Without Mercy (Mercy 1)

Again, she thought she heard voices in the hallway.

Damn!

Wasn’t that just her luck?

No one was supposed to be patrolling the halls of the administration building at this time of night. And if they found Shay here, what punishment would those dorky TAs dream up? So annoying, those überstudents who’d been brainwashed into believing they were superheroes or something. The TAs would act like she’d committed a major crime, just because she strayed from the rec hall next door.

Now the voices were louder. A man and a woman.

Shaylee shrunk into a dark corner, but bits of a heated argument seeped through the glass door with its blinds snapped shut.

“Let’s not go there, okay? I get it. I should have known she was going to bolt. My mistake!” A high-pitched, girly voice hissed through the hallways. Shay had heard it before and knew in a heartbeat it belonged to Missy Albright, one of the TAs. Was she talking about Shay and the fact that she’d slipped away from the group that had congregated in the rec hall?

Damn!

She had to hide, and fast!

Noiselessly, she dropped to her knees and crawled around the corner of the desk, using it as a screen if anyone walked through the main doorway. Even so, she felt like a dead duck.

A male voice responded to Missy. He sounded angry, but Shay couldn’t tell who it was or even what he was saying.

With a loud click, the door opened and the lights flipped on, offering wobbling illumination as the fluorescent tubes overhead flickered on.

Shay held her breath.

She couldn’t be caught here!

“See? Nothing!” the male voice said. “No one’s here.”

“I swear—”

“Just calm down.”

“Like I should have calmed down with Lauren?” Missy challenged.

Shay felt the blood rush through her head. They were talking about Lauren Conway, the girl who had disappeared one night. She’d already heard the rumors about her. No one knew if Lauren was dead or alive. Had she escaped? Had she met with some accident and died? The weirdest theory was that someone had killed her and she’d returned to haunt the school. Maeve Mancuso, a twit if ever there was one, was certain she’d seen Lauren’s ghost lingering in the gazebo under a full moon.

“Don’t patronize me, okay. It’s not cool.” Missy was really riled.

Shay squeezed her eyes shut and prayed the blond TA wouldn’t step farther into the room.

“We should get back,” the man said.

The lights clicked off.

Shay wasn’t fooled. They hadn’t left.

She waited.

A few seconds later, the door closed with a soft thud.

Still, she wondered if Missy, after winking to her companion, had stayed inside to flush Shay out. Shay didn’t move. Slowly and silently, she counted out the seconds: one thousand one, one thousand two, until she’d clicked off a good five minutes. There was no sound in the room aside from the soft rush of air through the heat ducts and the wild hammering of her heart.

When she could stand the tension no longer, she peeked around the corner of the desk, and deciding Missy hadn’t stayed behind in a ruse to catch her, Shay climbed to her feet.

Her pulse was jumping, her nerves as tight as bowstrings.

Now, wondering if her actions were being filmed by hidden cameras, Shay eased out of the room quickly. In her haste, she banged her thigh into the corner of a desk and bit her tongue to keep from crying out.