Three
Simone
“What?” I whispered, shocked I even had a voice at all.
I blinked, my mind not processing his words. Rubin stared at the door, his expression set in a way that made the hair on my arms stand up.
He’d been milliseconds from ending my life.
Now, he wasn’t paying me any attention at all.
Or I thought that until he loosened his hold and stepped back a fraction. A split second later, he grabbed my shoulders and pushed me back toward the warden’s desk. The force of his hands on my shoulders took my breath away, even though it wasn’t his full strength.
I stumbled, my lovely shoe catching a wrinkle in the carpet, and flailed, seeking some balance. There was none to be found, and it felt like I was moving in slow motion as my face raced toward the floor. I flinched at the last moment and stuck my hands out to break my fall.
That last-minute instinct saved the teeth I’d had repaired with Rubin’s money, but my head banged against the hard floor and my cheek grazed the rough carpet.
I sucked in a harsh breath and with it, an acrid chemical scent.
It smelled like those scented crystals that people used to vacuum the floor, the cloying perfume designed to hide the rot underneath.
My stomach churned, the rush of the almost stale bagel I hadn’t been able to finish burning at the back of my throat. I swallowed down the acid and pushed up to my knees.
I remembered that Rubin was behind me, and that the threat of violence that permeated the air around him was no longer theoretical. I tensed, waiting for him to pounce, trying to decide what to do. Scream? Fight him? I could try, but I wouldn’t win. But even still, I couldn’t just lay here and die.
Move, my brain whispered.
Move!
But I couldn’t. All I could do was kneel there, the carpet scratching against my palms, my cheek throbbing, my nostrils burning from the scent, and wait for the end.
Hope that he would make it quick.
Holding to that prayer, I waited to feel his bespoke loafer slam against my ribs.
Waited for his thick fingers to tangle in my hair, his palm to press against my skull as he broke my neck.
But the blow never came. His words did.
“Move, Simone!”
Then he grabbed my arm, tucking his hand into my armpit, and pulled me to my feet.
Seconds ago my entire body had been tense with the dreadful anticipation of his huge hands closing around my throat.
Now he was helping me up? I couldn’t make sense of what was happening, and apparently didn’t have time to.
Before I could even think to respond, there was a loud thud.
And I suddenly understood why he told me to duck.
The warden’s office door had a window that was six and three-eighths inches long, three and five-eighths inches wide. The covering was a thick plastic threaded through with metal and designed to look like glass. It should have been nearly impossible to break.
That much was clear with one look, but the man who slammed his head against the plastic wasn’t deterred. At the first crash, a fine film of red sprayed the glass and then spread on the man’s pale forehead. But the plastic held.
It held at the second crash, too, one that shattered the man’s nose and sent another mist of red into the air.
Crack.
The sound of the third crash was muted by the jagged splinter that spidered through the plastic.
Though his face was nearly coated in blood now, I recognized the man. It was the warden’s administrative assistant. I’d walked past him on the way to the warden’s office, and he’d been the only person I encountered who looked apologetic for me being there.
He didn’t look apologetic now. I stared at him with macabre fascination, trying to process what I was seeing. His neatly trimmed beard dripped with his own blood, and tiny shards of plastic had embedded themselves in his face. And his eyes…
Thirty minutes ago, they’d been bloodshot and jaundiced, leaving me certain that the man kept more than water in his thermos. But they’d been human. Now…they weren’t like any I’d ever seen before. Unfocused. Milky white.
Dead.
That word reverberated around my brain like a marble looking for a place to land. But there was no place because what I saw wasn’t possible.
I gaped, unable to form words, and then glanced at Rubin.
He grabbed the flagpole stuck in one corner of the warden’s office and cracked it over his knee.
The polished wood splintered, and then shattered.
Rubin looked at one piece then another, then chose the shorter piece with a heavy metal base at the bottom.
Clearly he was ready.
For what, though?
His smooth strides cleared up that confusion.
He was going to open the door.
But he couldn’t open the door because then that thing would be inside here.
I wanted to scream desperately, but couldn’t make the words. Rubin wouldn’t listen to me anyway. I recognized that expression on his face, the one that said the die had been cast, and all there was to do now was see it through.
I still couldn’t speak, but I searched the room.
My eyes landed on a trophy. Intramural Baseball Championship from two years ago.
I grabbed it and prayed it wasn’t one of those cheap discount awards.
It had some heft to it, so I hoped that meant something.
I decided it didn’t matter. It wasn’t like I could do anything with it.
But still, it felt better in my hand, the cool metal slick against my palm, the sharp corner of the marble base menacing in its press against my fingers.
“Stay there,” Rubin said.
My mouth hanging open, I gripped the trophy tighter as he pulled the door open. The man, thing, whatever that had been slamming into the door, fell into the warden’s office in an ungraceful heap. Its pale blue button-down was soaked pink with what I didn’t doubt was blood.
I yelped when the thing shifted, and for a split second, it met my eyes.
Dead.
That thought was back in full force as I watched the thing move. It put one hand down against the carpet, reminding me of how I’d been moments ago, but it was awkward, ungainly.
Still, where I’d been frozen, this thing wasn’t. It was slow, uncoordinated, but determined, and had Rubin in its sights as it stood.
Rubin returned the favor and when the thing lunged at him, he brought the base of the flagpole down hard on its back.
I heard the crack, which had to be bone, saw the thing’s arm collapse. Saw that the pain of a freshly broken scapula had absolutely no effect at all. The thing still clawed toward Rubin, determined to get him.
I saw Rubin from my periphery, seeing that same set expression and maybe just a hint of surprise. He swung the pole again, harder this time, directly into the center of the man’s back. It should have knocked the air out of its lungs.
It didn’t, and it was then I noticed not once had I seen the rise and fall of its chest.
I only heard a sickening sound. An inhuman sound. The thing clawed at the ground trying to get to Rubin. And the sound changed, becoming almost guttural. It flooded me with fear so acute, this must have been a dream.
Rubin kicked the thing; it gave no reaction, but as I watched, an insane idea demanded I voice it.
“The head, Rubin. Get its brain.”
That sound rang out again before Rubin could speak. A sound that stopped abruptly when Rubin slammed the base of the flagpole against its head. There was a dull thud, and the man’s skull caved in. It collapsed into a heap, red-black goo pooling around its head.
Rubin stepped back from the spreading pool, mindful of his shoes, and then looked at me.
“Stay close,” he said. His eyes dared me to contradict him, and part of me wanted to. But I couldn’t. Because even though Rubin looked at me like waste he would relish disposing of, the alternatives…there were none.
He stepped closer to the door, and I stared at him, hoping I was wrong about his intentions, but knowing that I wasn’t.
We couldn’t go out there.
I couldn’t go out there. I looked up, and Rubin was generous enough to spare me a glance. “I won’t repeat myself.”
The irony of my predicament wasn’t lost on me, nor was the weight of my choice. And then Rubin moved, leaving me with a choice that was no choice at all.
I swallowed, gripping the trophy tighter, and then stepped into the hall.