She shakes her head. “You don’t understand how this works.”
“I’m not leaving without you,” I say, my voice firm.
Millie’s eyes flash with something close to panic. She glances at the man she was with, then back at me. “You need to go,” she says through gritted teeth.
“Millie, I’m serious.”
“Take her,” Millie says, turning her desperate gaze to Lucas. “Please, just take her out of here.”
“Millie—”
“I’ll be home in the morning,” she cuts me off with an urgent hiss. “We can talk then. Don’t mess this up for me. I need this.”
My heart sinks.
“Please, Sisk,” she says, and the word is a surrender.
Lucas’s hand is on my arm, his grip gentle but insistent. “She’s right. We can’t help her like this. Let’s go.”
I look from his earnest face to my sister’s desperate one. Every instinct screams at me to stay, to fight, but I’m trapped. “Fine,” I manage, the word tasting like defeat. “We talk when you get off.”
Millie nods. “I promise.”
I let Lucas lead me away, but I don’t make it easy. Every step feels like a betrayal as we step back into the hallway with the red line.
“Can you stay right here?” he asks. “I just need the bathroom. Two minutes. Don’t go anywhere.”
“Sure,” I say, crossing my arms.
He disappears through the door. I stand there, staring at the flickering EXIT sign, trying not to let my thoughts spiral. All I see is Millie’s face—the lollipop, her eyes. Before I can fully unravel, a hand clamps over my eyes and everything goes black.
I suck in a breath, ready to scream. A second hand covers my mouth, firm and unyielding. My instincts kick in. I thrash, trying to twist free, but I’m already being pulled backward. A door swings open and then it slams shut. I hear the lock click, and I panic.
Sixty-Three
NOW | JAX
My head feels like someone took a sledgehammer to my skull and then poured in a bucket of concrete. My eyes stay shut, but I know the voices.
“There’s gotta be something you can do,” Sisk says.
“I told you,” Murtaugh replies, calm in that infuriating scientist way of his. “This isn’t something I can diagnose with conventional parameters. We’re well outside anything resembling normal physiology.”
“That’s not helpful.”
“What’s happening to him is different than anything I’ve seen in all the years I’ve been tracking his behavior,” Murtaugh continues, like he’s discussing a fucking lab rat. “Something fundamental is shifting.”
“Great,” Sisk mutters. “That’s super comforting.”
My eyelids finally drag open.
A sudden gasp. A chair scrapes hard against the floor. “Pits and ashes,” Sisk says. “You’re awake.”
I try to sit up, but the sharp clink of metal stops me cold, and when I look down, I see my wrists are fucking locked to each other in handcuffs.
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” My shoulders scream with the need to extend, to pop the joints back into place after however long I’ve been out.
“That was… well,” Murtaugh says carefully, “everyone’s idea.”
