A Girl Called Fearless: A Novel (The Girl Called Fearless Series) by Linka Catherine

Author:Linka, Catherine [Linka, Catherine]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2014-05-06T04:00:00+00:00

54

Food was next after my shower. I wrapped my hair in a towel and peeked out into the hall. The biohazard bag I’d left outside was gone.

Somewhere close by, a girl was crying, big, angry, painful sobs. “It hurts! It hurts!!!”

My heart skipped a beat. What the—

I stole down the hall and rested my ear against the door. I couldn’t hear actual words, just a girl whimpering and sobbing while another girl comforted her. They seemed to be alone, so I knocked.

A girl with big brown doe eyes opened the door. With those eyes and full red lips, she could have been Dayla’s sister. “What do you want?” she said.

Her blond friend sat on the bed in her underwear, a big piece of white gauze taped to her hip.

“Hi, I heard somebody crying,” I said.

“Sorry, we didn’t mean to disturb you. I’ll tell Shae to keep it down.” The girl went to close the door, but I put my hand on it.

“You didn’t disturb me. I just wanted to know if she’s okay.”

The girl squinted, and looked me up and down. “Are you … Cast?”

“No, I’m Juliet.”

Her eyes relaxed. “Shae’ll be fine,” she said, almost friendly. “Her tattoo wipe’s burning and that crappy painkiller they give you is wearing off.”

“So she had a tattoo removed?”

“Had to. You know how Magda is about resale value. Bitch.”

Resale value? “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

The girl threw her hand over her mouth. “Ohmygod, don’t tell her I said that. I didn’t mean it. She’s not a— Promise me you won’t say anything?”

“I promise.”

“Okay. Well, thanks. See you around.” She shut the door in my face.

Now everything clicked into place. Magda sold girls. She was a broker.

And based on that raging party, that wasn’t the only thing she sold.

I backed away from the door. I was blind, thinking I could trust Exodus. Crazy to have assumed that everyone Underground would be like Yates or Father G or Dr. Prandip. Honest and good and committed to the cause.

I strode up the hall and grabbed the handle of the emergency exit. I braced for the alarm and then pushed. The door flew open onto a staircase of windowless cinderblock. No alarm.

Fluorescent lights lit up this floor and the other nineteen below it. I could bolt right now, but I’d end up out on the Strip in my cami and sleep shorts, surrounded by horny, half-wasted men.

I retreated into the hall.

Nothing made sense. Father Gabe wouldn’t work with people he couldn’t trust, right? Not unless they had him fooled. Or he was working for them. A priest cozying up to desperate girls, promising them freedom and he gets, what? A cut of the profits when they’re resold? Maybe that was why he was arrested for kidnapping.

No, Yates would know if Father G was corrupt. He’s known him for years.

But maybe Yates was fooled, too. He’d basically admitted that he and Father G never spoke again to the girls they helped. Maybe those girls never got to Canada.

Cold cascaded through my body.

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