“I need answers.” I took a deep breath. “I’m nervous.”
“Hey, we’re here.” Will placed a hand on my arm briefly.
“The cameras are covered,” Adam said, looking at Will.
“How’d you manage that?”
“I called Nolan. He brought Marcus.”
“Who’s Marcus?” I asked.
“An Eight.” Will looked at me and back at Adam. “They know about this?”
“I wasn’t not going to tell my brother.”
“And of course he had to tell Marcus.” Will shook his head. “We haven’t even told The Swords about this, Adam. If they find out—”
“They can’t find out.” Adam let go of my hand. “We don’t even know what we’re dealing with here. Once we do, we’ll let some of the others in, if we can.”
“What do you mean if we can?” I frowned at Adam. “I thought The Swords were a family.”
“All families have secrets.”
“This one isn’t supposed to,” Will said.
“Yet it does. You know that better than anyone. Look at all of the crap we found yesterday. You think everyone knows about that?”
“Probably not.” Will scowled. “Definitely not the black members. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have joined.”
“Times have changed,” Adam said, his voice hopeful.
“Not enough,” I said so that Will wouldn’t have to.
“I know, and I hate that.” Adam’s expression softened as he brought his hand back to mine. “But if we want things to change, we need to do it together and that means getting to the bottom of this.”
The three of us started walking up the stairs toward the fifth floor. By the fourth, my thighs were feeling the burn. Adam and Will were walking ahead of me as if they were in a race to the top floor. I held on to the rail between floors four and five and paused to take a breather. They walked back down to me.
“You okay?”
“Fine. Just out of shape, obviously,” I huffed, looking up at them. “What the hell do you two do? Run marathons for fun?”
“Actually, we do.” Will chuckled. “Maybe you should train with us.”
“Maybe you should fuck off.” I put both hands on the rail, still breathing heavily. “Okay, let’s go.”
“We’re almost there,” Adam said, grabbing my arm when I reached him on the landing between the stairs.
“We don’t have walkie-talkies or something to make sure the cameras are turned off for sure?” I asked when we reached the door.
“No, we have cell phones.” Adam took his out and pressed Marcus’ name on his phone. “We’re on five. Are we good? Okay.” He hung up and put the phone away. “The nurses are on the third floor, which means we have exactly fifteen minutes before one of them comes back up to do her rounds. We stick together, you got it?”
I gave a nod. Will gave a nod. Adam opened the door and we followed him down the hall.
“Damn, this is fancy.” Will looked on either side of us.
We were surrounded by windows. The entire building was built like that, with Plexiglas instead of concrete. Debbie said it was built that way so it wouldn’t feel like a prison. The glass was supposed to make the patients feel calm and not trapped. It always had the opposite effect on me. I couldn’t even count the number of times I envisioned myself barreling through it and falling to my death, but that was then. I hadn’t been to the B-Wing in years and was seeing it in a different light now. Instead of drinking the Kool-Aid and accepting everything they told me, I was questioning it. The way I’d once questioned Karen. I’d spent so much of my life being angry at her and using her as a scapegoat for my flaws that I rarely ever paid attention when she bad-mouthed the Maslows. Back then, it felt like jealousy. Now it felt like . . . truth. Adam stopped walking suddenly and knocked on the door beside us, taking my hand in his when he dropped it from the door.
“Can she just open the door?” Will whispered. “Why wouldn’t she just leave?”
“The only reason we’re walking freely right now is because Marcus handled the cameras and alarms. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been able to open the door to this floor,” Adam whispered back.
“Her door won’t open,” I said. “Not without us unlocking it.”
“What?” Adam frowned. “Are you sure?”
“Positive.” I took the badge he had clipped on the pocket of his dress shirt.
“Wait.” He reached out for my hand just before I slid it. “They’ll have it on record that I was the one who opened the door.”
“Fuck.” That was Will. “Why didn’t you think of this before?”
Adam shook his head, looking annoyed at himself, and took out his phone. “Hey. Can you open the door for me from there? What do you mean he’s on his way over?” He hung up the phone and slid it in his pocket as he looked over at us. “He says Nolan is on his way with the key.”