Igroanatthepain in my body and a warm compress is pressed to my head. My eyes snap open and I grab the arm, but I’m not quick enough. Tyjae blocks me and gives me an annoyed look.
“Chill the fuck out. You fainted,” she says, swatting my hand away and I just let it fall to the mattress beside me.
I’m too weak to bother fighting her at the moment, and she’s less of a threat to me than anyone else in this godforsaken place, even if I don’t know much about her. Tyjae won’t fight me unless I fight her. Right now, I just need to sort my head.
Pregnant. I’m fucking pregnant.
Imprisoned in fuck-knows where and I’m pregnant.
“I want to help you escape,” Tyjae whispers to me, placing the warm compress back on my head. It feels wrong to allow her to do this. To be too weak to push her off the bed and tell her to go fuck a razor blade.
I snort.
“Please,” I croak.
“Your nausea is being caused by several things,” she says randomly.
If she’s about to tell me I’m throwing up because I’m pregnant, I’ve got a news flash: I’m so stupid I don’t know the basic symptoms of pregnancy, for fucks sake.
“Some of it is likely the pregnancy, but from what I’ve gathered, Elio is slowly trying to create a dependency on the lorazepam that he’s been injecting you with,” she continues.
My body stiffens.Excuse me.
“He’s shooting me up with fucking Ativan?” I hiss.
I never bothered to wonder what he was shooting me up with. Thinking it was just a simple tranquilizer to put me down when it suited him. Which was dumb on my part, since the Ricci’s dabble in the drug trade. Lorazepam is a tranq alright, but it’s an easy one to abuse and fuck you up for life.
“He shoots you up with the drug, keeps you compliant, builds an addiction to the drug and you will become dependent on him,” she adds. “If it weren’t barbaric I would say it’s a genius way to shape and mold someone how you want them.”
“Fuck you!” I snarl. “You’re not the one locked in a goddamn cell, pregnant, and being drugged! I don’t give a fuck what you think is genius,” I yell, my voice finally rising to drive my point home.
Tyjae hushes me, looking around to see if anyone is coming.
“I said I want to help you get out of here, remember?” she says with a stern look.
Damn do I wish I had the energy to knock that look off her face.
“And what the fuck’s in it for you?” I grumble. “People in our world aren’t exactly known for their good faith. So, what is it you want in return?
Tyjae’s face hardens, her eyes going distant as if she’s fallen into a memory.
“No, I suppose we don’t.”
She pauses and purses her lips, deciding if she wants to continue.
“I don’t know who you are, so how would I know if I can get anything from you by helping?”
“Say I don’t believe you don’t know who I am,” I counter.
She huffs out a laugh and pulls the warm pack from my head. “You don’t have to. Elio Ricci’s father took something from me a couple years ago. When Griffin and I got word that Elio was in need of someone to look after a prisoner, I realized this was my chance.”
I snort.
“Vengeance is one hell of a bitch, isn’t she?”
Tyjae gives me a tight smile, her eyes falling to her hands.
“I don’t know who you are and I could be releasing a terror back into the world. But when things get ugly here, I don’t want an unknown girl and her unborn baby getting hit in the crossfire.”