I stop scanning the room for a way out. “Lottie?”
I know that name.
Why do I know that name?
Her sweet smile is as pretty as it is sad. “Charlotte Meeks, but everyone has always called me Lottie since I was a baby.” She sucks in a sharp breath. “Juniper?Youare Juniper. They got you too.”
“Yeah.” I narrow my eyes at her. “How do you know my name?” My suspicion grows, and I keep searching for a way out of here. Even if I found one, I’m not looking forward to getting to my feet with the way my head is pounding. Sitting up hurts; I don’t want to know what standing will feel like.
“Callum told me about you. They all did.”
“They?”
“Archer and Torin.”
“How do you…”
And then it hits me. Her name. The last time I saw her face. The sense of familiarity when I don’t remember ever meeting her before.
“You were meeting with Archer, Torin, and Callum at the house. I saw you.”
Blue eyes widen in surprise. “You saw me?”
I nod. “You were laughing with them.” They were all so happy, and all too distracted to notice that I’d returned with Veronica from the heat clinic where they’d sent me.
“We never have long to see each other. Ian is usually dragging me out of the room before the thirty minutes are over.”
I scrunch my nose at the unfamiliar name. “Ian?”
She gets to her feet and crosses the room to a glass jug of water on a bedside table. “He’s my keeper.”
“Keeper?”
She fills a glass with water and walks over to me. “Ian comes with me when I go to visit Torin, Callum, and Archer. He’s there to stop them from helping me to escape.”
“I didn’t see him in the room.”
Her eyes are sad. “He was there. He’s always there with the gun he brings with him.”
A gun?
“But they could overpower him.”
“They tried that before, and it didn’t work. He has orders to shoot me if they try it again, and he wouldn’t hesitate to do it.”
Her resigned admission stuns me into silence.
She offers me the glass. “Here. Drink some water. You’ll feel better.”
Taking the glass from her, I sip the cool water. Up close, I see the things about Lottie that the dim light and my suspicion made me blind to before.
Callum said she was a prisoner to ensure their continued good behavior. A hostage to keep them all trapped in a place they wanted to leave, and to keep secrets they could never reveal.
Her skin is flawless, but pale. Big blue eyes show signs of strain, and she’s thin. Too thin. When she sinks back to the floor beside me after handing me the glass, she releases a tired sigh and rests her head on the wall, as if crossing the room for water is all it took to exhaust her.
Callum said she was deathly ill. I believed him, but knowing and seeing are two entirely different things. “You’re sick.”
With her eyes closed, she nods. “Since I was twelve. No one knows what’s wrong with me.”
