it’s likely that he’ll shoot me in the leg, rape me over the desk, and then kill me.
It’d be easy to blame it on someone else: one of Havoc’s crew, Mitch’s people, self-defense.
But I know the step-thing like I know the back of my hand.
He feeds on pain and suffering. He wants me to know that he’s won. And he wants to play with me first.
Neil opens the door and gestures me into the hall, marching me past the lockers and toward the front door. Since it’s a Friday, and this is South motherfucking Prescott, there are no students hanging around. They’ve all bailed for Hael’s birthday party, knowing that he won’t be able to attend, but loving the idea of gossip.
This is literally my worst nightmare.
Or rather, I thought it was until I come around the corner and find Kali waiting for me.
“Baby!” she squeals, running forward and throwing her arms around Neil’s neck. She nuzzles the side of his face and then turns to look at me, like she’s studying a wolf caught in a farmer’s trap. I give her nothing. I won’t cry or scream or even curse her out, because that’d give them both pleasure, and I’d rather die than see either of them smile. “How the mighty have fallen,” Kali quips with a roll of her eyes. She tosses her green and black hair over one shoulder and then comes to stand in front of me. “You only think you’re better than me because you’re weak,” she says, and this time, I have to laugh.
I mean, come on.
“Weak?” I query, cocking my head to one side as Principal Vaughn slinks from his office like the rat he is, bloodied fingers bandaged, his hand in a sling to keep the severed stumps from jostling. He’s sweating profusely, and honestly looks on the verge of passing out. “Kali, honey, if you thought you were in trouble before, you’ve just dug your own grave.”
She sneers at me and then reaches out to backhand me across the face. I’m proud to say that I take the blow without stumbling, lifting my head up to look at her with blood running into my mouth.
“Where are you taking her?” Vaughn simpers as he moves over to stand beside Neil. My stepfather is studying me curiously, eyes glinting with possibilities. This is his greatest dream come true, a chance to break that wild mare in that he’s always wanted. Crush my spirits, take what’s left of me, rape me into an early grave the way he did to Penelope.
“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” he says, scowling as he looks the principal up and down, like even Neil finds him pathetic and weak. “I’m just gonna take her to pay a visit to her sister.” Neil moves over to give Kali a kiss as Vaughn watches me with fear in his eyes. The thing is, when he glances at Neil, I get the idea that he isn’t the one that he’s afraid of.
“Call an ambulance for Ms. Keating,” I whisper, just before Neil shoves me from behind and Kali’s laughter fills the hallway. Scott doesn’t respond to me, stepping back and watching as I leave Prescott High with my worst nightmare holding me hostage.
Kali watches as Neil puts me into the back of his squad car, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him in a way that makes my stomach churn. Well, I don’t know if the baby she’s carrying is his, but it very well might be. I wonder if Mitch knows, and then file the information away to use against him later.
I could scream, but then, I’m a girl in cuffs and Neil is a cop. Who would care? Who would try to help me?
Nobody.
Until the Havoc boys come, I have to save myself.
Glancing out the window at the brick walls of Prescott High, I wonder where the rest of the Havoc Crew is.
Or … I do until I see a skeleton mask lying on the sidewalk beside a spatter of blood.
Charter Crew.
My jaw clenches as I turn back around to watch Neil climb into the driver’s seat.
“You ready, Bernadette?” he asks me.
I might not be, but I can tell from his voice that he’s been waiting for this moment for years.
I’m sure he plans on savoring every wicked, awful moment.
The Thing drives me almost an hour outside of town to the cemetery where Penelope is buried. I could bike that route with my eyes closed I’ve been