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Alex glances over at the casual lounge pants and rando on the counter

"Are those et a better view

"Uh, yeah I think they are, actually"

We smile at one another for one more moment and I shut the bathroom door softly behind me

Chapter 18

IT TAKES ALL OF the time Alex spent alone in the bathroom, and then some, for Isaac andto sleep Or, who’s going to babysit her while I’ Aramei I can’t take her with me Trajan will have her head on a pike

I never anticipated that these sorts of petty things would be harder to figure out than s like whether to send her away or keep her chained in the baseht that Isaac’s solution with the new shackles was the worst of it

"I can stay with her," I say

Isaac and I are downstairs in the hideously yellow kitchen while he makes a sandwich I spin around on the bar chair to see hie

"No way in hell I’es through the cabinet "She could cut your throat in your sleep"

"What if weht out of me

He leans up with an unopened bottle of mustard clutched in his hand and looks atdu sandwich on the counter and sets the mustard down

I crinkle my nose up at it I hate h, "but I really don’t want to put her back in the basement like a prisoner Maybe if it didn’t stink down there andon the walls, it’d be okay"

Isaac pops the lid on the th of his sandith the s he put on it before Then he puts thethe top bun over onto the mound of meat and condiments

"You know I don’t like mustard"

His shoulders fall and he looks down at the sandwich briefly "Sorry, babe I forgot"

"I’ off toward the kitchen entrance where on the other side of the wall, Alex sits in the den with shackles on her ankles and wrists "I can’t eat hat’s going on" My voice is distant

Ca across at us ide alesture toward the den and her long, silky ponytail swishes around when she looks back at us, restlessly "Youher hands on the doorjamb

My heart sinks and I juet around the counter Camilla moves to the side so that we can push out ahead of her, but then just before we get to the den entrance, Isaac moves me behind him and we stop "Just wait," he says

Sloe come around the corner to peer into the den, but we stay out of sight without putting any effort into actually hiding

"Go ahead," Alex says looking up at Rachel froirl in chains--you’ve already proven how you can win a fight after six other bitches hold ently around in a grinning, snide iven her, sitting on the edge of the coffee table She looks absolutely unafraid of Rachel, even makes it a point not to look directly at her much as if to show just hoorried she is that Rachel is standing there Zero worried I’

"Isaac--"

He reaches back and gently touches o too far," he whispers, still keeping his eyes on Rachel and Alex

"Well it’s not right that Adria’s sister is chained up," Ca into my back as she tries to see between us

I hear Rachel say, "You think you can just co--It took hs and pops a pretzel in herand brings the chains on her wrist up to her nose and sniffs She pulls aith a usted expression "Definitely smells like a skank wore them at soain and pops another piece in herit’s her hand at first

Rachel’s s face becomes much more heated; both sides of her nostrils flare up as she presses her lips together tightly

I catch a confident smile in Alex’s eyes and then I hear crunch, crunch as she happily chews A few seconds pass and when Rachel hasn’t decided on what to say, Alex ss and looks up at her, cocking her head to one side "Do you like watching me eat?" She bats her eyes

Rachel slalaring at Alex, eye-level "You have no idea who you’re screith," she growls

Alex leans toward her, boldly, "Neither Do You"

They’re practically face-to-face, their noses only a few inches apart When it looks like a draw, they both pull away at the sa the other believe they are the slightest bit intiain and crosses her arms Two of her six friends step up behind her as if to have her back, but she throws up her hand in a harsh gesture, telling theurative tails between their legs