He gripped her at the waist and rolled her over toward the part of the bed the ceiling-vent camera couldn’t reach. He kept the edge of their bodies in view so as not to give away that he knew about the remaining surveillance.

“Here,” he said.

“Okay.” She was breathing hard. “Okay.”

She sat up on him, tugged free the chopstick, shook her mane of hair. It resettled as if she’d placed it there strand by strand. She let the chopstick clatter to the nightstand, then ran a finger across the yellowed bruise on his shoulder from the beanbag round.

“You are tough,” she said. “But are you tougher than René?” The name brought a faint shudder.

“I know enough not to underestimate him.”

“That’s wise,” she said quietly. “You’ve killed some of his workers.”

“How do you know?”

“The men talk.” She was undulating on him, her shoulder blocking the camera above. “So you did?”

It was taking all sorts of focus and nonfocus for Evan to maintain the ploy. “Yes.”

“That’s what you do? Wait in this little room dreaming up ways to kill your way out of here?”

“Yes.”

Her skin carried the fragrance of jasmine. She leaned forward, pressing the softness of her stomach to his. The tips of their noses nearly touched. Her hips worked and worked some more, her eyes watching him appraisingly the whole time. “How would you kill me?”

“I’d put the chopstick on the nightstand through your carotid artery.”

Her eyes flared. “What an ugly thing. To know something just like that.”

“Yes,” he said.

She rolled off him, threw an arm across her forehead, ostensibly worn out. He slid the rest of the way out of the lens’s purview. She let her head fall to the side so she was facing him. “That’s why they told me I had to take the chopstick when I left. It was an experiment. To see if you’d fuck me or kill me.” Sadness touched her eyes. “You did neither.”

She waited for him to say something, but he had nothing to say.

“That’s what I am now,” she said. “A lamb staked to the ground to test the predators.”

She got up abruptly, slipping off the bed. She was sure to get the chopstick on her way out. When the door opened, Evan heard multiple sets of footsteps outside. It closed, dead bolts clanking into place, one after the other. He barely had time to consider what had just happened when he heard a familiar hissing from above.

“Fuck,” he said.

Gas flooded down on him.

19. Somewhere Much, Much Worse

19

Somewhere Much, Much Worse

A hint of cherry blossom laces the air. In other circumstances it might be lovely.

But beneath it is the earthy stink of damp concrete and the coppery tang of blood.