He motions to me, but I don’t know what to do. I’ve never played chess. “You have the first move,” he clarifies.
“I don’t play.”
“And here I thought you’d taken over planning those little jobs Archie’s so fond of.”
“Your son once told me that the mastermind being a chess player is a trope they use in movies to make the lead look smarter.”
A surprised noise that might be the start of a laugh escapes the devil’s mouth, and I force my gaze to his. His face is unreadably pleasant. “As I said, there are gaps, my dear. And I don’t much like them.”
So, I had to shoot a man to be promoted from ‘girl’ to ’my dear.’ Go figure.“Well, I’m bound to be a useless opponent. So, why don’t you just tell me what you really want?”
He looks down at the lake, the omnipresent glass of untouched scotch by his elbow. Then he looks back, moving one of my pieces forward two squares, before moving his own piece forward similarly. “Have you ever wanted something so badly that you’d do terrible things, horrendous things, to make it happen?”
“If you’re trying to win my sympathy, I should warn you that anybody who’d do what you’ve done to your son deserves none of mine.”
“So impudent.”
“I prefer honest.”
He huffs out a breath, moving pieces across the board, only stopping once he’s taken two of my white pieces. “Sometimes there are no good options. Sometimes you have to sacrifice pawns to protect the prize.”
“To protect the queen,” I say, knowing just enough from the movies to know she’s the most powerful piece on the board.
His movements are sharp, the tap of the pieces against the board like marbles dropped on a countertop. He only stops once he’s taken five of my pieces—a pawn, a knight, a bishop, a rook, and lastly, the queen. “Wrong. She may be the most powerful piece on the board, but she doesn’t win the game. The only piece that matters, when it comes down to it, is the king.”
One more move, and he flicks over my king, the piece rolling in a lazy half circle before resting against his winning piece.
“So, I’ll ask you again, girl. What are you willing to sacrifice? Obviously, your freedom. Your body, your other little boyfriends, the safety of your pink-haired friend, your childhood home, your thirst for adventure, your lily-white soul now splattered with blood. All for what? What are you getting out of this? Because I may have underestimated my opponent, but I won’t make the same mistake twice.”
His eyes burn, and it takes all my resolve to gaze calmly back at him. “I think you’reoverestimating your opponent.” I motion at the board. “You’ve only played yourself. I don’t even know the rules.”
It takes too long for him to look away, and too much courage for me to sit still and wait, but I manage it. “That’s what worries me.” He drops a pink-wrapped package on top of my lost pieces. “Mary will retrieve the pregnancy test ten minutes after you’re brought to your room. Please mind the cameras. Oh, and because you returned even after the opportunity your blond one created for you to escape, bringing my wayward son with you, you’ll find yourself with more freedom than before. You’ve been punished as much as I canrisk without you losing your sanity, at least for now. So, reap the rewards. Remember, I can gift carrots as well as I dole out sticks.”
I push back from the table, wearing my rich-girl manners like armor as I stand. “Understood, sir,” I say, knowing from Trips how much he likes respect, saying it even as my mind reels, trying to parse meaning from what he implied.
He doesn’t look like he buys my respectful words.
He shouldn’t. Because I sure as hell don’t mean them.
Chapter 10
Clara
Icatch glimpses of RJ and Walker throughout the week, but I have nothing to give them, mainly because I don’t have any pencils or paper that aren’t reviewed and removed from my room regularly. I dropped one under the bed, just to see what they’d do, and poor Mary had counted the sheets of paper, then crawled under the bed to get the missing one.
It’s bonkers.
And the need to get a message out weighs heavy, as Trips’ continued absence is a hole that threatens to suck my brain into an anxious spiral, all the skills Maria taught me barely keeping me together. It’s time to take a risk. And Thursday is my last chance this week.
I run through my plan the whole way to school, and once I’m there, I set it in motion. Bumping into a guy just inside the door of my classroom, I apologize as I step away, grabbing his phone and slipping it into my bag. A risk, but worth it.
Luckily, the guy is this class’s social butterfly, so he continues to chat with his friends while I take the long way to my seat. Once I’m almost there, I trip on the stair, falling face-first into the girl in front of me, dumping all of her stuff across the floor. “Oh no, I’m so sorry!” I bark, diving to the floor to help her pick everything up, whispering to the voice assistant to set an alarm to go off three-quarters of the way through class under the cover of the chaos. Then I slip the phone in with her wallet. “I wasn’t watching where I was going. I can’t believe I just did that,” I mutter, my guard grumbling at my back.
Sliding into my seat next to Jonah feels like sitting on a bomb that’s about to go off, and all I want to do is run, or tap out my nerves against my thigh, but instead, I receive my class-time allotted notebook from my guard, my breath coming a little too quickly. I hope he assumes it’s embarrassment.
Luckily, today’s guard doesn’t seem to care, leaning against the wall, his phone in hand, obviously bored even before the lecture. He has no vigilance whatsoever, and I wonder how he decided I’m harmless when I shot another guard point blank, no emotion showing on my face, just over a week ago.
It’s obvious he doesn’t view me as a threat. He’s a fool.
