I had to adapt to survive. I didn’t forgive my parents exactly, but I had to find a way to cope with what they did, to reconcile the fact that somehow, they did love me. We had good times together—impromptu concerts, board games, movie nights, holidays, just like other families. My father read me dark fairy tales every night, and my mother would kiss my forehead and tuck me in. She and I would go shopping sometimes, enjoying a day at the outlets, laughing over smoothies and soft pretzels. And I would smile while somewhere deep in my soul, I mourned the ghosts of my siblings who should have been right there with us.
I loved my parents even while I despised them. Which is the most screwed-up part of it all.
In my mind, love is always entwined with violence.
Maybe that’s why the Angel’s dark, protective passion is appealing on such a visceral level. I think he might be one of the only people who could ever truly understand me.
I need time to get to know him. I can’t just go and die right after meeting him. After everything I’ve been through, thiswill notbe how it ends for me—hanging here, waiting to bleed out or be rescued.
I don’t wait for help. That’s not who I am. If there’s a way out of this, I will find it myself.
If I can’t climb off the pipe, I’ll have to tear it out sideways,throughmy flesh.
“I’ll heal,” I whisper desperately to myself. “I’ll heal, I’ll heal, I’ll heal. Okay, Christine. Do it. Stop being a coward andjust do this.”
I extrude the claws of my right hand and slash at my side, ripping through skin and flesh. I have to work fast before it heals back up.
My faint, frantic screams echo back to me as I carve into my own body, working toward the pipe. Once I’ve gone far enough, I throwmy weight to the left, as hard as I can. The metal tears through the rest of my decimated right side, and I fall, plummeting farther into the dark and crashing hard on my left shoulder.
My body has been severed partway through, right below my ribs. I can’t move. I lie in the clammy dark on damp concrete, choking on my own blood and pain, waiting to heal.
My consciousness dips in and out while my organs, blood vessels, and muscles knit themselves back together. It’s slower than usual, since my blood supply is so low.
I need to scale the side of the pit. I have to get back up to the main level and find someone to devour. Maybe I’ll drink from the Angel again if I can find him.
Patting my side carefully, I discover that it’s much more intact now. It’s still sticky, since the muscles are forming, and there’s no skin yet, but I’m whole enough to climb, and I must do it before blood loss sends me into convulsions.
At first, it’s difficult to make headway up the wall. But my claws are strong, and I’m sure-footed, so I manage it, little by little, finding grooves and nooks for my toes and nails. Judging by the structure of the wall, I think I fell down a subterranean elevator shaft.
No city planner in their right mind would have approved this building as safe for use, not with so much of it in disrepair. I’m more convinced than ever that Firmin Richards and Gil Leveque bribed people to get approvals and pass their inspections. I’ve always gotten slimy vibes from them both, even more so since I ran into Mr. Richards that night in the residential wing. Not to mention the discovery that not only my room but several of the other apartments have two-way mirrors for walls. It’s disturbing on a whole other level. Mr. Richards must have requested those mirrors, and Joe Buquet, the contractor, knows they exist, too. Those perverts set everythingup and then lured in disadvantaged girls, offering them work and a cheap place to stay. And now Buquet, Mr. Richards, and probably Gil enjoy a free live peep show whenever they want. It’s disgusting.
Fueled by rage, I drag myself over the edge of the pit and lie on the concrete floor for a moment to catch my breath while visions of lurid vengeance swirl through my mind. I should drink them both dry. But if I destroy Mr. Richards, what will happen to me, to Raoul’s musical, to everyone who lives and works at the New Orpheum? Maybe lethal vengeance is too drastic an option. I need to figure out something else.
For now, all I can think about is drinking my fill of warm blood.
Where there’s an elevator, there are probably stairs nearby. I fumble along the walls of the dark hallway until I locate a door, half-torn from its hinges. Cool air wafts through the space, and I know instinctively that I’ve found my way up.
Slowly, step by step, I climb out of the depths of the New Orpheum.
By the time I reach the upper floors and find familiar territory, I’m shaking all over. Thanks to the absence of prey and my nearly unconscious state, my body skipped right past the blood frenzy and into a state of weakened desperation. I’m not even sure I have the strength to overpower a human, much less the presence of mind to lure someone into a closet and make sure they stay quiet while I take what I need. There’s no time to drug them, which means they’ll remember everything, and that’s a complication I don’t need. But at this point, it’s drink or die.
I shove my way through one of the doors with the construction tape on it, and I stagger into the hallway beyond.
There, in the buzzing light of the fluorescent fixtures overhead, stands a miracle in gray coveralls, wearing a hard hat and holding a measuring tape.
Joe Buquet, contractor.
At the sound of the door closing behind me, he turns.
I must be a sight, with my bloody shirt torn halfway off, blood drying on my leggings, more blood spotting my ballet flats. My hair is a wild tangle, and I know I’m pale as death.
Shock blazes across his whiskered face. He’s got a big, frizzy neck beard and a red flush of alcohol across his cheeks. There’s a beer bottle sitting near his feet.
So he’s a little tipsy. That might help me. If I play my cards right, everyone will believe he got too drunk on the job and passed out. Even if he remembers what’s about to happen, he won’t talk about it for fear that people might think he’s lost his mind.
I’m too weak to pounce on him, but if I can lure him in closer…if I can just get a taste of his blood, enough to revive me…
I stagger toward him.
