The Pentagon Paradox

Chapter Twenty-One

SCARLET

I feel someone sitting down at the edge of my bed, and I jolt awake. I am, in fact, not in my bed. I'm on Russian premises, in the maid's room where Theo laid me down last night.

Sighing I look at the foot of the bed to find two familiar-looking faces, Silva and Mary. They both stand up with an embarrassed look. "You are awake." I pretend to be in shock, I should be shocked. "Who are you?!"

"Hi, I'm Silva, and this is Mary. We sleep on the beds next to you," Silva tells me with a soft smile. I look around me to find rows of beds, some messy, some made. "Where am I?!"

I return her smile with a confused, scaredy-cat look. I have to pull this off, and I have to get used to the name Kiara. "Oh, you're umm," they both share a look. They're either scared to tell me I'm in Russian quarters, or they don't know where they are.

"You're in a mansion owned by some Russians," Mary finally says, and Silva gives her a worried glare. "Why?" I ask, masking a confused expression on my face.

Neither of them responds to my question, as Silva looks down at the paper she's holding and Mary twists the ends of her braided chocolate hair, looking anywhere but my face. "What is going on?!"

"This is umm, for you. Listen, we don't have much time, but you were kidnapped and now you're going to work as a maid for them," they say after a long, uncomfortable silence as they hand me a maid dress identical to the one I have at home. "I was kidnapped to work as a maid?!"

"You have to get ready before Anya comes, or we won't have lunch. There's a changing room back there, and this is your schedule. The others already started half an hour ago, we thought you would want someone to...you know, be there when you wake up." Silva says, coming closer and handing me two papers, one a printed schedule and the other a detailed map of the premises.

"Who's Anya?" I know who Anya is. She is the scary old Russian lady in charge of all the maids, and I might as well be afraid of her without even meeting her. Before I have time to get up or fan being scared, the door slams open and Anya strides in. Oh shit.

"You are still here." She has a heavy Russian accent, and that was not a question. "Get the new one ready, or I send all to dungeons!" she says, pressing too hard on the vowels in dungeon. And now said dungeons are on my list of places I should sneak into during my little stay.

She walks out, shutting the door after her. I can see the fear in the girls' eyes as they gather my maid's dress and my papers and give them to me, leading me to the dressing room. "Meet us in the kitchen after you are done," Silva says, giving me one of her soft smiles that I gathered are to comfort me.

I lock the door to the dressing room and sigh, wiping all the worry from my face as a grin spreads out on my lips. I do a little victory dance now that the hard part of the mission is done. All I have to do now is pretend to be a helpless girl and switch my schedule with whoever has a task in the important offices.

⇔

Pushing the door to what I think is the kitchen, I'm hit with a slap of heat right in the face, and two people in white aprons walk dangerously close to my face with burning hot liquids. If only I wasn't on a mission right now.

I make my way past the flaming hot sauces and head to a familiar braided head who's wiping the floors. "Oh, you're here. Silva!" she calls out, and Silva appears behind me. "Come on, follow me."

I do as I'm told till we get back to the door and the flaming hot liquids, and we start circling the kitchen. "Okay, so I'll go over the rules with you and introduce you to everyone. I know it must be hard, but it gets better when you busy yourself," she says as we go in the direction of the chefs.