Before I could curse him, another man arrived. “You summoned me, Mr. Ward?”
“Take this.” Not even bothering to look at him, the man passed the bloody handkerchief to him.
“Yes, sir.” The man bowed a little, snatched up the crimson-stained linen, and left us alone.
I shivered as my headache grew worse. “What exactly is this place? Whoareyou?”
Not bothering to hide himself anymore, the polished professional mask was traded for the gleam of a monster. “If you’re one of the lucky ones, you’ll find out.” He reached to cup my cheek, but I back-pedalled with a snarl.
He merely chuckled. “And my name is Marcus Ward. You’d do well to remember it. Now, excuse me. It’s almost time to tell the lucky women who won. See you soon, Ms. Snowden.”
He turned to leave, but then changed his mind and whispered, “Also, if you have any ideas of running, allow me to remind you of the ten kilometres of driveway you travelled to get to this gatehouse. Let me also remind you of the eight thousand acres that make up this estate, and the fact that if I don’t want you to leave, you won’t.”
And then, he did exactly what I wanted to do.
And left.
Chapter Three
“WE ALL NEED TO GO. RIGHT NOW,” I whispered into the ear of the closest blonde. About my age, she smelled as if she’d drowned herself in vanilla-laced strawberries. “Help me alert the rest, and we’ll use sheer numbers to get out of here.” I scanned the men congregating by the gatehouse after successfully testing every woman here.
Only ten of them. One hundred of us. The math worked in our favour if I could convince everyone to run.
“But why?” Her button nose wrinkled. “Why do we need to go?”
“They’re up to something.”
“Upto something?” Her faint concern bled into scorn. “Yeah, alright. So what you’rereallysaying is you’re trying to thin the crowd by removing at least enough of us so you’re one of the thirty who get the free spa weekend?”
“Nope.” I shook my head. “I’d be driving myself back to London by now if I could steal the bus keys.”
“You’re so weird.” Rolling her eyes, she went to move away, but I grabbed her wrist.
“Listen to me. Something is off about all of this. We need to go.”
“The only thing that’s off isyou.” Wrenching out of my grasp, she weaved through the crowd and vanished.
Ugh.
My headache pressed a little worse, and I did my best not to let stress get the better of me. I couldn’t afford to have vasovagal syncope—also known as a stress blackout that I’d apparently inherited ever since that fateful day when my parents accidentally killed themselves in the most horrific way possible.
“I just overheard what you said.” A willowy Asian girl with hair as black as mine sidled up to me. Keeping her gaze on the men in front, she whispered, “What makes you think something is wrong?”
I narrowed my eyes, trying to see if she’d come to laugh at me or was genuine. Either way, it didn’t matter. “When I refused to give my blood, the man in charge figured out a way to take it anyway.”
“Why would he do that?” Another girl appeared, honey-brown hair with yellow highlights glinting like gold in the sun. “This is a spa retreat. Not some crazy conspiracy.”
“I don’t know why.” I shrugged, sandwiched between the two women. “But I do know we shouldn’t go in there.No oneshould go in there.”
“But what if we know what’s in there and don’t appreciate you ruining it for the rest of us?” The stunning black-haired girl suddenly turned to face me, trapping me against the other one. Leaning far too close, her lips grazed my ear. “What if most of us knowexactlywhat we’re doing and the rest of you clueless idiots are just here to make up numbers?”
“What...what are you talking about?” I scrambled away, rubbing my arms as goosebumps erupted. “You actually know what all of this is?”
“Of course we do.” The two girls shared a look before breaking into mocking laughter. “We’ve been training for years for this opportunity.”
“Training?”
They nodded smugly. “Like we said. We know what’s in there.Who’sin there. And we’re not about to let you rile up the crowd and ruin it.”
