666#.
How fitting. The devil picked the devil’s number—something he probably did on purpose.
I hold my mace with a steady grip and race up the front steps, careful not to trip. I let myself into the house quickly, and the beeping of the security system immediately starts up.
It takes me a moment to locate the box on the wall. I jab the light switch and examine the panel. With shaky fingers, I enter the code.
It flashes red and readserrorthen goes back to beeping. Louder.
What the hell?
I reenter the code.
Nothing happens.
The beeping continues, followed by the wordintruderin a robotic voice.
I angrily text Cross.
Me: You're an asshole. What is the CORRECT code?
Cross and I are about to go toe to toe if he keeps this up. I was willing to play nice. After accepting my future at SVU, my plan was to keep my head down and finish my degree. But now I’m stuck dealing with this.
When he doesn’t text back, I try it again.
The police are going to show up if Cross doesn’t text me back, and then I’ll go to prison for murdering him.
Bzzzz.
I frantically drop to my knees and grab my phone.
Cross’s name flashes, and I quickly answer it, only to pull it away from my ear right away. Loud noises echo in the background, and it sounds like he’s at some raging house party.
“What the hell are you doing?” he shouts. “How hard is it to enter a fucking code, Scarlett?”
Angry heat covers me with his patronizing tone. “Hmm, I don’t know. How hard is it to give me the correct fucking code, Cross?”
“What are you talking about?” he snaps.
I repeat the code he gave me. “666 pound. That’s what I entered!”
The chatter in the background of the call lessens, and then I hear a door latch, shutting it out completely. “It’s 669 pound, stupid.”
“You typed it incorrectly!” I exclaim. “Maybe you shouldn’t skip out on those tutoring sessions.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t show up late,” he retorts.
I rush over to the panel and enter the correct numbers. The beeping stops, and the house falls blissfully silent.
I exhale loudly. “Okay, I got it.”
“Great. Can you fucking stay put? I’m busy and don’t have time to deal with your stupidity.”
“My stupidity?!” I shout. “And what are you so busy doing that–”
I jerk backward mid-sentence when the phone beeps.
He hung up on me.
