Chapter 29

Maddie

As soon as I realize I’ve fallen asleep, I jump up in a panic. They drugged me. Preston drugged me and I fell asleep and I… no… My anxiety goes up a notch when I realize I’m lying on the floor on my side in front of the mirror, surrounded by mud tracks. There’s also mud on my skin, my clothes, my hair. My shirt is torn and I have a cut on my finger. And the worst part is my hair is blond, like in the pictures. I’ve transformed overnight into someone else.

Into Lily.

“You dyed my hair.” I shake my head in denial as I touch strands of it. “No… I didn’t… this is just a dream.”

“More like a nightmare,” my reflection says from the mirror, looking just as wrecked as me, yet in more control. “Calm the fuck down, would you? It’s not as bad as it seems.”

I narrow my eyes as I let go of my hair. “What did you do?” I ask, sitting up and tucking my legs under me. “While I was out?”

She rolls her eyes. “I didn’t do anything, except…” She pauses and it’s the longest pause ever. “Well, your mother might be a little upset with you today, more than she already was.”

I clamber to my feet. “What did you do to her?”

She shrugs, but there’s a wicked glint in her eyes, “Honestly, do you really care?”

I briefly pause, deciding. The good rises in me and I dash out of the room and down the hallway. “Mom,” I call out. “Mom, are you here!” I reach her door and try to turn the doorknob, but it’s locked. “Mom, are you okay?” I ask with a desperate knock.

It takes three more knocks before I hear her moving toward the door. She doesn’t open it, but just says, “I’m fine. Now go back to bed.”

“Okay, but…” I scratch my head, wondering why she won’t unlock the door. “You’re okay, right?”

There’s a pause. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

It gets quiet, but I think she’s still standing on the other side of the door. I wait for her to say something about the sedative, thinking maybe I should say something, but Lily tells me not to worry. That she already took care of it.

I always take care of you.

I wander back to my room and shut the door. “What did you do?” I ask aloud, noticing that my window’s wet. It’s been raining outside, the grass is muddy and the streets are puddled. Lily’s been outside somewhere, doing God knows what.

Of course, she decides to play the silent treatment and doesn’t respond. I check the time—four thirty in the morning. I’ve been out for twelve hours. She could do so much in twelve hours. I have to check—have to know. Reaching into my pocket, I hold my breath, waiting to see if I feel a button. I exhale loudly when I don’t feel anything and move my hand to the other one. There is something in this one, but not a button. A piece of paper. I pull it out. No, not paper. A photo of a man. In the picture, he’s just sitting there staring at the camera. Brown hair. Dark eyes. Maybe in his thirties. Not smiling. Not frowning. Not anything. He looks hollow empty. Yet he makes me feel full of emotions I never knew existed inside me and with no control of my own, tears flood from my eyes. I cry for what seems like forever, my shoulders shaking, my body frozen in fear, my heart beating a million miles a minute. Fear. Fear. Fear.

I know this man well.

This is the man who kept me a prisoner.

This is the man that hurt me.

Beat me.

Hurt others.

I’m afraid of him.

“Where did you find this?” I ask, shutting my eyes tightly, willing myself to forget the man. But he’s there in every one of my memories. Killing people. Making me watch. Trying to teach me about wickedness. Evil. When the evil is him.

“From your file in Preston’s office,” she says in the gentlest voice I’ve ever heard her use. “There were a lot of interesting things in there.”

“Like what?” I whisper, but deep down I think I already know. Pain. There’s a lot of pain. Caused by this man, who I know, as well as I know my own mother.

“You really want to see?” she asks cautiously. “Because you really need to make sure you’re ready. It’s worse than looking at that photo.”

I hesitate, opening my eyes and looking down at the photo. Do I really want to know? Pain. My chest aches. Vomit burns at the back of my throat. It’s just a man. Just a man. But I know it’s not. Deep down I think I know who he is, not just the man who kept me prisoner, but I’m not ready to admit it to myself anymore. The things he did to me… to all those people… to Evan. You’re the one who hurt Evan.

“I don’t want to look at it anymore,” I whisper through my tears as I clutch the photo.

“Then get rid of it.”

“I can’t,” I sob, so afraid of the picture I can barely move.

Lily sighs exhaustedly. “Oh, fine. I’ll do it. It’s always been me anyway. I’m your out when you don’t want to do things.”

Without warning, my feet move toward my bedside and my fingers move toward my nightstand drawer. I’m not in control anymore and I’m gratefully handing it over, because I want to stop crying, want to stop staring at the photo that instills fear in me.

I open the drawer and take out the lighter. Then with a flick, I ignite the flame and watch the photo burn.

Burn.

Burn.

Burn.

And only when it’s nothing but ash, gone, dead, burned, do I feel content again.

“Now show me what else you found,” I say, feeling better that it’s gone. Like I can breathe again. Like I’m not a child cowering in the corner.

“Not yet,” she says. “Not until you’re ready.”

“And when will that be?”

“When you can’t feel anything anymore,” she says cryptically. “When you become me. Otherwise you won’t be able to handle it.”