Hope for the Best by Vanessa Lafleur

Author:Vanessa Lafleur [Vanessa Lafleur]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Boutique of Quality Books Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2020-02-05T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

All food must be consumed inside the cafeteria Anyone who takes food out of this room Will be sentenced to life in the barracks

The signs posted outside and throughout the cafeteria held a more ominous meaning on this particular evening. Taking food had always been a crime, but it had never stopped her before, and she wasn’t about to let a few posters stop her now. She stood in line, watched food pile onto her tray as it passed from one server to the next, then carried it to an unoccupied table. Watching the others fascinated her, but she didn’t intend to become friends with any of them. Making friends would only lead to two possible outcomes: they would either discover the truth and report her or be incriminated themselves.

Everyone around her was caught up in conversations. Free of their work and enjoying the small window of social time allowed each day, no one wasted a minute paying attention to her. At least, that’s how it seemed at first glance. Four years earlier, Lareina had almost been caught stealing apples from an outside market because she failed to notice a man partially hidden beneath the shade of a nearby tree. On that day, she created a rule of her own: always double-check for witnesses. She glanced around more carefully, trying to feign casual observing, before quickly slipping her apple and dinner roll under the table then into her pocket.

“Hey, Rochelle.” Tony sat down across from her. His voice sounded marching band loud to her ears.

She jumped. How had he approached so quickly? Did he see what she’d done with her food?

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. It’s been a few days since I’ve seen you.”

Safe for now. Smiling, she scooped some pudding onto her spoon. “No need to apologize. I guess I’m just a little jumpy.”

Tony leaned across the table. “Is it because of your lunch with the president today? Did he threaten you?”

How did he know about that already? “No, nothing like that. He just wanted to know what I thought of Oak Creek.” She still wasn’t sure how she felt about the lunch and didn’t want to publicly commit to any particular emotion.

“That’s it?” Tony sounded surprised and confused. “That’s strange.”

Of course the invitation seemed strange to her. Even more strange was the president coincidentally being outside in the rain at the very moment she left the hospital. If he were paying attention to her schedule, she would have to be extra careful. But she would need to visit Nick as often as possible to plan their escape and to pass on food.

“Tony,” she asked absently, “how long have you lived here?”

“Since we moved from the other campus, so . . . two years now.”

“The other campus? There are other Oak Creeks?”

Tony laughed and took a bite of his apple. “By other names, yes. Four of them, all within fifty miles of here.”

Taking a drink of water gave her a minute to process the new information.

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