My thoughts drift, untethered by exhaustion, skipping across memories like stones across water. Mom’s face swims into view, her eyes crinkling at the corners when she laughs. Dad teaching me how to use my knife. Leo giving me half his ice cream when I dropped mine.
Strange, the things your mind latches onto when you’re handcuffed to a table with a corpse for company.
Dad’s birthday is coming up, and I promised Mom I’d be there. But… now I might end up breaking that promise. God, if I die, I hope Piper lies to my parents. Tell them I died of an aneurysm or something in my sleep.
No, I shouldn’t think like that. I’ll be there somehow. And, fuck it all, I’m bringing Matteo. We can wear matching eyepatches and give Dad his present together.
My throat tightens as I think about the perfect gift I bought—the vintage knife… wait. Hold the fuck up.
The knife.
My heart stutters as I dig into the pocket and fumble with clumsy fingers, pulling out the small knife. How could I have forgotten?
“Thanks, Dad,” I whisper, the words a prayer as I slowly unfold the blade.
I turn my attention to the handcuff, examining the lock through eyes blurred with exhaustion.
With my free hand, I maneuver the knife tip into the keyhole, feeling for the mechanism inside. It’s awkward. The angle is all wrong, and my hand shakes from cold and fatigue. The knife slips, scratching across my already raw wrist, and I hiss in pain.
“Focus,” I tell myself, voice a thread of sound in the quiet room. “Focus, Raven.”
I try again, more carefully this time, probing gently until I feel the internal components of the lock. There’s a technique to it; small, precise movements, feeling for resistance, then applying pressure in just the right spot.
The knife slips again, the tip skittering across metal with a sound that makes my teeth clench. My fingers are cramping, unused to this kind of delicate work after hours of stress and cold.
“Come on,” I mutter, adjusting my grip. “Come on, you stubborn piece of shit.”
My wrist aches where the metal has rubbed it raw, sticky with blood that makes my grip treacherous. I pause, wiping my hand on my dress, leaving a dark smear across the once-pretty fabric.
The third attempt is no better, and frustration builds in my chest, threatening to spill over into hopeless tears. I can’t fail at this. I can’t.
“You never taught me how to do this one-handed, Dad,” I huff.
I force myself to breathe, to calm the frantic racing of my heart. Panic is the enemy of precision. I close my eyes for a moment, visualizing the lock, the mechanism, the way it should feel when I get it right.
When I try again, I move with deliberate slowness. The knife slides in, and I feel the tumblers inside, resistant but not immovable. I apply gentle pressure, probing, listening with my fingertips as much as my ears for that telltale click.
Nothing happens.
“Please,” I beg the lock, the knife, whatever gods might be listening. “Please. Please. Please.”
My hand cramps violently, fingers seizing around the knife handle. I bite my lip to keep from crying out, tasting blood as the scab splits open again. Working through the pain, I shift my angle slightly, trying a different approach.
And then… a click. So soft I might have imagined it, but when I test the cuff, it gives just slightly.
“Yes,” I breathe, hope flaring like a match in darkness.
One more careful twist and the cuff springs open, falling away from my ravaged wrist. The sudden freedom is so shocking that for a moment I just stare at my hand, disbelieving.
I’m free.
Well, free from the table at least. Still trapped with a corpse and a psychopath potentially returning at any moment.
I stand on shaky legs, wincing as blood rushes back into numbed limbs. The room tilts alarmingly, and I grab the table for support, waiting for my equilibrium to return.
Adam’s body lies where it fell, a grim reminder of Finn’s capacity for violence. I need a weapon—something better than my small knife.
Swallowing my revulsion, I kneel beside Adam, searching his pockets with trembling fingers. Nothing in the front. Nothing in the back. I pat down his jacket, feeling for anything useful, but he’s as empty as his staring eyes.
