Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4- Past cont (TROUBLE)

"Where are we going?" she asked.

The driver didn't answer. He hadn't spoken in forty minutes since she entered the car.

They rolled into the underground. Twelve other vehicles, maybe more, black sedans, SUVs, and a limousine were parked in the garage like when you go to a car show. She had never seen such expensive cars all at once in her whole life.

The driver opened her door. "This way." "Through the red door. Someone will meet you."

Elena stepped onto the pavement. The red door was exactly where he said, painted a shade between wine and blood, set into a brick wall with no signage.

She thought of Mateo, her mother, the envelope with seventy-five hundred dollars that had been bought for her for three weeks.

She pushed through the door.

The woman who met her had the same voice on the phone, smiling with teeth that were too white.

“Your name.” The lady asked. “Elena, ma’am.” She replied.

"Elena. Lovely. Come, we'll get you ready."

"Ready for what, exactly?" Elena asked.

"The showcase, of course." The woman, who never gave a name, guided her through corridors that twisted like a maze, past rooms where Elena caught glimpses of other girls in various states of preparation.

Some in lingerie. Some in dresses that cost more than Elena's monthly rent. Some with numbers pinned to their chests like racehorses.

"Why the numbers?" Elena asked.

"Organization, darling. Nothing to worry about."

Wrongness hit her first. Everything about that sentence told Elena to worry or run for her dear life

They entered a dressing room. The thick smell of hairspray and cheap perfume welcomed her nostrils. Three other girls sat in makeup chairs, faces being painted by artists

None of the girls met Elena's eyes.

"Sit," the woman said. "We'll have you ready in twenty minutes."

Elena sat. A makeup artist descended, brushes flying across her face with practiced speed. Foundation. Contour. Eyeshadow in shades of smoke and gold. Lipstick the color of dark wine.

Elena watched herself transform in the mirror, becoming someone unrecognizable. She didn't like the person looking back.

"Hi, hello, what's your name?" she asked the girl in the next chair, a blonde who couldn't have been older than twenty.

The girl's eyes darted to the makeup artist, then to the door. "I, I'm not supposed to talk."

"Why not?"

"Please, just mind your fucking business ." The blonde's voice trembled. "Just don't. It makes it worse."

“You don’t have to be rude, if you didn’t want to reply to me, you could have just ignored my question,” Elena responded.

The lady, looking her up and down, rolled her eyes while hissing at her.

Elena felt the wrongness settle deeper, spreading through her chest like ice water. She stood abruptly, knocking the makeup artist's hand aside.

"I need to use the restroom." "Through there." The woman with the white smile pointed to a door at the far end of the room. "Quickly. You'll be called soon."

Elena walked toward the door, her heart hammering against her ribs. She wasn't going to the restroom. She needed to find an exit, a phone, a way out of here.

The corridor beyond was dimmer, quieter. She moved quickly, silently. A door to her left, locked. Another to her right, a storage closet, nothing useful. Ahead, the corridor turned, and she heard voices.

"Silas wants us to do a clean job. The Morettis can't know we were here, I never expected you to bring a traitor here. Fuck we have to end him here". A male voice said angrily.

Elena flattened herself against the wall, barely breathing. The voices came from a room with a door cracked open, light spilling across the floor in a thin blade. She shouldn't look.

Every instinct screamed at her to turn around, to run, but her feet remained glued to the floor as she continued to look.

“ Just kill him and get over this." The same man who spoke earlier said.

Two men in suits stood over a third man on his knees. The kneeling man was young, handsome in a way that was already fading, blood streaming from his nose, his mouth.

He was crying. Begging. Speaking a name that Elena caught only in fragments, "Moretti," he said, "please, I didn't tell them anything, I swear on my mother.."

The man on the left raised a gun.

Elena couldn’t see him pull the trigger. But she heard the sound of the gun, even the loud music from the event couldn’t overcome its noise, and she watched the kneeling man's head snap back.

Blood spread across the concrete floor, dark and thick and endless.

She made a sound. She didn't mean to. It escaped her throat before she could swallow it, it was small yet loud, enough to get the attention of the men in the room.

The man with the gun turned.

His eyes found hers through the cracked door, and Elena saw her own death in them. Cold. Already decided.

The man with the gun turned.

His eyes found hers through the cracked door, and Elena saw her own death in them. Cold. Already decided.

“Hey beauty, lost your way.” "Wrong place," he said, and his voice was almost gentle.

A hand clamped over her mouth from behind. An arm wrapped around her waist, lifting her off her feet. Elena kicked, scratched, bit down on the fingers against her lips until she tasted copper, but the grip only tightened, dragging her backward into the dark.

"Witness," the man with the gun said to whoever held her. "She saw the face. She heard the name."

"I'll handle it," a new voice said. Female. Familiar. The woman with the white smile, now stripped of all pretense.

"Go. Clean up. I'll make sure she's... accounted for."

The hand over Elena's mouth smelled of chemicals, sweet. She tried to hold her breath, but panic made her gasp, and the darkness rushed in before she could scream.

The last thing Elena saw before the black took her was the dead man's eyes, open and staring at nothing, reflecting the overhead light like broken glass.

Then nothing.