Sacrifice Me: The Complete Season One (3 page)

“Let’s do it,” I said.

“Hell yeah.” Katy leaned over the top
of the bar, looking for the bartender who had served us a few minutes
ago.

After a delicious dinner at my favorite sushi
place, we’d ended up at a pub near campus. Being a Wednesday
night, the place was practically dead.

Normally, that might not have been such a bad
thing. The more I had to drink, though, the more I wanted Katy to
deliver on her promise to make this a night to remember. The alcohol
made me feel wild and different and loose.

I wanted more.

“This place is lame,” I said, ignoring
the fact that my words were slightly slurred. “Let’s do
something wild.”

“Oh, yeah, that's my girl,” Katy said,
landing a wet kiss on my forehead. “I was starting to think
you'd disappeared on me.”

“Like what?” Jennifer asked.

Her less-than-enthused tone wasn’t lost on
me, nor was the fact that Ashley had glanced at the time on her cell
phone four times in the past five minutes.

That was the down side of constantly keeping
everyone at arm's length. You ended up with very few true friends.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Let’s
go dancing.”

“Yes,” Katy squealed. “Let’s
go to Smart Bar.”

Ashley shook her head. “No way. Alex is
working there now. I’m not taking the risk of running into him
right now.”

“Poop,” Katy said, frowning. “Not
even for Franki’s birthday? Besides, you look amazing tonight.
It would be the perfect night to run into him. Make him see what he’s
missing.”

“No,” Ashley said. She grabbed my hand
and squeezed. “Sorry, Franki. I can’t do it. The girl he
cheated with works there too. If I had to see them together right
now, I would just die.”

I squeezed her hand back. “I get it,”
I said. “It’s fine. There’s got to be another place
we could go dancing, right? There are tons of clubs on that side of
town.”

“We’d have to take a cab to get
anywhere good,” Jennifer said. “And it’s already
getting late. I have to be up pretty early.”

“Party poopers,” Katy said, standing
and putting a knee in her chair. “Let’s shake things up.
We’re failing on our best friend’s twenty-first!”

I shook my head. “It’s okay, really,”
I said. I caught the disappointment in my own voice and cursed myself
for letting it slip through. “I have to be up early, too.”

I wondered if it was too late to grab a six pack
and head to the one place I knew I shouldn’t go tonight. The
place I’d spent every birthday since the one three years ago
when she disappeared.

“Don’t even think about it,”
Katy said, as if reading my mind.

“What?”

“You know what,” she said through
clenched teeth. “Your mother has messed up enough of your
birthdays. I’m not going to let you go back to that old house
and think about sad things. We’re going to have fun tonight if
it kills us. Come on, ladies, we’re going out.”

She downed the rest of her drink and went to pay
the tab.

I had a nearly-full glass of Jack and coke, but
took a deep breath and drained it in ten seconds flat.

Jennifer and Ashley shared a look.

Annoyance bubbled to the surface. Why were good
friends so hard to find? I mean, it’s not like I expected them
to stay out all night with me, but it was my birthday and it was only
eleven. Was it really so much to ask that they hang out a couple more
hours?

Apparently, it was.

As we made our way to the door, Jennifer put her
hand on my arm. “I’m sorry, sweetie, but I think we’re
just going to head home,” she said.

Ashley threw her arms around my neck, a fake smile
plastered on her lips. “Love you so much, girl. Happy
birthday.”

“Thanks,” I said, amazed at how easily
some people tossed around the word love. “I’m glad you
guys came out.”

“Screw this,” Katy said. “You
guys suck. It’s not even midnight.”

I pressed my lips together, not wanting to smile
too hard. I could always count on Katy to say what needed to be said.

Still, if they didn’t want to be here, I
wasn’t about to beg them to stay.

“I know,” Ashley said, wrinkling her
nose. “But it’s the middle of the week and—”

“Blah, blah, blah,” Katy said, rolling
her eyes. “You suck.”

“Maybe we can do something this weekend.”
Jennifer hugged me.

“Sounds good,” I said, even though I
knew I wouldn’t be able to get out again over the weekend. I
needed to focus on finding a new job and saving money.

“Good night,” the girls said as they
waved and took off down the sidewalk in the direction of their
apartment.

Katy threaded her arm in mine and sighed.
“Assholes,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” I said. “Maybe
we should call it a night, too. We could rent a movie or something
and grab a bottle of wine.”

“No way.” Katy shook her head and
pulled out her cell phone.

“Who are you calling?” I asked.

“I’m calling a cab,” she said.
“There’s no way I’m letting this night end before
midnight. We’re going to go find some fun. We're going to find
this place you were invited to. Venom.”

I protested, but Katy's mind was set on taking me
to this new club.

The truth is, I was curious. Who had sent the
roses? No one else I knew called me Little Bird, but there was no way
my mother had bought those expensive roses for me. Well, not unless
she'd magically gotten her shit together in the past three years. And
if that was the case, there was no way I was missing out on seeing
that.

But what if they truly weren't from my mother?
What if there was someone else who knew about her? About me? What if
they were from someone else in my family?

The note had been on my mind from the moment I
first opened it, and even if I protested, there was no denying that I
wanted to see what was going down at this club and why I had been
invited there.

Our cab picked us up within minutes, but when we
asked him to take us to a club called Venom on Hubbard, he stared at
us like we were high.

“You don't know it?” I asked.

He shook his head. “There's no club by that
name.”

“Well, a bar, then. Or a restaurant.”

“No,” he said. “I would know
this. There is no place in this city by the name.”

Katy showed him the card and he just shrugged.

“Then just take us to West Hubbard,”
Katy said with a loud sigh. She turned to me. “We'll find it.”

I let my head fall back against the seat of the
cab. I really didn't want to spend all night on some wild goose
chase. If a cabbie had no clue where this place was, it was either
brand new or it didn't exist. This was definitely not turning out to
be the birthday of the century, but I guess anything was better than
drinking beer in my mom's old house, thinking about old times, and
where the hell everything seemed to go off the rails for me.

Ten minutes later, he dropped us off at the Paris
Club.

Katy asked a few people standing out front if
they'd heard of Venom, but we got the same blank stares we'd gotten
from the cab driver.

“Maybe we should just pick a place and get a
few drinks,” I said. I was curious about the note and who it
came from, but there was also a part of me that was scared of finding
out anything beyond what I already knew.

“Dammit, if you say that one more time, I'm
going to kick you in the tits,” she said. “We're going to
find this place. Come on.”

She looked both ways down the street, then just
randomly picked one and started walking down, her eyes sweeping back
and forth, looking for the name on a sign.

Half an hour went by and Katy was near tears. She
raised her arms, then let them slap back down against her legs. “I've
totally failed you,” she said. “This is the lamest
birthday ever.”

I shook my head and looped my arm in hers. “I've
been with you, so it can't be lame,” I said. “Really,
it's fine. This whole thing was probably someone's idea of a bad
joke. Let's just pick a place where we can drink and forget all about
Venom and the black roses.”

She sighed. “Okay, you win. Pick any bar you
want. I have no idea which ones are good down here, so just follow
your gut instinct.”

I closed my eyes and twirled around, my world
turning like I was on some wicked merry-go-round.

Follow my gut instinct? I usually tried to do
exactly the opposite. I always figured my instincts were screwed up
after such a crappy childhood.

I’d never known my father. Or any of my
family, for that matter. We were one-hundred-percent loners, my
mother and I. She refused to answer any of my questions about where
I’d come from. Or where she’d come from. I guess I’d
always known she had run away from something. She was always running.

Late on rent? We’d just pack up and move to
a new city before they could kick us out or take her to court.

Meet a guy who actually seems nice and treats you
well? She’d almost give in, then would dump him so fast, it
would make your head turn. I had no idea why she was so scared of
getting close to anyone, but it happened without fail. The second she
thought a friend got too close or a man seemed too interested, she
would wake me up in the middle of the night and tell me to pack my
shit.

Running is just what she did.

The one thing I never thought she'd run from was
me.

No, I didn’t trust my instincts.

But tonight, something was different. Maybe it was
the full moon. Or maybe it was the drinks still sloshing around in my
stomach. As I twirled on the sidewalk with my eyes closed, something
tugged at me deep down.

I stopped, listening to that whisper of instinct
or pull.

“This way,” I said, grabbing Katy's
hand and walking toward the quieter end of the street.

She giggled, tripping over her own feet. “You're
going the wrong way. The bars are all the other way,” she said.

“Shhh,” I told her. “I'm
following my gut, like you told me.”

I paused in front of the open door of a bar toward
the end of the street, letting that feeling deep inside guide me.

This was the last place on this side of the
street, so I expected to feel the urge to go inside, but no, there
was something else. I couldn’t explain it.

I should have ignored it. I should have turned
back toward the lights and looked for a more normal place with actual
people coming in and out.

But I was feeling wild.

“Wait,” I said, pulling Katy back from
the bouncer she was already handing her ID to. “Not here.”

“This is the last place down this way,”
she said.

“I don’t think so,” I said.
“Follow me.”

The bouncer raised an eyebrow and threw a glance
toward the alley, which is exactly where I was feeling pulled toward.
It was completely empty and very dark, but I stepped into the alley
between two tall buildings.

Katy gripped my arm. “Okay, so I know I told
you to follow your instincts, but I didn’t expect your
instincts to lead us to a dumpster.”

I shook my head, feeling breathless. “I
think there’s something down here.”

“It’s creepy down here,” she
said, the excitement from earlier fading from her voice.

“Yes, it is,” I whispered.

I kept my eye out for a door or something, but
this place was just dark and dead. What the heck was I doing?

Being stupid, that’s what.

We were way out of our element just being
off-campus and here I was dragging us into a back alley where girls
like us probably got murdered on a regular basis.

But I pressed on, the tug in my core growing
stronger.

Undeniable.

“Let’s turn around, Franki,” she
said. “I don’t like this.”

I frowned. There had to be something down here. I
could feel it.

A few more steps, though, and I was ready to turn
back.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I
don’t know...”

Someone stepped out of a door in the middle of the
alley.

For a moment, the entire alley lit up with an
eerie electric green light, but when the door slammed closed,
everything went black all over again.

“Wait,” I said. “There.”

Katy mouth twisted. “You sure? It looks
sketch.”

“Let’s check it out.”

“I'm only doing this because it's your
birthday,” she said, taking a deep breath. “But if we get
murdered, I'm coming back from the dead so I can murder you myself.”

I knew it was crazy, but I knew I had to go to
this place. “Deal.”

When we got down to the door, I was surprised to
see that it was just an unmarked door. No club name. No bouncer.
Nothing.

“I think maybe this is the back door or
something,” Katy said. “Let's go around and try to find
the front.”

I reached forward and placed my hand on the rusted
metal handle. Static shock surged through me and I pulled my hand
away.

Katy shrieked and I laughed.

“Just a little shock,” I said. “Don't
be such a baby.”

She put her hand on her chest and took a deep
breath. “You scared the crap out of me.”

I reached for the door again, knowing with all my
heart that everything that had happened since the moment I woke up
this morning had been leading me here, to this door. As if my future
had been waiting for me right here in this dark alley.

I wrapped my hand around my future and pulled,
opening up a whole new world.

A world I had no idea how hard my mother had
worked to keep from me for so long.

The door opened up to a long, narrow corridor. The
black walls made it seem like the inside of a very dark box, the only
light came from two long plastic tubes running along the ceiling.
They were filled with some kind of glowing green liquid. Not quite
like neon. More like a lava lamp with a ton of bubbles. I’d
never seen anything like it.