Page 58 of Talk to Me

I could have wept. Closing the door as quietly as I could, I hurried up the hallway in the direction of the elevator I’d heard. The hall continued past the elevators toward—whatever.

Did I need to go up or down?

I had no idea where the hell I was. I could be a mile underground or in the top of a skyscraper. Not for the first time, I’d kill for an actual window.

Up?

Down?

Fifty-fifty chance of being right.

I flipped a mental coin.

Tails.

I hit the down button.

Now, I just had to pray no one was in the elevator. The faintest sound of whirring had me twisting to look back. There was a camera. The red light on top of it was on.

Yeah. Couldn’t care about that.

The doors opened and the empty elevator was frighteningly anti-climactic.

Inside, my breath coming in shallow pants, I looked at the control pad.

We were on level three.

There was a one and a four.

There was also a G.

Ground.

I pressed the G.

A keypad lit up.

Entering the code, I closed my eyes as I pressed enter. It wasn’t like closing my eyes and looking away would make it work any better than if I just hit enter. Didn’t matter. I needed it to work.

“One more time,” I murmured, clinging to the wall. “Just one more time.” I entered the number and hit enter.

The elevator moved.

Holy shit. My heart was in my mouth, but we were descending toward G.

G had to mean ground. What else could it mean?

Get fucked?

Some dark, macabre part of my brain enjoyed delivering that a little too much. A shiver raced over my skin as the elevator slowed to a stop. The hesitation before the doors opened seemed to last an eternity.

The soft “chime” was so innocuous and yet I still jerked when it sounded. The doors opened to another floor that looked like a lobby, but they still didn’t have windows.

Fuck, I hated these people.

Charging out, I headed for what I hoped were the exit doors. The quivering in my soul reverberated through my frame. I half-stumbled as I left the elevator. There was nothing to catch myself on.

An alarm bleated to life overhead and all the lights went red.