The Alpha King Call Boy
Chapter 231

Third person

"Think it's coming soon," Tuesday whispered." Daylight. They been gone a while."

Lucas shushed her so faintly, the sound could have been mistaken for an exhale.

If she was right, great. If not. she should not be talking about their plan, not yet. Not when they could still be near. Not when there was even a slight chance they might be close enough to hear. "What's your favorite... dessert?" he whispered to distract her.

She had started asking him things like this, and now they did it practically nonstop. Traded questions about favorite things, firsts, memories. It did occur to Lucas that this was the kind of stuff normal people probably talked about on dates. Getting-to-know-you things.

Not that he had ever been on a proper date, himself.

"Pie," Tuesday whispered

They talked about food a lot. That was what your brain made you do when you were starving, they'd learned. Think about food. Talk about it. Dream about it. "What kind?"

"Yeah, it was weird not to specify, huh? That's cuz it's a tie. I couldn't decide which would win in a fight. Peach and pecan. My mom makes 'em both." "Wow. That sound delicious."

"Yeah." Her voice was thin as paper when she added, correcting herself, "Made, Used to make."

Because her mother was dead. That's who Tuesday had come to the resort with, for a vacation. For her mother's birthday.

"How' bout you?"

For a second Lucas thought she was asking what kind of pies his own mother baked. That was hard to imagine - his mother in a kitchen, working with her hands "Cake," he said,

remembering the question. *Chocolate."

"Mmm. That sounds good."

They exchanged a couple more silly questions to pass the time. And then Lucas finally got up the courage to aska more serious one. One he couldn't stop thinking about.

"Tuesday... why are you so nice to me?"

She sighed. And was silent for a long moment.

"Well, for one thing, you're brave enough to help me," she finally answered, "when no one else is. And I guess I just don't really care about all that stuff they say about you. Dunno how anyone could care about the past, at a time like this. The only thing that matters to me right now, is right now. And right now, I've got no better friend than you."

Lucas could not respond. He had to focus on holding back tears that suddenly welled in his eyes. Everything -the vampires, the t*****e, the pain, the blame and guilt-for whatever reason, Tuesday's for giving words made him feel all of it all at once. He was afraid he was going to burst into sobs.

But he didn't. He managed to hold it in.

Tuesday didn't say anything else.

Until the first gray hints of sunrise started making shapes out of shadows and set both their hearts racing.

"It's time," she breathed.

And she began to move.

The vampires, assuming they overpowered the werewolves so completely, didn't pay much attention to the contents of their prisoners' pockets. So Tuesday found herself locked up down herewith something on her person that she knew instantly would be useful. All she had to do washide it so her captors wouldn't find it while taking turns drinking her blood and abusing her. And then wait for the right time to use it.

The nineteen-year-old worked in a psychiatric hospital in the rural mountain town where she'd resided all her life. She dreamed of being a nurse. She had to finish teaching herself to read and then get through high school equivalency tests first, before she could even start on college, so realizing that dream was a ways off. But Tuesday figured the time was going to pass anyway. For now, she worked graveyard shifts filing paperwork at the hospital's front desk, and she loved it. She made minimum wage and only got the job because she lied on her resume, but she was proud of having found a way to stick her foot through a crack in a door that might lead to her dreams.

One full moon's night a few months back, almost all the RNs had called out from work, leaving Tuesday alone in the hospital with the charge nurse. They had lots of intakes so he asked her to help him, even though she wasn't actually qualified to have her hands on patients. That was when he gave her a universal handcuff key.

She'd tried to give it back at the end of that wild shift, but the nurse told her just to keep the peculiar little cylindrical key. In case she needed it again.

She'd never needed it again at work. But she also never had a reason to take it off her keyring, And she had her keys in her pocket on the night she was abducted by a swarm of vampires that fed on her blood till she blacked out and then locked her up in this dungeon.

Tuesday had tried the key in the lock of her wrist cuffs once already.

She could've died right then and there when she felt it click and turn. She cried silently with relief and said a prayer of thanks to the gods.

She also prayed for blessings for the charge nurse, whose faith in her competence at work might just save her life.

The band cuff key now lived in a little valley between two stones on the floot. She didn't dare retrieve it until that moment - that long-awaited moment when sunlight promised several hours before the vampires could rise from the dead again and return - but once she had the key in hand, she made very fast work of plugging it into the cuff locks and opening them up. She tried to be as quiet about it as she could.

Lucas was hovering his body around hers to try to obscure her activities from the other prisoners. They'd start yelling at her again if they knew what she was doing And she just wanted to focus for a minute, make sure she did this right.

Tuesday's whole body was trembling with excitement. She got her ankle cuffs released next and had an immediate, ridiculous thought about wanting to do a cartwheel now that her limbs were free.

What she actually did was pass the key to Lucas, pressing it into his palm and feeling his fingers close over hers, and whispered into his ear, "I'm going for it. I'll meet you at the top of the stairs fast as I can."

And then she got up, wobbling for a few seconds on shaky legs, and disappeared into a shadow.

"What are you doing?" screamed one of the other prisoners. "How did you -"

"She's trying to escape! Stop, you're gonna get us all killed!>>

"They're going to kill us either way," Lucas shouted. He freed his wrists and suddenly felt unstoppable. "Stay here and wait for them to do it slowly if you want. But we're gonna escape or die trying" "How'd you get unchained?!"

Lucas couldn't help but groan with relief as his ankles came free. "I can unchain you, too. But it's now or never. We have to get out before the brainwashed ones upstairs can stop us."

He tried to stand, but couldn't. He had to crouch for a few seconds, catching his breath and summoning his strength. He gripped the handcuff key in his palm. The others continued to scream about Lucas and Tuesday being stupid "Who's coming with us?" he interrupted, pressing up off the ground. "Please. We only have a few seconds though."

He glanced over to the stairwell that led up to the ground floor.

Tuesday was out already. She was small enough that she'd squeezed through a high and tiny window at the back of the decrepit chamber. It was a narrow space through which Lucas would definitely not have been able to get his body. Tuesday's plan was to go back into the hotel in order to let him out through that door at the top of the stairs that the vampires used when they came to select their food every night.

When his friend told him about this part of her plan, Lucas had urged her not to come back for him. It was too risky; why not just save herself, start running as soon as she could get out?! But she insisted she needed someone else with her, if she were going to survive the flight by foot that would follow escaping the prison. After all, once they got off the resort property, they'd be at the mercy of the desert.

"There's nowhere to go," the angry man growled. "You can't escape this place!"

The dripping water kept Lucas grounded in reality as seconds slipped by.

"Please," he cried hoarsely. "Anyone? Come with us. Please.

"I'll go," croaked a voice from nearby

It was the blood-soaked, skeletal woman who had lost her daughter.

The one that Lucas was sure would kill him if she had the chance.

Lucas crossed the chamber on unsteady legs.

He heard pattering footsteps overhead, getting louder as they neared the stairwell.

He crouched down and unlocked the woman's ankle cuffs. Her skin was sickly soft and cold to the touch. He got her weiats freed next.

Forced his way back up to his feet. And reached out his hand to help the woman stand

"Come on," he urged. *I know it hurts. But we have to go- now." Her shaking, filthy, bony hand found his.

The door at the top of the stairs flew open, and standing there in a rectangle of blinding artificial light was Tuesday, smiling, her green eyes shining. She looked like an angel.

The woman was too weak to stand She really tried.

A surge of adrenaline kicked Lucas's body into overdrive. He lifted the crippled woman up into his arms, cradled her like a baby, and sprinted up the stairs.