Queen of Quarantine (Brutal Boys of Everlake Prep #4) - Caroline Peckham Page 0,13

me a burst of energy as I dialled Saint’s number, my heart hammering madly against my ribs like a tiger trying to break out of a cage. I’d never thought I’d think this, but thank Christ for Saint and his punishments because he’d once had me write out his phone number a thousand times after I told him Kyan had fucked me with the cucumber Saint had eaten in his salad for dinner. Not true, but totally hilarious.

Hope fluttered through me as ringing filled the silence, but a beeping in my ear signalled that the battery was low. I glanced at Jonas’s phone seeing it was on two freaking percent. What kind of psychopath diced with fate like that and let their battery life dance on the brink of doom? Trust my fucking luck to pick the one asshole in this place who didn’t keep their goddamn phone charged up.

“Pick up,” I hissed in desperation. But my hope waned as the call rang on and on.

It was an unknown number. What if Saint didn’t pick up to anyone who wasn’t in his contacts? He must have hated cold callers with a vengeance. And I knew he didn’t have voicemail because he’d once told me voicemails were left by peasants who didn’t value their time on Earth.

“Come on, devil boy,” I begged and miraculously, the call connected.

“Hello?” Saint asked, suspicion colouring his voice.

“Saint, it’s me. It’s Tatum.” But there was no answer and as I pulled the phone back to look at the screen, I found it was blank. “No,” I gasped, panic slicing up the centre of my being.

My hand shook and I wet my desperately dry lips as I considered what to do. And there was only one thing for it. I had to fucking run. I abandoned the phone beside Jonas and ripped the lanyard from around his neck which held a key card. I dragged the lab coat off of him next, putting it on before covering my face with his mask and visor. His feet were far too big for me to borrow his shoes, so I just had to hope no one looked too closely at my bare feet.

I stumbled to the door, running on adrenaline alone as my entire body quaked with weakness. I slipped outside and headed down the empty corridor in the direction of an elevator, my pulse thundering in my ears.

The tiles were icily cold against my bare feet as I moved as fast as I could toward the metal doors ahead. Before I reached them, they started to open and chatter sounded from inside. With a jolt of anxiety, I lunged toward a set of double doors beside the elevator and stumbled through into a brightly lit stairwell. I stifled a cough, my lungs feeling like they were about to pop in my chest as I held it back with all my might.

Stay in my damn chest, you explosive cough of doom.

My tongue was thick and heavy in my mouth as I gripped the railing and started moving down level after level, my breaths coming unevenly. If I can just get outside, get to a road, find help…

An alarm sounded like a klaxon in my head and I cursed, quickening my pace, nearly falling several times but somehow staying upright as I pushed myself harder and harder. I felt like Bambi on the ice, my legs as brittle as twigs. But the only Thumper I had cheering me on was my pounding heart in my chest.

I made it to the ground floor and shoved my weight against a fire exit door, depressing the bar that secured it. But it didn’t budge. Who the fuck kept fire exits locked??

“Shit,” I growled, pushing it harder, but the thing wasn’t opening.

The sound of running footsteps reached me somewhere further up the stairs and panic washed through me.

I have to get out. I can’t give up.

I ran for the door next to the stairs, pushing through it and finding myself in a large foyer with two security personnel with fucking guns at their hips staring out of a large, rotating door. My heart leapt as I gazed at the street ahead of them. Rain started tinkling against the floor length windows as I looked around for any other way out. But that was it. My one, single hope.

A reception desk lay empty opposite the doors and I ran boldly toward it, dropping down behind it before I was seen. I’d moved with all the