I remember him applying that electrode jelly shit to my temples before he ruthlessly clamped the paddles to my head. It didn’t work then, and I don’t care about the scars now.
“How do you feel?”
The same. Only tired, and bruised, and submerged in a thick layer of indifference. I want to sink beneath the water and never come up. But as the tiny pricks of light project a glow over the rocks, I can see the shadow on the wall. How this all works. Suddenly, the answer is illuminated by the faintest stars.
It’s faded and hard to grasp—but it’s there, the solution, buried just below the gauze shrouding my thoughts.
I bury my face in my wet hands, clearing some of the fog.
Alex would never fall for a ploy so basic. But really, if I fail, I’ll have lost nothing. It’s a chance—and that’s a reason to try.
“I feel strange,” I say, as I wade through the water. I notice where the trickling is stemming from, and look up at a cascade of water sheeting over a jutted crag in the rock face.
“Strange how?” Alex probes. “Immediate side effects should wear off within a day.”
My gaze stays on the waterfall. “I don’t know, just strange. My chest feels heavy, but it’s not in a terrible way. I want to go into the waterfall. It’s so beautiful and serene.”
“Blakely, you’re worrying me. Maybe I should take you back—”
I push through the water toward him and grasp his face between both hands. I stare up, making my eyes wide, my lips trembling from the cold and onslaught of emotion. And before I say what’s right on the edge, I hear Mrs. Fisher’s voice in my head.
Cruelty is a disease, Lauraleigh. It will fester inside you like cancer.
This may be the cruelest thing I’ll ever do, but Alex has earned my cruelty.
“If I could rip your throat out right now, I would. I would carve out your jugular and watch your blood stain the water, and I would feel….nothing.”
Alex swallows, his throat works hard, his gaze unwavering. “Then what’s stopping you?”
I crush my body to his and run my fingers through his damp hair. The spray off the waterfall makes the droplets look like the stars in the dark sky. I lick my lips slowly, tasting the river water, and his eyes fall to my
mouth.
“What you did to me…what you’ve been doing to me…” I trail off. “No one has ever done such things. No one would ever dare hurt me the way you have. No one would, because no one cares about me that much to try to help—” My voice cracks, and I glance down at the ripples of water barely separating us.
His hands are clamped to my shoulders, holding me at bay. When I look up at him, his brow is furrowed as he studies my expression. I wonder if he can discern the lie there—if I have a tell that he’s already labeled in his journal.
“We should go back to the lab.” He looks past me. “Run tests. Get updated scans.”
I smile at that. “I said you were the rabbit.”
His fingers press into my skin. “I don’t understand—”
“Did you ever realize how Alice never stopped…couldn’t stop chasing the rabbit? It was a compulsion. Even though that world was crazy and frightening, she kept chasing. You’re not the rabbit, Alex. You’re Alice. Chasing your compulsion to some deranged Wonderland.”
His hands drag over my shoulders and slowly travel up to clasp my face between his palms. His mouth parts as hunger sparks in his eyes. The air charges around us. “You’re my Wonderland.”
“And you’re a hypocrite,” I say.
Confusion creases his forehead, and I grip his shirt in my hands. “I should rip your fucking throat out, but I can’t, Alex. Not because you don’t deserve to suffer. And not because of any law or self-preservation. I can’t…because it would cause me to feel something I don’t even know how to describe.”
And there it is—the smallest glimmer, the hopeful well in his pale-blue eyes. He wants to believe. I just have to give this delusional fuck a reason.
“Touch me, Alex,” I say, a hot whisper against his lips. “If you don’t touch me, my chest will explode. There’s too much…just too much all at once, and I need you to siphon off the overflow.”
“Christ, Blakely.” He tries to pull away, but I cling to his shirt. He places his hands over mine. “Don’t do this to me.”
A strangled laugh escapes. “Do this to you? You fucking coward. You torture me. Sadistically subject me to scans, drugs, and literally cook my brain, and now you can’t handle the… What’s the thing you scientists are always touting?”