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Is Lochlan going to make it out of surgery alive?
How did they end up in the scuba shed?
Why did Juliette try to kill him?
Will she even be able to tell me?
She’s not in surgery, but other than that, I don’t know anything about what state she is in. She was barely conscious when the helicopters arrived.
The door opens, and I whirl around as a nurse clutching a clipboard steps out. “Can she talk?”
She looks hesitant to answer me, but I know Cash pulled some big fucking strings and every nurse, doctor, and janitor should be well persuaded to ignore all patient confidentiality laws.
I feel like my jaw is going to snap with how hard I’ve been clenching it. I try to relax it and ask again. “Can she talk?”
“She can talk, but she has a severe concussion. She may become disoriented or tired. I’m sure she will also be very forgetful or have trouble recollecting certain things.”
“Fine.” I move past her and walk into the room, locking the door behind me.
Juliette is sitting up but reclined in the hospital bed. She has two fat black eyes and a busted lip from her fall. Her head is wrapped in bandages, and a mess of wires and tubes are connected to her hands and arms.
“Stella, I am so sorry—”
I hold out my hand. “I don’t want apologies or excuses. I want an explanation and that is it.”
Her eyes brim with tears and she looks down, licking her split lip. Slowly, she raises her gaze and asks with a croaky voice, “Is he aliv—okay?”
Fire spits and burns in my chest. “An explanation, Juliette. Don’t open your mouth again unless you’re giving me that.”
She nods apologetically. “Yes . . . um . . . okay. When we were at the beach club, I was looking for something in my purse. I couldn’t find it, so I started taking everything out, including my membership card. Lochlan recognized the number—”
“Wait.” I blink rapidly, and my head swims. It feels like the ground is shaking under me. “You killed Jeffery?”
1. Play “Work Song” by Hozier
Juliette
8 days earlier
I never understood the term paralyzed with fear until this moment. The man talking to Stella just took off his mask to wipe his sweaty brow. In doing so, he revealed the face of a monster. Four years later and that same face still haunts my sleep and waking hours.
During the day, I see him reflected in ordinary men around every corner, coffee shop, and stoplight. But tonight, it’s not just my imagination imposing his face on others. No, he’s truly here this time. Here in the flesh . . . rotten, rotten flesh.
The shock of thinking I recognized him on the streets is a pin prick compared to the lance ripping through me now.
The fragmented memories of that night are usually confined to the loop they play in my nightmares. Now, they race through my mind. Fragmented as they may be, the pieces are brutally vivid. It’s as if Libidine transforms in the blink of an eye to a different club a hundred miles away.
The mocking way he says, “Careful now,” is like a cold chill spilling inside my skull.
The overpowering smell of cologne and clove cigarettes that makes my stomach lurch.
The feel of hitting the mattress and bouncing like I’m weightless.
The metal that clamps around my wrists and the pull as my arms are stretched above my head.
The way my consciousness comes and goes but fights to stay, even though I am wearing less and less clothing every time I come to.
The air I can’t seem to breathe as something soft and fleshy is shoved down my throat again and again.
