Oddette's POV
Somewhere behind us, the world we left decided what it wanted to be without us.
Somewhere far behind us, the night hiccuped—tiny pops, too small to be thunder, too deliberate to be anything kind. My chest tightened until the air had corners. I pressed my fist to my mouth to keep the sound in. I didn't need eyes to know what a pop means when men with guns are in the house you grew up in. I wanted to cover the world with my hands and make it stop. I couldn't even cover my own ears; the jacket slipped when I tried, and the cold found my wrists like it had been waiting.
I thought about names. He had given me his—Evander. It sat heavy in my chest, too sharp to belong to a man, too human to belong to a monster. Knowing it didn't make him smaller. If anything, it made him worse. Because now the devil had a name, and it was Evander.
I could not help but think about, the people he ordered dead. They also had names too—Marta who kept peppermints in her apron, Ayo who taught me how to count the steps to the front gate, Mina who turned the radio up when my favorite song came on even though I can't see the music videos. Names are anchors. I said them in my head so they wouldn't float away.
The car had its own map. My fingers learned it as I went: a seam like a river, a pocket like a small harbor, the buckle clacking quietly when the road jarred us. I slid my hand to it and thought about seatbelts. I should have one on. I also shouldn't be here. Life is full of shoulds that arrive late.
I could hear him breathing. Not ragged. Not angry. Just steady, like this was a Tuesday. It did something awful to my spine—the idea that my catastrophe was his routine. I wanted to hate him so purely it would keep me warm. It didn't.
"Why me?" I asked, because silence was a room I didn't want to live in anymore.
"You're useful," he said.
It landed like a slap. I sat with it and let it file my edges down. Useful. Not safe, not alive, not I won't hurt you. Useful. It told me exactly who he was and exactly what I could never be to him.
Fine. Then I would be useful… to myself.
I tucked my chin, breathed in to three like my therapist taught me, out to four, and kept my hand on the handle. My heart said jump. My skin said don't. The jacket said keep breathing. I decided not to listen to any of them until I had a plan that wasn't only a feeling with a death wish.
Okay. Inventory: towel; jacket; phone… not here; hair, wet; dignity, in pieces; courage, noisy and small. The door had a lock; I could feel the dip where it sat. If I timed it with a red light, maybe I could—
We rolled through a red light. Of course we did. He told the driver not to stop. The car didn't argue.
The ride smoothed out to a hum. The cold seeped through the jacket anyway. I pressed my forehead to the window.
Every time the car slowed, my hand tightened on the handle. Every time it didn't, I told myself one more block. I don't know what I thought would be better in one more block. Sometimes bargaining is just time wearing a dress.
Sound floated from the front—someone's phone crackling, a man named Rook asking for confirmations, the driver's replies flat as stone.
I tried to remember the bathroom, the steam, the singing. I tried to drag myself back into the girl who made dumb jokes about being a blind Beyoncé. She felt like yesterday and a lifetime ago.
Evander had given me his name, but it didn't make him less terrifying. If anything, it made him worse. Because monsters with names are harder to forget.
I thought about Dad tucking lavender into my drawers and bragging about rugs and saying class is a smell, pumpkin, and me saying it's called roses, Pa. I thought about the way he whistled three notes on the stairs so I knew he was coming and how, because of that, I always felt like the house loved me back. I hoped it loved the staff. I hoped it learned how to lie to spare them.
The car took a left. My stomach took a right. I tightened the jacket and found a pocket and curled my fingers into it so I would stop picking at my nails.
I tried to talk to him again. "If I'm useful," I said, "tell me how. Tell me what you want."
He didn't answer. The driver didn't either. Their silence was a language. I didn't speak it yet.
The car slowed. Not a stop—just a breath. My palm slid to the lock. My thumb found the right shape. Click. No one noticed.
Outside noise grew. Not traffic. Open space. My father taught me to listen for edges: buildings hold noise; emptiness lets it run. We were leaving the part of the city that keeps its shirt tucked in.
I didn't know where they were taking me. I did know that the car was still a door, and doors are honest if you learn their hands.
I slid forward on the seat an inch at a time. The towel complained. The jacket tried to help. I ignored both. The handle waited under my fingers like a held breath.
If I jumped, I could get hurt. If I didn't, I could become property.
I am blind, not breakable.
The car sped up again. The driver said something into a radio. The man beside me leaned forward and said, "Faster."
I shaped myself around my fear and counted down from five.
Five: my father's hands on the banister.
Four: the smell of roses I pretended I hated.
Three: the workers saying good night.
Two: the jacket, heavy, unfairly warm.
One.
My fingers tightened around the handle.