The Girls Before

Chapter 24 Below

Below

The door opens with a tortured sound, and then the light streams in. I curl against the wall, trained fear taking me over. The light is here the light means pain there is no salvation in the light—-

“Oh my god,” says a voice, and it isn’t one I know. Not the one with orders and recriminations, the one that saws between sweetness and rage, the one that belongs to the hands whose touch has marked my days down here.

I force my eyes open and find a woman staring at me.

“Melinda?” a voice calls from above. “What’s down there?”