Reclaim - Aly Martinez Page 0,36

honest with myself, that’s where I would have rather been anyway.

I’d spent months obsessing over Josh. Did he like me? Did he think I was pretty? Did he want to be my boyfriend? I liked that he was older and part of the cool crowd. He was super cute in a football uniform and soccer uniform and baseball uniform.

But he wasn’t Camden, and at first, that had been his greatest quality.

Now that Cam was back though…

But Camden returning was temporary. In a few months, he’d be gone again and I’d be alone in Clovert again, for an entire school year without him. No, Josh wasn’t currently ready for people to find out about our relationship/non-relationship. But he’d get there eventually. And when Camden inevitably left, life would be a lot easier if I still had a way to fit in. Josh was that ticket for me.

Though, if he was in a crap mood and we rushed through this picnic in time for me to get back to the creek before nine, I wouldn’t be too upset.

I waited for at least fifteen minutes before Josh came sauntering into the dugout with a duffel bag thrown over his shoulder. His blond hair feathered out from beneath a Clovert High baseball cap and not surprisingly, he had on his summer uniform of a polo shirt and cargo shorts.

“Hey,” he said, setting his bag down on the bench beside me.

“You know we can hang out somewhere other than the baseball field, right?”

“I thought you liked it here.”

Yeah. A stinky, dirty dugout where during baseball games over a dozen sweaty boys sat trapped like caged animals. Every girl’s dream.

I looked at my watch. It was only six. I still had about three hours before Camden had to be home. “No. It’s fine. Soo…what’d you bring for our picnic?”

“Shit,” he breathed, snatching his cap off. He ran a hand through the top of his hair before turning it around and replacing it on his head backward. “I forgot to pack food.”

“Oh,” was what I said. Jesus Christ, seriously? was what I thought.

“But hey, look what I did bring?” He dug through his bag and pulled out his phone. “I need a new picture of my girl for my wallet.”

I usually swooned when he called me his girl. That night, I just rolled my eyes. Maybe I was the one in the bad mood and not him.

“Don’t you already have one of those?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Yeah, you’re probably right. But you know what I don’t have?” He lifted a camcorder out of his bag.

My heart stopped immediately and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end like some sort of sixth sense, but my brain wasn’t nearly as quick. “Wh-what’s that for?”

“You know how I like pictures of us and stuff.” He opened the flip screen and angled it just right before setting the camcorder on top of the bat holder at the end of the dugout. “This is better than pictures. This way, when I can’t see you, I can watch the real thing.” He clicked a button and a tiny, red light illuminated at the corner. “Wave to the camera, sexy.”

It could have been as innocent as he’d said. Just a kid wanting to record funny videos with a girl he liked. But even at a completely inexperienced, naïve twelve, I knew it wasn’t. The alarm bells didn’t just start ringing in my head; they screamed like blood-curdling sirens.

He prowled toward me, and the smile I’d only weeks ago thought was charming and cute suddenly appeared sinister and cruel.

I quickly stood up, backing toward the exit on the other end, my pulse thundering in my ears. “You know what? I just remembered I told Ramsey I’d be home by six.”

“You can be late. I’m sure he’s doing the same thing with Thea.”

“If I’m not there, he’ll come looking for me.”

“Not here, he won’t.”

In a miscalculation that measured in mere inches but would alter the course of my entire life, instead of backing out of the dugout, my back hit the wall.

He was on me in the very next beat.

I’d spend years trying to forget that evening.

The feel of his fingers biting into my flesh.

The screams burning my throat.

My back on the cool bench, deep splitters driving into my skin.

His teeth mauling my neck and shoulders.

The overwhelming panic of being pinned down beneath him.

I kicked and hit and punched, but it was useless. I opened drawers in my head at lightning speed,