5
CAP
The bulb over the stairs coughed on and shoved shadow into corners. Ariel’s fingers locked through the seam between our cages. I leaned so my shoulder threw shade across her face. Above us, boots scuffed, a bolt skittered, the door yelped open, and three shapes cut the rectangle of light.
First was the guy who’d never been told no. Keys, with his carabiner clacking like a cheap metronome. Second dragged a plastic tote that thunked like it hated its job. Third hung back with his hands in his pockets, the watcher type.
I counted without looking like I was counting. Twelve steps; one chipped and hungry for lazy feet. The bulb swayed on a rusted loop I could’ve reached if my hands weren’t tied. ThescrewI’d lifted off maintenance rode the edge of my cuff. The bobby pin and wire Ariel had slid me lived there too. Both thin, mean, and patient.
“Up with the ginger,” Keys said.
Ariel’s breath hitched. She didn’t make a sound. I slid between her and the glare and gave my wrists a test twist. The zip tie held.
The watcher skimmed his eyes over me then filed me where men who cause paperwork live. “Not him,” he said, clay flat.“Boss wants the guy breathing. Pretty one goes upstairs. Keep it clean.”
Keys crouched. His knee popped. Coffee and peppermint over the smoke that slept in his shirt. He reached for Ariel’s arm; I put my bound hands in the way. His grin said I’d made his morning.
“Don’t,” the watcher said, still mild. “You break him, we carry him.”
Keys changed tactics. He grabbed Ariel’s ankle chain and yanked until metal screamed on concrete. “Boss says no floor-dogs for the upstairs batch.” The lock snapped. The shackle fell, spun. He kicked it aside.
Freedom’s a trick down here. It always comes with hands waiting to catch you for the wrong reason.
He hauled her up by the elbow. The cuffs wreck your balance; she stumbled, and her body tried to make it easier for him. That sorry little reflex lit a clean burn at the base of my skull.
“Careful,” I said, even. “You crack her head; you get blood on your load.”
The watcher’s mouth barely moved in appreciation for the math, not of me. Keys slowed a hair. She brushed my bars with her shoulder for one heartbeat, let out a breath she didn’t name. I gave her the nod you feel more than see.
Keys hauled her toward the steps. She looked back once, and the second our eyes caught, everything else dropped out. The noise, the boots, the stink of bleach. It was just her and me, one look that saidhold the line.I saw the copper flash at her hairline, the set of her jaw, and it hit like gravity shifting under my feet. She didn’t need to saydon’t let them win.I didn’t need to sayI’m coming.It was already there. Between the breaths, in the count, in the way I’d find her no matter what doors they shut. I nodded once, and the light caught her crown before the door took her.
I let the first thought hit hard: They’ve got my girl. It rolled through my chest like a shell I swore I wouldn’t load again. Then I did what training taught me, stuffed it in a box, sat on the lid, and counted what was left.
The stairwell went back to breathing.
The watcher measured me like I was an appliance. “Swap his plastic,” he told tote-guy. “Transport ties. No marks.”
“Copy,” tote-guy said, suddenly eager now that he had something to do that wasn’t thinking.
He rattled my latch and swung my door with his hip. The cage mouth yawned cold. He liked that feeling too much.
“You gonna be good?” he asked, stepping in.
“Always,” I said, the kind of lie men like him enjoy.
He grabbed my wrists to cut the zip and put on his fresh ones. I lifted my hands like I was helpful and rolled my shoulders forward, stealing half a step into his space. He didn’t like losing ground. He booted his tote to make room; hard enough that the lid cracked and a cardboard sleeve slid half out, the red nub of a utility blade winking at me.
“Careful,” I told him, mild on purpose. “Your hands shake when you’re scared.”
That did it. He yanked the tie to jerk my face up and I went with it, planted off the back foot, drove my shoulder under his sternum. We hit the doorframe and the whole unit sang. He grabbed for my throat; I dropped my chin, shoved mybound wrists up through his arms and hammered both forearms down in a wedge. He grunted; the tote tilted;moreblades skittered in their little paper suits.
He swung messy. I let the punch glance, then buried my tied wrists in his ribs like a battering ram. Air left him in a wet grunt. I hooked his ankle with my heel and pulled.He went sideways into the cracked lid and split it wide.
I stepped on the nearest sleeve, dragged it under me like I was just trying to stand, then let myself drop one more beat as he bounced off the post. My palm “caught” the floor and aflat bladekissed into the pocket along my thumb. Metal whispered; his pride made all the noise.
“Enough,” the watcher said behind him, and added a sound the room obeyed. The clean click of a gun you feel more than hear.
I froze half a beat, then went to a knee like I’d learned something. Tote-guy, proud again with the gun in the room, took a last cheap shot by striking the tote corner across my cheek. The world flashed and settled.
