Jaclyn sighed. “I know what you’re going through. I was in that goddamn cage longer than either of you. If I’m being true to myself, I’d like to cut the cock off every last one of these breeders out here. But there are laws. There are men with badges and guns calling the shots. There is an entire judicial system, Orion. They know more about us these days than we know about ourselves!” She paused. “The state takes care of the criminals, babe. Catching monsters, locking them up. All that shit. Let them do their job.”
Orion gritted her teeth. “But he needs to die. He needs to feel just a little bit of my pain. Our pain.” Her voice was sharp. Ugly.
Jaclyn nodded. “I don’t disagree.”
Orion threw up her arms, rose from the bed, and began to pace. “This is a prominent cancer doctor we’re talking about. And the evidence against him is what, the account of a drugged-up girl who says she recognizes his shoes and cologne, and his badge from when he raped her numerous times? I’m not used to this world, but I know they need a fuck of a lot more than my word to sentence him.”
“You saw his badge,” Jaclyn offered.
“I did, once,” Orion agreed. “For a split second. While I was chained to a bed, about to be raped. Malnourished, beaten, broken. Having been locked in a cell for years. My credibility isn’t exactly ironclad here. His fancy attorney will just convince everyone who needs convincing I’m some poor, damaged girl with traumatic memories, anger, and nowhere to put it. And he’ll have a whole world of wealthy friends to back him up. And, even if he is somehow convicted, he’d serve, what, like two years?”
Jaclyn chuckled. “You’ve put a lot of thought into this.”
Orion narrowed her eyes. “Yeah, every second since we got out. Every second since I saw him.”
Though they hadn’t been out for long, she’d spent enough time on this in her mind to realize she had limited options. She’d played out different scenarios. Different ways she could make him bleed. Make him pay. And none of those ways included a fucking judge and a witness stand. Had they not escaped, how long would it have taken those same cops to find them? Ten years it had been already for Orion. For years, two ex-cons held these girls and turned a senile old lady’s house into a brothel. For years, they killed the ones who no longer serviced them, and got away with it. Where were the cops?
A knock abruptly ended the debate, and Orion’s constantly wandering mind.
All three of them stiffened, their eyes on the door. Jaclyn and Orion moved forward, no longer at odds. The two of them would always be partners. Sisters in blood.
“Who the fuck could that be?” Jaclyn demanded, trying to sound strong, bored even. But she was afraid. “Maybe the cops?”
Shelby let out a small whimper from the bed.
They were meant to have cops stationed out front and in the back of the hotel to keep them safe, along with one stationed in the lobby. Of course, Orion hadn’t believed the detectives. She didn’t trust anyone outside of the girls in the room.
Thoughts of Thing One flashed in her mind, and with the way Jaclyn’s forehead crinkled with concern, Orion wondered if she was thinking the same.
They hadn’t found them for years, and now Thing One was on the loose.
Another knock rung out, louder this time.
Orion jumped. “I don’t wanna fucking answer it,” she said, creeping closer to the door.
“Maybe it’s your boyfriend,” Jaclyn said, a hand on her hip.
Orion flipped her off.
She pressed her eye against the peephole, not stupid enough to open it, trusting uniformed strangers and one all too familiar detective to keep them safe.
She saw a blonde head, bleached because she could see the roots. A woman. She was somewhat distorted through the peephole, but Orion could see both her bare arms were covered in tattoos.
The woman banged again. “Orion, open the door!” she shouted loud enough to be heard through the door.
Orion jerked back. The woman was not familiar, but she knew her name and where she was.
“Who is that?” Jaclyn demanded.
Instead of answering Jaclyn, Orion slowly opened the door, out of curiosity more than anything.
The woman standing in front of her was smaller than she was. Petite. Heavy makeup but in a way that suited her. A pink bra peeked through her thin cotton tank and she was wearing a ripped denim skirt and combat boots. She should’ve looked ridiculous and kind of skanky, but she made it work. Girlish envy, the same she’d had for Jaclyn that day all those years ago, bubbled within Orion.
The woman blinked rapidly at Orion, putting her shaking hand to her mouth.
Orion stared back. She recognized her best friend, though much had changed. The makeup. The hair. The tattoos that likely gave her parents a heart attack.