“There isn’t any point.” Kara raised the gun higher. “I came down here to kill all the prisoners. So that their deaths would be quick and none of them would have to suffer. Then I’m going back to do the same for my mother.”
I heard Evie’s sharp intake of breath beside me. “Please, Kara. Let us go. I know you’re trying to help us. Just . . . let us go.”
Kara shook her head at me. “They’ll only capture you again. And your deaths won’t be as easy as they could be now. I tried to take you all down to the beach before. So that you could die with the sound of the ocean in your ears. Instead of in here, upon the cut of a Saviour’s knife. Not one of you is going to leave this island. You all signed your death warrants the moment you stepped foot on the island. The Saviours have everything. Every weapon you can imagine. And my stepfather has put new safeguards in place over the past few years. There is no escape.”
“Your stepfather?” Sethi’s shook his head in confusion.
“The man who heads the Saviours is married to my mother.” Kara’s voice thickened with loathing.
In shock, I immediately pictured Constance. Her husband was the head of the Saviours?
“You won’t get near him,” Kara added. “There are hundreds of Saviours here right now in the monastery. Minus a few.” She glanced briefly around the room. I guessed that Sethi had killed Lewis, too.
“Please,” called a young guy with straggly black hair, his face angular and handsome. “Kara, let us choose. If I’m going to die, I choose to die on my feet.”
“You don’t understand what you’re asking, Cormack,” she replied, her hands curling into loose fists by her sides.
But desperate cries echoed around us.
Letting her head drop, Kara silently nodded. She shoved the gun into a back pocket. “If that’s what you want. But I warn you, the death you face might be brutal.”
Sethi found the keys on Valdez’s body and raced around undoing every lock.
Evie stood, trembling, her eyes filled with fear and shame as she gazed at me. “I’m sorry, Gray. So sorry. You shouldn’t have come.”
Her body was tense and rigid as I brought my arms around her and held her close. She felt cold, and smaller than I remembered. She asked about Willow and Lilly, and I answered as best I could, telling her they were safe and loved. She didn’t need to know about Lilly—it would only wound her. “I love you,” I said, knowing that was inadequate. There wasn’t time now to tell her everything I wanted to say. There might never be a chance.
“Kara,” said Sethi. “All that just happened would have been seen on the cameras, yes?”
“No,” she answered. “I put the footage on loop. If anyone looks, all they’ll see are the prisoners sitting there chained up. Prisoners don’t move much. There’s not much that changes from minute to minute.”
I blinked my eyes tightly in relief. That bought us some time.
Everyone made quick introductions—just their names and nothing else.
“What’s going on here?” demanded Richard, a small, blonde man with a goatee. “How in the hell did everyone’s relatives suddenly turn up? If my father is about to walk in here, too, I want some warning.” There was an ironic, harsh edge to his voice.
“The door!” said Yolanda, ignoring Richard and pointing to the other end of the cellar. “Kara would know how to disable the alarm and unlock it. It leads straight outside.”
Kara ran her lip across her bottom teeth as she eyed Yolanda. “Yes, I do. But the Saviours know that there are intruders on the island. And there are Saviours running all over this island right now. With AK-47s. If you want to be shot at like it’s duck season, go for it. You’d just want to pray they kill you dead and don’t just maim you.”
The room fell into silence.
The slight sway of the enormous cage with its macabre collection of dead bodies captured everyone’s attention.
“That’s where we’re all ending up, no matter what we do now,” said Richard. “So why not fight? I’ll take as many of the bastards with me as I can before I die.”
“I’m with you.” Cormack shook back his mane of black hair.
Yolanda and Hop went to stand beside Richard and Cormack. “I know how to shoot,” said Yolanda darkly. “And I’ll start with the mentors.”
My mind roared. Fighting all of them was certain death. Maybe it was all we had left. But I refused to give in yet.