Wicked (Somerset University #2) - Ruby Vincent Page 0,87

looking at Gwen right now.”

“I am,” he said. “She stopped at a café after work. She hasn’t moved in the last two hours.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. Gwen was nowhere near Val. She was okay.

“Thanks, Jacob. I can’t get a hold of Val. I just had to be sure she was safe.”

I heard a chair scrape the floor. “Should I come back?”

“Nah, it’s cool. I know how to find her. Everything’s okay.”

VALENTINA

“Get out of the car.”

My door flew open. She reached in, yanking me out, and shoved me in front of her. The gun jabbed my spine.

The deserted side road she forced me to drive to were plentiful in Evergreen. What they weren’t was well used. It could take days for someone to stumble on my abandoned car.

“Walk,” she ordered.

“Why are you doing this, B— Be—?” Her name finally came to me. “Bianca. What do you want from me? I don’t even know you!”

Jaxson’s boss shoved me, pushing me to the tree line. “You know what I want. I tried to get rid of you. I warned you to stay away from him!”

Another shove and I fell to my knees. Bianca hauled me up, strangling me with my collar, and put my ear to her lips.

“I’ll make sure this time,” she hissed. “Jaxson is mine. Finally, we’ll be free of you.”

We staggered through the trees, and Evergreen Forest swallowed us.

It was her. Jaxson’s boss was behind it the entire time.

Fear blotted my mind. Discovering the true person after me should have brought the situation into clear focus, but none of this made sense.

“What are you going to do, Bianca?” My voice was a thick rasp forced out of my throttled throat. “Kill me? Bash me over the head and leave me here like you did Serena? Because that was you, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?!”

Bianca tightened her hold, biting the collar deeper into my neck. Snarled roots rose out of the ground, grabbing at my ankles. I tripped, scraping my arm on bark and gasping in the stranglehold.

She let go to shove my back. “Move!”

Whipping around, I slapped her hand away. She struck just as fast.

Pain exploded in my temple and I fell, clutching my head, fingers dampening with blood.

Bianca brandished the gun. Hatred scorched in her eyes, warning that she would hit me again, and follow the act with worse.

“Why?” I was a notch below a scream. “You’re risking everything, and for what? Jaxson will never be yours. Nothing you do to me will change that.”

Her eyes flashed. “That’s not true. You want me to believe it. That he’s too young for me. That he loves you more. But Jaxson is my soul mate. We want the same things in life. He and I connect on a level I’ve never reached with another person. He’d see that if you weren’t in the way.”

Jaxson doesn’t give a flying fuck about you other than bringing you coffee and sorted demo tapes.

I burned to lash her with the truth. She tormented me over a clearly imagined relationship with my boyfriend. I’d snatch it away from her like she took my safety and peace of mind.

I can’t, common sense warned. This woman has proven she’s not above murder. I have to get out of this. Keep her talking.

“Was Serena in the way too? Is that why you beat her head in?”

Bianca’s lips peeled back. “She was another worthless slut throwing herself at him. Jaxson would never in a million years want her. I trusted him,” she said. “Knew he’d be loyal to me, so I let him go to New Orleans. I followed to support him during his first festival and you”—she spat the word—“were there.

“You’re always there. Tempting him. Seducing him. Filling his head with lies and pretending you love him.”

“I do love him!”

“I love him,” she roared. “Him and only him. You force him to grit his teeth and watch while you screw his friends. That’s not what Jaxson wants. He wants a woman that will be there for him. Who’ll support him in his dreams and who he doesn’t have to fish out of someone else’s bed every night.

“I know what he truly wants because I know his soul inside and out. As surely as I know his heart is too big. It’s not easy for him to walk away from people he believes in, even if they don’t deserve his time,” she said. “No one noticed me among all the people backstage. I lifted his phone and texted you