A Step to Nowhere by Natasha A. Salnikova Read Free Book Online Page A

push me onto the backseat. The door slammed closed and the car took off.
    “Who are you? What do you want from me? What do you want? Was it you who were watching me?”
    I found myself between two men. I turned my head from one to the other, but they didn’t look at me and it seemed as if they didn’t hear me, either. They were both about thirty, both dressed in blue parkas. One had a big nose and thin lips, but I couldn’t see the face of the other. He bent to his knees and rustled something on the floorboard.
    “Hello! Do you hear me? What’s going on? Who are you? Where’s Ray?”
    The man on the left straightened up and turned to me. I shivered when I looked into his empty, brown eyes. Then I noticed a syringe.
    “No! Let me go!”
    The man on the right twisted my arms behind my back and the man on the left pulled up my jacket sleeve and then the sleeve on my shirt.
    “What are you doing? Why? Stop it!”
    The last thing I felt was a needle, penetrating my skin. I screamed, moved, but it didn’t last long. Almost immediately my body felt as if it were going under warm water, becoming weightless. My head became heavy and my neck refused to hold it steady. I sank into a fog.

CHAPTER 8

    Before I opened my eyes I smelled a strange scent and tried to identify what it was. Something light as a breeze, fresh as rain, and sweet as fresh cut grass.
    Where am I?
    My head was aching; my body seemed limp and soft like modeling clay. I lifted my arm and dropped it down right away, it was so weak. Then I opened my eyes, even though it was difficult, and my lids felt as heavy as if they were pressed with stones. My mouth was as dry as if I hadn’t drunk for a week. What had happened to me?
    White ceiling and white walls, this smell, like a forest, but it wasn’t a forest. What was it?
    I lifted myself, supporting on my shaking hands. White walls and no windows. I lay on a bed with a metal headboard and there was a metal table beside it. A chain extended from a leg of the table to the wall, a glass of water was on the table. I picked it up and almost dropped it; it seemed so heavy. The operation was still successful; I chugalugged the liquid and only as the last few drops poured into my mouth I realized the water had an unusual taste. There was a bitter tang in my mouth.
    Where am I? What happened?
    The roomed looked like a jail cell or a hospital ward. A hospital ward for nutcases who could break a bed, throw a table into a wall, and jump from a window. Could it be that I lost my mind and my mom sent me to a crazy house? Could it be that I didn’t remember it?
    No, it’s not possible. I’m not crazy.
    “Though all lunatics consider themselves normal, don’t you think so Mr. Holmes? Have you met a lot of lunatics, Dr. Watson? I sure have … I’m talking to myself. Out loud.”
    Ray!
    I jumped from the bed and hardly stood on my feet when my head spun and darkness covered my vision. I had to get back to bed, on my side. Now I remembered what had happened. We had been waiting for a person who supposedly was spying on me. Ray was by the farmer’s market with boxes of vegetables and fruit; I was in the coffee shop across the plaza. I received a message from him and ran outside, but was seized and kidnapped by three men: one behind the wheel and two on the backseat. The one who had brown eyes injected something into my arm and I disconnected with reality. They brought me here. Why? What was this place? What were they going to do with me?
    I checked my clothes and discovered my shirt and jeans, but no jacket or my darn gym shoes. At least they hadn’t undressed me completely.
    I felt a little better after drinking the water. The dizziness went away. When my hands stopped shaking I tried to get off the bed again, but my legs still felt mushy. I still managed to circle the small room, touching the smooth, cold walls.
    What is it? Is it an apartment? No sounds, total silence … and this smell.
    Could it be air freshener? It