Ben scowled. “Forget it. I’ll handle it. Go to bed.” I didn’t move. “I’m not saying you can’t.” He knew me. “This is me saying I got this.”

I stared at him, at them all, uneasy with the thought of leaving things in someone else’s hands, but, deep down, I knew they were right. I was dead on my feet, my brain scrambled, the room a little off-kilter. I was done in and outnumbered. Without another word, I turned and headed for my bedroom. I groused some, but the bite had gone out of it. Still, I fought for the last word.

“This doesn’t count as number three,” I called back to Weber.

“I’m still waiting on that move,” he replied.

I could hear Ben asking him what the number meant as I closed my door and flicked the lights off. I climbed into bed fully clothed, asleep the moment my head hit the pillow.

* * *

I woke with a start in the dark, every bone and muscle I owned throbbing like a decaying tooth. The bedside clock read 7:00, which meant I’d gotten about five hours of dead man’s sleep. It hurt to breathe, but I had little choice in the matter. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and stood holding on to one spot, waiting for everything to settle. When it did, more or less, I padded to the bathroom. Peeling gingerly out of my clothes, I stood at the mirror and marveled at all the bruises quickly forming up and down my neck and across my back, chest, and shoulder blades, gifts from the giant goons who grabbed me and slammed me into a very hard wall.

I stood in the shower till the water went cold, then got out and headed back, dressing in a quiet, painful hurry, so as not to wake my keepers. I wasn’t sure who was still here to guard me—Ben, Barb, Mrs. Vincent, or Weber—but I was sure they hadn’t left me completely alone. I grabbed a bottle of aspirin from the dresser, shoved it into a pocket of my jeans, then tiptoed out of my room and down the hall past the guest room, where Barb was sleeping soundly. She was a committed nun, a fantastic teacher, but a lousy prison guard.

Slowly lifting my keys out of the ceramic bowl by the front door, I grabbed my bag and eased out, mindful of the door’s squeaky hinges, backing out of the quiet apartment as stealthily as a sobered-up one-night stand trying to get out before things got weird. Down the three flights of stairs, out the door, I raced for the curb where the rental sat. I jumped in, started it up, and peeled off. Home free.