The Wicked We Have Done (3 page)

His swallow is audible. “Are you afraid?” When I shake my head, he repeats my words back to me. “The Compass Room sees who you truly are, despite the lies you tell yourself.”

It’s the first time since I’ve woken that I notice the pounding of my heart. “When do you think the tests will start?”

Tanner glances over at Salem and Gordon as the boys clink together glasses full of clear liquid. “I think they already have.”

***

Blaise isn’t the only one engrossed by a book from the shelf in the living room. Erity’s been carrying around a hand-bound journal. Her dark hair hangs in a curtain around her face as she flips through the pages, first on a couch, then outside, and then tucked away in a corner.

“Looked over her shoulder when I walked by. It’s a witch book,” Salem whispers to Gordon when I walk into the kitchen. “All sorts of diagrams and Latin writing and shit, like it was on the shelf just for her. Little witch bitch. You should ask her to cast a spell.”

“Could probably learn a few fucked-up tricks from her.”

Valerie glares at them maliciously when she walks inside from the deck. We exchange glances before she starts scrounging around for food.

Gordon slides me a shot. “Don’t think, just drink.”

A mass torturer just slid me a shot, waiting with that stupid, smug grin of his. He doesn’t look like a psychopath, more like a surfer boy finishing up his final semester in San Diego.

Average. A curtain of average features to hide his twisted fetish. His smile makes me wonder if torturing those kids to death got him off.

“Suit yourself.” He picks the shot up off the table and downs it. “Top-shelf. Might as well—I’ll be gone in no time. Most of us will, except two-point-five of us. I wonder if the unlucky one will lose his legs. Maybe his arms. Or her legs
and
arms.” He waggles his eyebrows and I taste bile.

“They’re testing our morality, right? Any of this could be a lure to make us do something stupid,” I say.

“And then what, an army will come stomping through the door and shoot me dead? Doubt it.”

“He’s right, you know.” Salem sifts through the bottles in the liquor cabinet before choosing a petite tequila container, a label I’ve never seen before in my life. Probably because I don’t barhop at places that offer thirty-dollar shots. “Test ratios for Compass Rooms are against all of us. Your best bet would be to drink and fuck your last night away. Who’s it gonna be?” He winks, pointing his finger between Gordon and himself.

My stomach clenches. “You’re sick.”

“Better make your decision quick. It’s obvious you’ll be the first one dead.” He studies the bottle. “Damn, I’ve only drunk this one other time. That was a night, I’ll tell you.”

Valerie rests her hand on the knife block. Valerie Crane strung up three of her twin sister’s supposed rapists, and yet this asshole who is here because of his out-of-control cock is yammering away. As if he was clueless.

I shake my head at her. Don’t cause a scene, don’t shed blood. She grinds her teeth back and forth, burning holes into the back of Salem’s head as he takes a long pull from the bottle.

Casey has reappeared and studies the scene in the kitchen from the living room couch, expressionless.

“Have fun dying drunk and alone.” I saunter past them.

“Bitch.” Gordon snickers in amusement.

A crash rings through the kitchen. When I turn back, Valerie has Gordon pinned to the wall by his neck. “Apologize, you little fuck.”

A chuckle bubbles from Gordon’s mouth, setting every last one of my nerves on fire. His eyes roll lazily to me. “I’m sorry, Evalyn, for calling you a bitch.”

I don’t feel better.

Salem laughs and drinks.

“Let him go,” I tell Valerie. “You know it’s not worth it.”

She doesn’t listen immediately, shoulders heaving with every breath. Finally, she rips her hands away and stalks to the deck.

Not wanting to linger in the poisonous aftermath, I return to my room and sift through the contents of my bag. What to do in a house full of killers and psychopaths—I eye my canteen, my blanket.

I could leave.

There’s no sense sticking around here and waiting for the inevitable. Bags were given to us, bags with supplies. Perhaps we were meant to run, explore. Go separate ways. Perhaps Stella was right.

I zip the pack up, swing it over my shoulder, and turn.

“Evie.”

He stands in the doorway, head tilted to the side, sucking on his finger like he’s always done. A habit he’s never broken.

My brother.

“Todd?”

He giggles. “Hide-and-seek, Evie. You count. I go!”

And then he runs.

“Todd, stop!” I yell, darting into the hall. He races to the end, giggling like mad, and rushes into the only open door.

I sprint into the room, where Casey is alone. And changing.

He straightens, shirt coiled around his wrists. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Did a little boy run in here?” I spout, simultaneously gaping at him. I’d been right before when I’d ventured to visualize his brawn. What I hadn’t imagined were the zigzagging scars roping his torso.

He slides into his shirt. “Excuse me?”

I swipe the hair from my eyes to scan the room. “I . . . err . . . a little boy. About five.”

He acknowledges what I’ve said by leaning back against the vanity. I’m noticing a trend to the response of his body language—this one is popping up often. It means,
Are you a fucking idiot?

“I see now,” he says. “You’re mentally insane. That’s what probably attributed to your crime.”

So Todd didn’t run in here.

Why would Todd even
be
here?

Maybe I am insane.

“Does that mean no?”

Casey rolls his eyes. Only then does he notice my backpack.

“You leaving?”

“Thinking about it.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Is that so?” I tug the hanging strap around to my other shoulder. “Care to enlighten me?”

“Do what you want.” He nods to the window that showcases the valley, the near-impenetrable pine. “But you don’t know what’s waiting out there.”

“I don’t know what’s waiting out there, but I know what’s waiting in here. I’ll take my chances.”

His lip twitches. “You talk like you aren’t the most dangerous one of us.”

I tighten the straps of my pack. “If I’m so dangerous, why the hell are you persuading me to stick around?”

He’s calculating, still as stone.

I cock my head. “Planning on being vindictive, are we? Keeping me around so you can punish me yourself? Heard you’re good at that.”

Before I can shut my mouth, he has me up against the wall, arm to my throat, the air knocked from me out of sheer surprise.

“Don’t think I fucking won’t,” he growls.

I wonder if they’ll let us kill each other in here. People get killed in jail, right? This wouldn’t be different. “All talk and no game,” I spit. “Maybe you should stop being such a pussy and do it already.”

“Do
what
?”

“Kill me.”

His whole aura practically shakes with rage.

“I know I’m gonna die, Casey. You could make it easier. Save us a feud.”

Something shifts in his expression—playtime is done. A deeper loathing takes over. He backs away from me. “Get out.”

I ball my hands into fists.

“I said
get out
!”

I wait a few seconds to prove I’m not affected by his smoke and mirrors, and push away from the wall, leaving the room.

The hall is dark. It’s the time of day when no one’s yet thought to turn on the lights because you can see enough to trip your way through the shadows. My hands are shaking. I don’t know why, not quite. I didn’t mean what I said—that I wanted him to kill me. I needed to see his reaction, to see if he took me seriously. It’s hard to gauge the insanity levels of others when you’re so screwed up yourself.

A woman stands at the end of the hall in a short nightie. Her eyes are Bambi orbs.

I pause, waiting for her to move. She doesn’t look real.

Doesn’t look real at all.

And she’s not an inmate.

“Casey,” I hiss, but the door is shut.

Maybe she’s the owner of the house. Maybe she’s been hiding. I open my mouth to say something, but my voice has vanished.

She creeps to me, shoulders erect. Her head hangs at an angle, stringy blonde hair falling limply around her shoulders, eyes sunken in their sockets.

She’s unbelievably thin. Her rib cage protrudes around her nonexistent breasts. With a bony hand, she flips back her hair, revealing the mottled bruises on her neck. “Shh.” She reaches out, like she’s going to place a finger to my lips. I shut my eyes, waiting for her touch.

“Don’t tell him I’m here. I want it to be a surprise.”

I open my eyes to ask who she means. But she’s gone.

I exhale and breathe in slowly through my nose. Exhale. It was the traveling, the train trip, that’s causing these visions. Or the drug they used to knock us out. First Todd, now her. I’m having side effects. Hallucinations.

That has to be it.

I hurry downstairs. Valerie and Jace are in the kitchen, doing their damnedest to stay away from the boys. We’re all trying to stay away from two boys in particular, although interacting with Casey isn’t exactly a walk in the park either. But Salem and Gordon are both vocal in their conversation, inebriated chatter filling the cavernous downstairs. Everyone either has their packs on or near them. We all got the message that they are important.

“There’s food.” Valerie holds a glass of water—or vodka—close to her mouth. “In the fridge. If you want it.”

The last thing I am is hungry. Squatting, I scrounge the liquor cabinet for the perfect bottle—an aged scotch—before uncapping it and taking a long pull.

Smooth. I feel the effects immediately. The horror threading my spine begins to ebb.

“Damn, girl,” Valerie says as I bring the bottle back down. Jace remains distant, rubbing her arms as she observes the boys.

“You two been seeing anything strange?” I ask. “Things—people—that shouldn’t be here?”

Valerie crosses her tattooed arms across her chest. “Having an episode? You’re not gonna go bat-shit crazy on us, are you?”

I might be. Because Todd and that girl—I saw them. Who’s to say how sane I am?

Jace takes the effort to drag her gaze away from the boys. “People?”

I open my mouth to explain, but I’m distracted by Casey, who’s now hovering at the base of the stairs. He glances from us to the boys on the couch. I guess neither conversation is appealing to him.

The lights flicker, the buzz of electricity a prevalent force against my ear drums. They sputter out.

When the power returns, Valerie hisses, “Holy fuck.”

The girl from the hall stands at the top of the stairs. Valerie can see her. I’m not going insane. She’s real.

Blaise, who has been lying on the couch since this afternoon, suddenly sits up. He starts to mutter. A prayer, maybe? He jumps up, swings his backpack over his shoulders, and bolts out the door.

Salem acts like he’s going to follow in Blaise’s footsteps, but stays planted in his chair, watching the girl cautiously.

Casey realizes the attention magnet above his head.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Salem groans.

“Who is
she
?” Jace asks.

“One of the cunts who testified against me.”

An audible growl escapes Valerie’s throat. She clutches the kitchen island in front of her, the muscles in her forearms dangerously tense.

How can Salem’s victim be here, in the Compass Room? Someone must have paid her to make an appearance, but that means she was willing to be in the same room with him.

She leans forward on the railing, breasts trying their hardest to spill from the triangle restraints of her nightie. “Hey, baby,” she purrs. “Missed you.”

“What the
fuck
?” whispers Valerie.

Jace’s hands clamp her glass of juice tightly. “How is she here? How is she inside, like us, how . . .”

The skeletal girl struts down the stairs. “Come on, sweetheart, why such the long face?”

Don’t tell him I’m here. I want it to be a surprise.

“Here to apologize, you stupid bitch?” Salem seethes. I wince at his tone.

“Knock it off, asswipe,” Valerie snarls. “Don’t pretend you didn’t rape her.”

Salem locks onto Valerie, cracking a wicked grin. “Never denied anything, did I?”

“I’m going to kill him,” she mutters.

She isn’t above it, Salem should know. But his expression is fearless.

“I do want to apologize, Salem.” The girl steps onto the stone of the living room floor and slinks around the couch, making her way toward him. “I know what you’ve been thinking. That this place is paradise. I’m here to prove that to you.” She bats her eyelashes. “So sit back and let me.”

The lights dim. Valerie’s all jumpy next to me, so I extend my hand in front of her and say, “Let it play out.”

“Let him
touch her
? After what he did?”

Yes, because she’s letting him. Yes, because this situation is too insane to address. The little blonde crawls onto his lap, and Salem smirks, feasting his eyes on her scrawny, deprived body. Casey waits with clenched fists. Hurried whispers stir from Erity and Stella behind me, and Gordon, well, Gordon starts to cackle, low and gravelly at first, spiraling into mania.

“Think I’d leave you all alone, baby, in a place where the girls don’t service the boys like they should?”

“You’re finally making sense to me.” His hands travel up the back of her thighs, cupping her ass.

She chuckles darkly. “Good.”

Clasping her hands on either side of his head, she twists, elbows swinging as she snaps his neck in half.

I Don’t Remember Most of the Trial.

A funny thing happened with my mind—a trick—during all of those testimonies. I couldn’t even remember
my
testimony. Just blocked out. A shade drawn over a window.

But I remember one particular witness.

It had never been officially over between Liam and me. I was in federal prison, and he was getting over the fact that the world knew me in a different way from how he did. Those two Evalyns weren’t allowed to exist on the same plane together.

The prosecuting lawyer was relentless. But I should have expected that.

“Mr. Calaway, how close were you to the defendant?”

Liam’s eyes flickered to mine. “We’ve been dating for five years.”

“So you’re still dating, correct?”

“I . . . we haven’t really talked about it.”

My eyes stung. I blinked furiously, sucking in air through my lips.

“Was it a sexual relationship?”

“Objection, Your Honor.”

The judge waved her hand in a dismissive fashion. “Overruled.”

“Yes,” Liam said.

“And in the months before the event, did Evalyn start to act any differently than normal?”

Liam thought about this. He thought about this until my fingernails were embedded deep into my palms.

“No.”

“How about her relationship with Meghan Luciani?”

“She started spending more time with her.”

The whole courtroom buzzed with hushed whispers, and I felt the dead cold seep into my stomach.

“Therefore, she started spending more time with Nick.”

I knew what everyone was thinking. That thought was the most humid thing in the room, clinging to the air until I couldn’t breathe.

“I guess,” Liam said.

“So it would be possible that Evalyn was having an affair with Nick?”

My lawyer stood so fast she almost knocked her chair over. “Objection, Your Honor! Total speculation!”

But Liam didn’t need to answer that question; it had already been implanted into the minds of the jury. Evalyn Ibarra spent time with the girl she murdered in order to fuck her boyfriend.

“Sustained.”

So the prosecuting lawyer tried a different route. “How close was the defendant to Meghan Luciani?”

“Very close. Sisters close.”

That’s when Liam lied. We weren’t sisters close. Liam used to always tease that he would have thought we were lovers if he didn’t know better.

“That’s why it came as such a shock to me when Evalyn was charged.”

That wasn’t what the lawyer wanted to hear, so he changed the subject. “Did Evalyn ever talk about chaos theory in front of you, Mr. Calaway?”

Liam shook his head. “No. Well, only once. Meghan had told her that Nick was obsessed with it.”

The purr of the court grew to a rumble.

This was the one bit of evidence given that didn’t damn me. Nick’s obsession led the police to find a hoard of philosophical books about chaos theory in his apartment—the theory that validated his delusional desire to kill. As for me—nothing in my possessions proved that I even knew what chaos theory
was
.

The lawyer held up a baggie with a tube inside for Liam to see. “Can you make out this shade of lipstick, Mr. Calaway?”

Liam nodded.

“Is this a shade that Miss Ibarra owned?”

I saw the crime-scene photo as if it was in front of me. The mirror, the note in pink.

Whoever finds this—

I’ve crumbled along with the world.

This cookie-cutter girl you want me to be

Makes me sick.

There is no turning back. Not for

Any of us.

We will see you in

The next life.

—Evalyn Rochelle Ibarra

“I—maybe. I don’t know? I mean, I’m a guy.”

The gallery, and even some of the jury, laughed. I don’t think Liam was trying to be funny.

“Do you plan on breaking up with Miss Ibarra, Mr. Calaway?”

“Objection!”

“Sustained.”

“No further questions, Your Honor.”

As the prosecuting lawyer made his way back to his seat, Liam’s head remained bowed, his shoulders shaking.

I prayed that he wouldn’t look up at me. I told God that if he did, I’d break, right here in this courtroom, in this chair.

That was the last prayer God answered for me.