“Oh yeah, I remember. One of the first times Ash and I are hanging, she gets a call and your picture pops up on her phone screen. I couldn’t believe it. You were the fucking ‘Saint of Silver Lake’ Ash kept going on and on about. This amazing woman who took her in, this mansion she lived in, the private school she went to. All I could think about was how you sat across from me, all prim and fucking proper, asking all those questions about Ash, and how we knew each other. I couldn’t believe it when you said that Ash was safe and you said she was happy. That’s all I wanted. Then you started asking about my case, promising you’d try and get someone to look at it, saying maybe Ash could visit. I was used to people lying to me, but you, you seemed different.” Nate snorted.

“You never told Ash? About our meeting?” Becca said. It was selfish to ask, but she did it anyway.

“Why would I tell her? She thought you were the shit. You think I wanted to be the one to ruin that? It’s not Ash’s fault you’re a liar.” He spoke with almost no affect, though his eyes told a different story. Becca deserved every bit of his derision.

“I’m sorry, Nate. If I could go back and do things differently, I would. All I wanted to do was to protect Ash.”

“Guess we both failed her,” Nate said dispassionately.

He didn’t know about Ash. God, he didn’t know. Becca inched closer. “Nate, she’s alive. Ash is alive.”

Nate tried his best to sit up straight in his bed. “No. No. No. She can’t be. Mo said… I mean, I was sure they…” Nate couldn’t finish the sentence.

“They tried their damnedest to kill her, but she’s fighting like hell.”

“She’s alive. Ash is alive,” Nate said, repeating the words over and over again. This revelation transformed him, the spark returning to Nate’s eyes, color staining his cheeks. He began to pull against the restraints. “And the others?” Nate asked softly.

The last thing Becca wanted to do was to tell Nate his friends were dead. She owed him the truth. “Nate, I’m sorry. They’re gone.”

Nate shrugged as though this were inevitable. “Mo promised the afterlife would be better than this shit. For their sake, I hope she’s right,” he said. He tried to act as though it didn’t matter. He wasn’t that good of an actor. She saw the depth of despair in his expression, and then Nate began pulling at his restraints. “If Ash is still alive, then she’s not safe. I have to get to her. Mo isn’t going to stop. I have to make sure she can’t hurt her.”