m going slowly insane, with nothing but my own thoughts and two dead men for company.
I start humming the overture that starts the symphony’s program, needing some break from the silence.
At first, I think I’m imagining it. That I am actually losing my grip on reality or have fallen asleep.
I bite my tongue, I blink rapidly, I pinch my arm, and still, the music continues.
It pauses, and Nico’s voice echoes through the awful, empty space. “You play so beautifully, Carina.”
The music resumes.
I lift my hand, cover my mouth, and scream against my palm.