My mind had drifted away from the monitors to thoughts of revenge, so I was slow to see the change. The simultaneous pause. When my attention returned, I saw that the men had stopped cleaning up their respective rooms and were now standing underneath the cameras looking directly into them. Staring straight at me. Identical faces all expressionless. Then, as though on cue, they all turned to leave their rooms. The man who had been cleaning the operating room entered the hallway I’d just come from, walking briskly toward the break room I was just in. There was no time to leap back through the double mirror and barricade the door. Others were filing down separate hallways that I assumed led toward this room. I looked around for a weapon and found nothing except for the swivel chair, which wouldn’t do much. The door to the break room opened, briefly backlighting the man in dim light before he closed it and entered the dark.

All I could hear was the cop talking. “What kind of lawyer do you think will take on your case, huh? The evidence we have on you?” I reached for the audio button, but didn’t want to turn my back on the hole in the mirror. Before I could find it, the man stepped into view. His face obscured in shadow.

“Why don’t you help us out and maybe there’s something we can do for you?”

I backed up against the table, checked the door.

“You’re in a bad situation here, you know? Why make things worse?”

The man stood still, light glinted off his eyes. Watching me.

“It’s only a matter of time until we find the body. What then? Come clean now and I can get you life with early release for good behavior. Keep this up and you’ll be facing death.”

I lifted the chair and jabbed it at the man like some lion tamer. He didn’t flinch.

“You’re in a bad situation here, you know?” the man standing before me said in a dull monotone, echoing the policeman’s words. “Why make things worse?”

“Shut the fuck up,” I said.

The man smiled. “Why don’t you help us out and maybe there’s something we can do. Keep this up and you’ll be facing—”

I slammed the base of the chair into the man’s face and upper body, feeling a satisfying thunk as it made solid contact. I used the chair to barricade the hole and hustled toward the door.

“You were the last person to see him alive, Lance,” the cop said. Caspian was hanging his head, that lank hair covering his face. I almost felt bad for him. Then I realized the cop had suggested I was dead.

The man removed the chair and began climbing through. I should have stayed with Malia, I thought, as I began my blind run.

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen