“No.”
There was no anger in his voice. Just that calm that I now found fucking annoying.
“Ay. Ay, listen. Man to man,” I began, trying to hide the nervousness in my tone. “You got her. You won. Whatever you think I did, it’s over.”
“No.”
“I can disappear.”
“You already tried.”
“I can leave the country.”
“You tried that, too.”
My stomach turned as I remembered Zurich and Rome. I thought about the villa where I had slept better than I had in months before I woke up in a warehouse with no windows and a big ass Russian humming some old song while he cleaned a knife. All those times I thought I had almost gotten free. After all those times, I had still believed I would.
“Your brother crazy as fuck and you just like him!” I accused.
He laughed. “Yeah.”
The agreement pissed me off. But more than that, it terrified me.
“But this… this was all mine,” Targen said,
The panels stopped moving. For one second, hope bloomed inside me. Then the floor beneath my feet vibrated. The section ahead opened, not wide, but I might be able to squeeze through sideways. Beyond that, I saw light, a way out. Relief almost left me boneless.
Then, I moved. I pushed into the narrow opening, scraping my chest, my back, my arms. Metal pressed against me from both sides. I sucked in, cursed, and pushed harder. That light was waiting ahead. Close… so close.
Targen’s voice returned, calm again.
“Now, what did we learn today about impulsivity?”
The walls moved inward another inch. I cried out, completely stuck. Panic spread through me, desperate and terrifying.
“Stop it! Stop! Stop!” I screamed.
“Observe patiently,” he said.
“I can’t move!”
“What do you notice?”
“I notice I’m stuck, nigga!”
“Why?”
“Because you trapped me!”
“Nah.”
The light ahead dimmed. The ceiling above the narrow opening showed storm clouds so dark they looked almost black.
“You saw something you wanted and stopped thinking. You forced your way into a space that was not meant for you.”
I was breathing fast, too fast.
“You did that with Theory, too.”
