Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 66997 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 335(@200wpm)___ 268(@250wpm)___ 223(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66997 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 335(@200wpm)___ 268(@250wpm)___ 223(@300wpm)
Ten fucking grand.
Something really doesn’t add up. Again. I’m doubting what I know. I’m doubting what she did. And I hate that she’s just standing there like some fucking victim! Shit!
“Anyways, now that the pleasantries are out of the way,” he grumbles, “it’s dual narration for the end of the book, and Steven’s out, so you’re in.” He points at me.
I glare. “In what?”
“Studio, dumbass,” she mutters. “What did you think we did here?”
File papers? I don’t know. I mean I know what they do here, I just thought she was more an administrative assistant. “You’re a narrator?”
“Yes. Some people actually like my voice.”
“Doubtful.” I smirk. “It’s more or less like…nails but saying on a chalkboard would be too kind.”
“This is fun, everyone having fun?” Axel claps his hands. “I’m getting fired aren’t I? Look I’m desperate. I’m short, I need to hire more people, and Steven is being a pussy about his cold like corona came back and sent him into hibernation. Just read the last ten chapters. Please. And finish the book off live like we do when we end, answer some questions, be nice, and I’ll pay you double.” He’s eyeing her then turns to me. “And you, well I won’t tell my dad or yours and I’ll buy you drinks after and not kill you. Deal?”
“How could I resist?” I say dryly.
No chance in hell am I missing this. There’s no way she even compares to the other narrators I’ve heard here, voices like… I pause.
No. I laugh.
“Something funny?” she asks.
“No, nothing, I’m just surprised this is your job, someone who can’t even tell the truth gets to read truths out loud for money. It’s ironic in a way right?”
She takes a deep breath and shoves past me. “Try not to mess up. Some of us have to make money and weren’t born with a silver spoon.”
“Some of us also didn’t go to prison for three years.”
She stumbles. “Three?”
“Three.” I breeze past her, she knows nothing. “Years.”
Her eyes fill with tears. Oh please, like she feels sorry for me, she’s the one who said I had the gun, she’s the one who said I pulled the trigger out of self-defense when it was my own father and hers in that room.
Axels ignores us and points down the hall. “Room two? Both of you need to set up, and if you want a disguise it’s fine, she does it all the time.”
My entire body stills. “She does?”
The she in question walks past me and puts on a familiar black cap and black face mask. I’m frozen in spot. I can’t breathe. I can only stare as she takes a seat and puts on her headphones and stares into the computer screen and waves then starts typing away answering questions.
I don’t have to ask.
I already know.
The person L and Lilah are one in the same.
And the entire voice that I’ve been listening to for three fucking years in prison, my comfort, my only solace.
Has been the person who put me there in the first place.
14
“He entered their world politely. Dressed like a gentleman. Starving like a wolf.”—The Count of Monte Cristo
JUDE
“Okay we start in three minutes.” Axel exhales and levels me with a glare. “Seriously, be nice.”
My entire world has exploded. I stare her down and whisper. “I’m always nice.” Too nice, and right now I don’t know what to do, what to say.
“It’s two hours, not like I’m going to kill him in two hours,” she says, and somehow with that outfit on and her positioning, her voice sounds different, a bit muffled and lower behind the mask or maybe it’s just softer with the microphone? Either way, I cannot believe that she’s who I was listening to.
Messaging or commenting under Sleepyhead. That was me, and I lived for some of her comments. I’d wait until I was able to listen, and I’d just sit there and relisten to every episode that had L’s voice. My prison mate used to make fun of me for my obsession, said it was probably some old retired grandma with bunions and a lazy eye and I was head over heels for her.
The stupid thing? I dreamed of that voice all the time. It got me through the rage, it led me away from the pain and got me sucked into stories that weren’t mine, into endings that were happy, some that were sadder, but always important.
How was I supposed to know that the devil had outstretched his hand and I’d taken it thinking it was my savior from drowning, from disappearing into the darkness altogether.
Rage overtakes me then.
Pure rage.
“Two minutes,” Axel calls.
“You’re L,” I say dryly.
She looks up. “Yeah, why?”
“You ever fuck your commentors too or do you reserve that for your professors, asking for a friend.”
She shakes her head. “I know you hate me but can you at least try to hide it right now? We have a job to do and—”