Page 18 of Hush, Little Baby

“I am taking you home,” Nikolaus growls, his hand clamping over my mouth. “Come on, baby, don’t make this any harder than it needs to be.”

I whimper into his palm, frantically looking around for anyone who can help. But there’s no one. No one except these strange men and their driver.

“Easy,” he murmurs near my ear. “You’re alright. I promise this is for the best, Charlie. You’ll see.”

The driver steps back politely as we get close, like this is just a normal occurrence for him. I don’t even want to think about why that may be.

“Get him inside already,” Constantine orders.

Nikolaus doesn’t hesitate. He lowers himself into the back seat, pulling me in with him before I can wriggle away again. I try to scramble out the other side, but Constantine is already there, blocking the door as he slides in beside us.

“No,” I gasp, trying again anyway. “No, no, no—”

Nikolaus pulls me firmly back against his chest, one arm wrapped securely around my middle while his other hand cups the back of my head, pressing my face gently into his shoulder.

“It’s alright,” he repeats. “You’re okay. Nothing bad is going to happen.”

I whimper in distress when I feel the car start to move.

Now I’m not almost leaving with them.

I am leaving with them.

The door beside me is locked. I heard it click. I felt the car pull away. The building is already disappearing behind us through the tinted window.

“I wanna go back,” I whisper, my voice thin and shaky. “Please.”

Nikolaus doesn’t let go of me, just pulls me even closer, making a pleased hum.

Like I did something right.

Like being tucked against him is where I’m supposed to be.

The sound should scare me more than it does, because I am in a car with men I don’t know, being taken somewhere I didn’t agree to go, and my brain keeps trying to make the pieces line up into something that makes sense.

But they don’t.

Nothing makes sense.

Not the car, which is so quiet inside it feels sealed off from the whole world.

Not the seats, soft black leather beneath my palm, smooth and warm and stitched in perfect little lines along the edges. Not the faint glow of hidden lights tracing the floor and doors. Not the little black sliding window between the driver and us, closed tight like the front of the car is a different place entirely, and we are back here in our own small, secret room.

Not Nikolaus’s arm around me.

Not his hand stroking over my back like I’m something precious instead of something stolen.

I stare at the little window until my eyes start to blur.

It reminds me of movies.

Bad ones.

The kind where someone gets into the wrong car and never comes back out.

My breath catches, then catches again, and then it won’t stop catching.

I try to breathe normally, because I know what this is. I know the beginning of it—the fluttery, awful squeeze in my chest, the funny floating feeling in my fingers, the way the world starts sharpening and blurring at the same time.