In The Darkness (Project Artemis #1)(19)

Persephone had no idea what he had planned, but she’d do as he said. She didn’t know if what she felt for him truly could be called trust, but she had to admit she’d never been as happy to see someone like she had when he appeared beside her just a few moments before.





Chapter Seven





Nick carried the bowl of the usual grey slop toward Persephone’s room, happy to get away from the militia guys for a little while. Between their need to constantly play that damn video game or talk about it when they weren’t playing it and their sudden spikes of rage that usually resulted in one of them pulling a gun on the others, he needed a break from being on edge all the time.

He knew most people wouldn’t understand. The idea of spending time with a woman he had to keep tied to a chair didn’t seem very healthy, to say the least. Ordinarily, he would have been the first to agree, but these weren’t ordinary circumstances.

Just a few more hours and he thought there might be a window of opportunity for them to escape. The group had been told to come to this house on a secluded property at the end of a long country road so nobody would be able to find them. Miles of woods around the place gave them cover.

It also meant he might have a chance to get Persephone away. He just needed one window of opportunity.

He’d watched the men around him for the past three days and noticed they had gotten into the habit of taking the pills their leader gave them every night just before midnight. He suspected they needed them to sleep after days full of energy drinks and fixating on zombie killing. Whatever the reason, he didn’t care.

All he cared about was finding that chance to get Persephone out of there alive.

He closed the door behind him and walked toward where she sat in the chair one of them had taken from the kitchen set. Before he did anything else, he removed the cloth from her mouth and tossed it on the bed. He hated that he had to put it back every time he left, but the least he could do was get rid of it as soon as he could.

“Thank you,” Persephone said quietly. “I hate that thing more than any other part of all this.”

Kneeling in front of her, he smiled. “Even more than when one of the other guys comes in?”

She winced and shook her head. “No. Thankfully, they don’t even seem very interested that I’m here anymore, though. Any idea why?”

Her voice sounded so full of hope that he hated that he didn’t have better news to tell her. “Not sure. Your father has paid them twice, and I’d guess they’ve asked for more money. They also seem more interested in killing zombies than anything else. Well, other than fighting with one another and drinking energy drinks by the case.”

Persephone smiled and her eyes lit up. “They sound like a fun group. Maybe I should consider myself lucky that they’re the ones who kidnapped me.”

Nick scooped up some of the grey gruel out of the bowl and held it up in front of him. “I wouldn’t go that far, but I guess it could be worse.”

She grimaced at the sight of the runny food dripping off the spoon. “I don’t want that,” she said, shaking her head.

“Don’t make me do the whole airplane thing,” he said with a chuckle, trying to be cute.

Her eyes opened wide in surprise. “Don’t you dare! You put that spoon anywhere near my mouth, and I swear I won’t be the only one wearing it.”

Dropping the spoon into the grey muck, Nick accepted she wouldn’t be making his task easy. “You know they made me feed you this when you were out, right? I can’t let you starve.”

“Ugh. You didn’t,” she said, grimacing. “I think I might be sick.”

“It wasn’t much. Even out of it, you didn’t want it. But that just means you have to eat now. I’d give you what I had earlier, but it wasn’t much better than this stuff.”

She craned her neck to look down into the bowl. “What is this?”

As much as he didn’t want to admit the truth, he said, “Oatmeal with skim milk.”

“And this is supposed to keep me alive?” she asked, looking up at him and then back down at the grey slop in the bowl.

“I guess.”

She lifted her head and stared into his eyes with a pleading look that made his chest tighten. “Please don’t make me eat this.”

Her voice caught on the last word, making him hate the job he had to do. “One bite, Persephone. That’s all. Just one spoonful and that’s it.”

Like a disobedient child, she tightly pressed her lips together and shook her head. “Uh-uh.”

He couldn’t make her eat, as much as he knew she had to, so he placed the bowl on the floor and sat down in front of her. “Fine. I’m not going to fight you, but if we have the chance to get away from here tonight and you can’t run fast enough to not get caught, I can’t tell you there will be another chance for us.”

Persephone drew her eyebrows in and frowned. “I’ll be able to run just fine.”

“After sitting in that chair for a week and not eating? You’re a little thing, but I might not be able to carry you if we have to be running for a while.”

She thought for a minute about what he said and then her shoulders sagged in defeat. “Fine. I’ll eat.”

He didn’t envy her having to ingest that horrible slop, but it had to be done. Lifting a spoonful up to her mouth, he slowly pushed it over her lips. Her expression contorted into one of utter disgust, and she pulled away in a hurry.