Two Can Play (Celeste and Dominic) novel Chapter 484

Still, the memory of what I had gone through before I passed out was enough to make my stomach turn. I never wanted to feel that again. Never.

Cara studied my face, reading every thought as it crossed it, and shook her head slowly. "Get ready. The pain you felt earlier will return tenfold in a few more minutes. And the possibility of surviving it..." She clicked her tongue against her teeth, tsk, tsk, tsk, and shook her head again.

She turned and began to walk toward the door.

"Stop." I hated how desperate my voice sounded. But I could already feel it, the pain, slowly seeping back into my body like poison returning to an old wound, settling into my chest, into my stomach, into my shaking hands. "What can I do? What can I do to survive? I need your help."

Cara stopped. She turned, and a slow smile spread across her face, satisfied and knowing. She walked back to the bed and stood in front of me, looking down at me like a teacher surveying a student who had finally arrived at the right answer.

"Well, now you are talking. If you are serious about wanting to live, I will tell you what you need to do. But if you have no interest in what I have to offer, I will walk out that door and leave you to it. So which is it going to be?"

"I told you to help me. I want to survive."

She scoffed. "Easy. You just need to get more pills. More of the white happy pills."

"Something that almost killed me, and you think I am going to put more of it into my system?"

"Well, there you go. You asked for a solution, and I gave it to you."

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a card. Plain white, and on it nothing but a phone number. No name. No logo. No address. Just ten digits that were apparently supposed to save my life.

Her eyes met mine, and for a moment the lightness in her voice was gone, replaced by something old and heavy.

"When you were up on that stage, I saw the fear in your eyes. I know that look. I have worn it myself." She shrugged. "Now, whatever happens to you has nothing to do with me."

And she left, closing the door softly behind her.

I stayed where I was, staring at the card in my hand, turning it over and over between my fingers.

I did not trust Cara Langley. Something about her was too easy, too smooth, too knowing, like a woman who had been playing this game for years and had learned every rule. And I did not want to call that number. I did not want to owe anything to a stranger who sold pills that could stop a heart. But I could not take chances. If I had another episode like the one that had just nearly killed me, another wave of that pain, I might not survive it. There was no one here to save me a second time. If only anyone had been here, anyone at all, but there was no one. Emerson was gone, and I did not know a single other soul on this island.