Agony

29

Moments later, the lights in the room flickered on and familiar blonde locks caught my eyes.

Hayley.

"Stay away from me," I seethed as she walked toward me. "I'd rather rot here alone than be in your presence."

"Why so cold, Lottie?" Hayley laughed, but the smile didn't reach her eyes.

I wanted to lunge at her. Stupid chains.

"Are you seriously asking me that?"

She stopped a few feet away. "Just give them the answers they want and they'll let you go free."

"I don't have any answers. And even if I did, they wouldn't let me leave alive. They wouldn't let you go either."

"What are you talking about?" Hayley frowned.

I furrowed my brows at her, "They have to kill us to get the chips in our shoulders to deactivate."

"I don't have any chip in my shoulder."

"What?" I gasped.

Did my parents only tie the vault to my life?

How lovely.

Hayley was free to live and I had been raised like a lamb to the slaughter.

"Charlotte, they're not going to kill you. I have their word. After working with them for so long, they promised me that the two of us would make it away alive."

Alive doesn't mean without injury.

Then I remembered something Beau said. "Why did you kill our grandmother?"

Hayley sat down beside me, whispering. "Everything I did, I did for us."

"Why did you kill her!" I snapped, trying to move away from her, making the mistake of looking at the rotting carcass once again.

"She asked me to," Hayley murmured. "She told me it was the best way to convince them I'm on their side. But I'm not." She flitted a glance to the open door. "I'm on your side. I always have been. And I'm always going to be."

What?

"Any luck?" Beau asked, popping his head in a few moments later.

Hayley shrugged, standing up.

"Very well, I'll call Sebastian."

"Why?" Hayley asked nonchalantly.

"He'll be able to get out information from her."

She threw me a nervous look, before walking out without a word.

If she was nervous then I wasn't sure what to feel.

"Good luck," Beau smiled, not an ounce of emotion in his tone. "You'll need it."

* * *

After sitting alone in the dark for an unknown amount of time, I started to lose all my hope.

Dallas, Ace, and Ellie. They'd be found soon enough. The vault would be in the hands of Venom, whether it was a bomb or contained actual evidence, our weapon against them would be dismantled. Then, I'd probably be killed. Dallas and Ace may get forgiveness from their dads and move on, forgetting about me. About my family.

Eventually, no one who remembered us would be around.

Venom would continue to grow, get whatever it is they were after. They'd get everything they wanted.