Wicked Kiss (Nightwatchers) - By Michelle Rowen Page 0,38
angles.
“Oh, my God,” I whispered, my throat closing. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, what I’d just witnessed happen right in front of me.
Chaos swept through the first floor, through the whole mall. Screams and cries of horror filled the air, and a rush of bodies swarmed around Julie.
“Why?” The anguished word wrenched from Jordan’s throat as she gripped the railing next to me. “What happened? Why would she do that?”
I couldn’t speak. And nothing I said would help this make any sense.
I stayed with Jordan as we hurried downstairs, but it was too late. The fall had killed Julie. The ambulance attendants confirmed she was dead. Jordan started to sob, and she clutched onto me tightly as if she needed something—anything—to anchor her.
Making everything that much worse was the fact that down here, so close to the swell of people who’d witnessed Julie’s suicide, my hunger didn’t let up for a moment. My heart pounded, and I put some distance between myself and Jordan and everyone else as soon as I could, trying to think. Trying to rationalize what happened.
I failed.
Nothing could explain this. Nothing could make it better.
The police arrived and asked Jordan some questions.
“I don’t know why she did it.” Jordan’s words were raspy, her face tear stained. “She was fine. All day. All week. She wasn’t upset or anything. But she—she just lost it.”
The police officer took her statement, then they took mine, which was basically the same thing. A teenager had committed suicide in public.
I didn’t like Julie, but I never would have wished for something like this to happen to her.
It wasn’t right. Seventeen was way too young to die.
Jordan was in shock. She’d stopped talking and just started to tremble. I directed her away from the food court and into an alcove of the mall. She pressed her back up against the wall and called her father to come pick her up. She was in no shape to drive home.
I gave her the bottle of water I had in my leather bag. She took it from me with shaking hands and took a sip. She didn’t complain that it was room temperature.
“It’s my fault,” she said, her voice hollow and broken. “She was so happy about the modeling agent. I felt bad about Stephen so I had to bring her down. And—and this happened.”
She’d sunk down to the floor, her long legs pulled tight up against her chest. I braced my shoulder against the wall. My hunger swirled the longer I stayed in this busy mall, but I couldn’t just abandon her here. Not like this.
“It’s not your fault,” I assured her. But really, I didn’t know what had triggered Julie to end everything in such a horrible, final way. “Was she depressed? Like not just today, but maybe clinically depressed and on medication?”
“No.” She frowned. “I mean, I don’t think so. She never said anything to me.” She drew in a ragged breath. “I didn’t even know she was still into Colin. I should have known. She was my best friend.”
My heart clenched for her. “Is there anything I can do?”
Finally, this seemed to break through to her. Her brows drew together and she looked up at me through red, puffy eyes. Her perfectly applied makeup was only a memory now. Her gaze hardened. “It’s probably your fault this happened.”
I stepped back, my stomach souring. “You know I had nothing to do with that. I barely knew Julie.”
“You stole Stephen from me. And now my best friend is dead.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “Anything else you want to destroy today?”
My face burned from her words as if she’d struck me, but I refused to hit back. Not this time. “I’m sorry she’s gone, Jordan. I know how much you cared about her.”
There was nothing I could say to make it better. It looked like I could only make it worse by staying. So I left.
If I’d seen any signs of what was going to happen—what Julie was going to do—I would have done whatever it took to stop her. But as the moment played over and over in my mind on my way home, I couldn’t think of any clues to what triggered her mood change. One moment she was fine, the next she was suicidally depressed.
Like a switch had been flicked in her head.
Every time I closed my eyes I saw her falling over the side of the railing, like a song on repeat. Over and over.