“Prudence,” Jim says coldly. “You know what to do.”
She pulls her gloves off and reaches toward me, her eyes locked on mine.
“Make it a good one,” I growl. “I love horror movies.”
Her fingertips brush my temple, and the world dissolves.
I’m standing in a cell much like my own, but the prisoner isn’t me. A girl is chained to the wall, arms wrenched above her head, wrists raw where silver cuffs bite into her skin.
She’s young. Sixteen? Maybe younger. Honey-colored hair clings to her damp cheeks, eyes wide and brown and terrified.
“I don’t know anything,” she’s whispering. “Please—I don’t know anything about the other packs. I can’t just see things?—”
Bob’s voice cuts through, rough and impatient. “Adelaide, you’ll see when we tell you to see or your family pays the price.”
Adelaide.
Her name hits me like a rock to the gut. Kier’s missing were.
The vision lurches, and I’m somewhere else. A cabin. Blood pools in sticky glistening puddles on the floor and streaked across the walls. Two people lay crumbled on the floor, their throats torn out.
The smell hits me even though I know it’s not real—copper and grief and ruin.
Adelaide’s parents.
My stomach twists. Even in the unreality of this vision, I can feel the despair bleeding off the scene.
Jim’s voice slithers through the dark, wrapping around the edges of my mind. “This is what happens to those who resist. Tell us what we want to know, Lithia.”
“Never.”
The vision intensifies, the bears on the floor rising from their death, mouths wide and gaping, eyes glassy and flat.
I turn to run and find Adelaide behind me.
As the bears approach snarling and growling, she holds out a hand.
“You aren’t alone,” she whispers.
My breath catches, heart slamming into my ribs.
“Tell Kier it wasn’t his fault. This had to happen—he had to meet you.”
The world convulses. Adelaide’s form wavering.
“Prudence will show you.”
The world spins and I’m in another room, this one small and bare but for a thin mattress and some blankets on the floor.
Prudence kneels the bed cradling a baby to her chest.
A baby.
It’s no older than three, maybe four months. Soft pale fuzz on her head, fists curled tight against Prudence’s shirt, little mouth open in a silent, wobbly cry.
“I’m sorry,” Prudence is whispering, over and over, rocking back and forth. “Please, please, don’t take her. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll do anything, just?—”
Footsteps echo outside the door. A shadow moves under the gap.
