skate along the wounds. “What the hell did you do?”
“I tried to tear my hands off.” The truth is worth it to see the horror on his face. “Didn’t you both think of that? I could rip them off and worry about reattaching them later. Be gone before you noticed.” I savor every bit of his revulsion, holding my arms out like an accusation. “I couldn’t chew through the tendons. It hurt too much.”
For the first time he seems to make the connection. The wounds on my wrists above where the cuffs are, the blood dried to a tight mask on my lips and face. “Like an animal in a trap,” he says softly. The contrast of his voice to the anger in his eyes almost makes me flinch, but I hold my ground until he speaks. “If you’re going to act like an animal, Allie, I’ll have to start treating you like one.”
A chill rushes through me.
“Jamison,” Talia calls. “Please. I promise I won’t try anything. I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Just a second,” he says. His eyes don’t leave my wrists. “Don’t ever try anything like that again.”
I let out a bitter laugh. “Why? The waste of blood makes you mad?” Anger brings tears to my eyes and with them comes a vicious disappointment. I don’t fight it. This time, I let him see. My voice comes out quiet and broken. “Where’s Ploy?”
“Not here,” he says as he tosses my wrists free. He shoves a bowl into my hands. I can’t help my wince as I grasp it out of instinct. “You are a special breed of crazy, Allie.”
I raise an eyebrow at Jamison in mock amusement. “Still better than the murdering kind, I suppose.”
I’m never going to get out of here. The realization pounds through me. I can’t even imagine that I’m going to be killed quickly. No, we’ll stay locked in this basement until we’re bled dry or he loses his temper. Which I’m not really helping with right now, I think. I have to get on his good side, convince him I’m a docile little victim.
When I glance up at him though, there’s none of the rage I expected. For the first time since Talia’s apartment, he looks uncertain. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he says. “I promised I wouldn’t. I know you won’t believe me now, but give me an attempt to prove it before you do something like this again, okay?” There’s something so close to kindness in his voice that part of me aches to latch onto it, accept his words as true.
I think about my plan to play nice. “Okay.”
“Promise me,” he says. He grabs my chin and forces me to look at him when I say it.
I want to spit in his face. Claw his eyes out with the broken shreds of fingernail I have left. “I promise,” I say instead. “Talia has to go to the bathroom really bad.” It’s his chance to prove himself to me and we both know it.
“That’s why I came down.” He releases my chin and moves around to Talia. “I’m trusting you not to do anything stupid,” I hear him say. The chains clank to the ground one by one.
“I’m not going to make it,” she says. “Can we run?”
I close my eyes as Talia and Jamison bolt up the stairs. I wonder if I should start over on the wrists again and get the job done this time. It’d be awful hard to make it upstairs without hands though, and Ploy and Jamison would be back before I heal enough for my hands to be decently reattached. Not to mention I’ve got nothing to stitch with. Also hard without hands. The blood loss alone would probably kill me. By the time I came to, they’d have found out what I did and it’d all be for nothing anyway.
I sigh hard and my eyes drift down to the bowl. In it is a hamburger on a bun and a handful of salad. There’s no fork. I dig in with my bloody fingers, not caring, ravenous. Healing takes energy and I haven’t been able to bring myself to sleep. The next best thing is calories. I need to be strong. Maybe Talia’s right and I shouldn’t count Ploy out yet. He might be our only chance to get free.
As Talia comes down the stairs, I’m picking the last crumbles of meat from the bottom of the bowl. Jamison is behind her. He’s