by Lily White
“What the fuck, asshole? Leave me alone, I’m sleeping.”
A groggy voice spoke from the bed. “Hey, Soren. If you want to join in, it’s cool.” Nameless bitch number one pat the bed next to her.
I kicked Grady harder.
“The fuck, man?”
His bloodshot eyes snapped open.
“If you want pussy, there’s two over there. Kelly and Myra, this is Soren. Soren, Kelly and Myra.”
“It’s Christy.”
“And Mandy.”
“Whatever. I’m sleeping. All of you assholes, shut up.”
I crouched down next to the idiot who was still drunk from last night and locked my hand over his throat to pick his head up off the floor.
He made a gurgling sound, and his eyes popped open, which is exactly what I wanted. Dropping him, I glared down while he called me every name under the sun.
“You finished?”
Still pissed, he glared back. “What the fuck do you want?”
“Who was filming?”
He coughed, rolled over the spit on the floor before looking back at me. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Who was filming that damn video of Kendall? I know you’ve seen it from when it happened. So who the fuck was the fourth person in the room?”
“Oh,” his eyes came into focus and he rolled to his back. “Why?”
I was about two seconds from punching him in the stomach. “Who the fuck was it, Grady?”
“Camilla. She’s the one who showed it to me.”
It felt like spiders were crawling all over me, a panicked buzz vibrating beneath the skin. “Where does Kendall live?”
Eyes closing, Grady didn’t answer. I punched him in the stomach for ignoring me.
“Dude! Fuck! Do that again and I’m going to tear your scrotum off with my bare hands and feed it to some fucking piranhas.”
His threat was oddly specific, but I ignored him.
“Where does Kendall live? Olly told me she had a cabin close by, so where the fuck is it?”
“I don’t know,” he roared just before rolling over to vomit.
Son of a bitch...
I ran to my room and grabbed my phone to call Olly again. It rang over and over without an answer and my blood fucking boiled. I tried again. And a-fucking-gain. No answer.
Pushing to my feet, I ran into her room, found her purse and dumped it on the bed looking for a business card I knew she carried on her.
Not much fell out besides a wallet, her keys and some lip gloss. Tearing her wallet open, I dug through the pockets before finally finding what I needed.
My thumbs flew over the phone to dial the numbers, my body pacing back and forth across the floor.
It rang twice before a gruff voice answered. “Agent Vaughan.”
Fuck, I never thought I’d be so happy to hear his voice.
“Tell me you’re still watching Olive.”
Silence and then, “Who is this?”
Rage rushed through me that he was taking his time.
“Soren Callahan. Tell me you are still watching Olive.”
“I am. Why?”
“Are you at Kendall Warner’s cabin?”
“I’m in the area. What is this about?”
“Go over there right fucking now, and tell Simon to turn on his sirens. I’m heading over.”
“Mr. Callahan -“
“Olive might be in trouble. Stop asking questions and do it.”
I hung up the phone and ran to my room to pull on a shirt and shoes. Grabbing my keys, I rushed out, hoping like hell I could find her cabin.
Olive would kill me if I was wrong about this. But I couldn’t shake the feeling I was right.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Olive
My eyes cracked open, pain shooting over my skull immediately.
I groaned at the assault of it, tried to move my hand but it wasn’t working. My eyes fluttered closed, my mind demanding sleep as it tried to pull me down again.
I had to wake up. Wasn’t sure why, but something wasn’t right.
Fuck, I hurt. Had I been drinking? No. Not me. I’d poured the alcohol into the plant. I couldn’t be hung over.
It took effort to force my eyes open to a slit, the room blurry, the only light a bulb overhead, the blades of a ceiling fan moving slowly. It creaked with every rotation, an annoying grating sound that made me want to tear the thing down. Creak, creak, creak.
Please, God, make it stop.
Maybe that was my body creaking because it pulsed in time with the sledgehammer beating against my head. A dull thud giving way to pain so sharp, I swore I wouldn’t survive it.
Fuck, what happened last night? Why was my head hurting so badly and my stomach ready to explode?
My eyes shot open. Memory rushing in.
“I told you to stay away from him.”
Footsteps approached me, hesitant.
“I begged you to listen.”
My eyes closed again, but I forced them open. Words filtered into my thoughts as my head bobbed around over my shoulders. Something oozed down my cheek and I fought not to vomit at the iron scent.
“Tristan?”
The footsteps stopped, a fuzzy human form in front of me blocking the light. “You should have listened.”
“I-“
Damn it, my throat was on fire. I could barely see anything or talk. Again, I attempted to lift my arms, but they wouldn’t move. I felt heavy. Delirious. Like a bad dream had followed me into waking life.
If I was even awake at all?
“What happened?”
A hand touched my knee and I jerked in place. I was sitting up. My back hurt. My head...
“I didn’t kill anybody, Olly. You should know that. I wasn’t the one who hurt them. I only protected her because I didn’t want her to get in trouble. But she wouldn’t stop.”
Silence fell, and I continued to struggle. I thought I was tied up...again. If this was another prank, I would kill those assholes when I woke up fully.
“She didn’t mean to kill Teagan. That first one was an accident and she called me for help. But then...she was acting weird about it. She wanted to embarrass Teagan for what they had done. I only wanted to clean off the body. I knew if there was no evidence, the police wouldn’t know who did it. I told her she had to stop. And she did.”
“Tristan,” I said, not really processing what was happening.
“Until he came back, at least. I told her not to go to that party. I knew it was a bad idea. But she wouldn’t listen. ‘Oh, it’s fine, Tristan. Don’t worry about me, Tristan. None of the others are even here anymore’. And you know what happened?”
He laughed. Meanwhile I was wondering when my eyes would focus. Every word he said was hammer inside my skull. It wasn’t any worse than every beat of my pulse.
“Tristan...”
“Maia came back. That’s what happened. And when she saw them tie you up in the same place as Teagan, she lost it. She couldn’t help you, so she tracked Maia down and did it again. And off I ran to help her clean up. I didn’t want any of this to happen. But I loved her. I had to help her. So she killed them and I cleaned them up. And then she saw Camilla...”
He groaned, not finishing the thought.
This confession was great and all because who doesn’t love solving a great mystery? But it wasn’t doing anything helpful for my situation. I was dying and he wouldn’t shut up.
“Tristan, I need help.”
He moved, his footsteps falling again.
“She cracked your skull. I’m sorry about that.” A bark of laughter. “It only proves what I knew all along. This wasn’t because of what they did to her. It’s because of Soren. She’s obsessed. And when she found out that you two slept together-“
The footsteps stopped. “What is it about that guy? Why does every woman want him?”
“Soren,” I begged, my voice as weak as the rest of me. “Call Soren.”
“I can’t do that, Olive. Not when she’s just now starting to love me again.”
From somewhere in the room, my phone rang.
“Shit. She’s coming.”
Another set of steps sounded behind me, approaching and then passing my chair. The phone stopped and started again.
“Oh, look. Soren’s calling. How fucking sweet.”
Kendall’s voice, the shrill tone hurting my head even more than Tristan’s.
“I can’t watch this.”
“Tristan, it has to happen.”
“I’m leaving.”
No, don’t leave...
The phone rang again and Kendall screamed. My eyes squeezed shut at the sound just as plastic broke against a wall. The phone stopped ringing then.
I almost passed out when something long and hard slammed against my stomach. Once. Twice. Three times. Maybe the same object that had cracked my head. I vomited finally. It only made the pounding against my skull worse.
“It shouldn’t have come to this, Bitch. You weren’t supposed to be involved with them. Have you been laughing at me, too? Did you know they were planning on playing that video for everybody? How long have you been making fun of me behind my back?”
Hands slammed against my shoulders and my chair tipped back, my skull slamming against the floor. Pain shot through my body, pounding, pulsing, like a spear that just kept stabbing me everywhere over and over again.
I was going to die here. Trapped. Alone. And I couldn’t find the strength to fight back. Not that I could move to fight. Not while tied up.
“Kendall!”
Tristan’s voice came from somewhere. The living room maybe? Or was I in the living room?
“Kendall, you need to get in here now.”
Footsteps fled the room. In the distance there was conversation. Yelling. My name called over and over again.
I thought it might be Soren. It sounded like him. But then a wave of exhaustion crashed over me and I forgot why it mattered.
All I wanted was to sleep. I’d make sense of what happened in the morning.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Olive
(Eight months later)
Is it really worth it?
Is your life so much better when your power isn’t really yours, but is stolen from those you cling to?
What do you see each time you look in the mirror? Are you real? Or have you clung so desperately to a false persona that you don’t know who you are anymore?
If I take your money, your friends, your looks, your possessions, your high power career, your clothes and your lies...what’s left for you to call yourself?
Nothing.
You’re naked.
Vulnerable.
And there’s nobody left to hold you up.
How high is your pedestal now?
The thing with wanting attention is that it can come from all places. The consequence of stepping on others to climb up is that you fall much harder when it ends.
Just ask Maia, Camilla and Teagan how well it turns out when your entire life is built around hurting others.
There are predators in this world.
They play. They laugh. They tease. And they taunt.
They’re hungry. Ravished. So empty they can never be filled.
But then there are weaker predators, those who break under the pressure, those who have no other choice than to kill.
Kendall was weak. Until she wasn’t. Or at least until she thought there was no other option left open to her than to destroy the people who destroyed her.
I pulled a photo from my wall that was taken in my first year of high school. Kendall was smiling. Her brown eyes full of hope. Her arm wrapped around my body, the sleeve of her prep school uniform bunched at the shoulder.
“This is it, Bitch. This is when we become the center of it all. We’ll take this school by storm and show them just how awesome we are...”
I didn’t believe her then. I didn’t care. I wasn’t eyeing a future of fitting in and being the most popular.
It broke my heart to know that the life she wanted most was what ultimately destroyed her.
In truth, her bright smile was a disguise for the insecurity that lingered beneath it. And much like what happened to her in Winter Ridge, with its social circles and hierarchy, Kendall disappeared beneath the brown packing paper that crinkled when folded. I closed the last moving box. Kendall was gone but never forgotten.
“Olly, move your ass. We need to be on the road in fifteen minutes.”
It was a miracle I’d survived Kendall’s attack. A miracle that Soren had found the last puzzle piece and snapped it in place in time. If another hour had passed I wouldn’t have left that cabin alive.
Fractured skull.
Brain contusion.
Ruptured spleen.
Broken ribs and a dislocated shoulder.
Three months spent in a hospital bed, and I still haven’t finished physical therapy. It was fortunate that my school allowed me to finish my coursework from home. Even if it did mean working through the first months of summer to complete it. But I graduated...barely. And now I was moving back to California to attend college.
I think, if anything, I would miss the rain in Washington the most, but I was also ready for the sunshine.
A quick glance around my room and I knew my stuff was packed and ready to go. I’d miss this house too. My parents. The life we’d built before they died and the life Nolan and I had stitched together when they were gone.
With the money Nolan won, college was paid for. And with the money we made by selling this house, Nolan could open the bike shop he always wanted.
The wheels were turning and our lives were rolling on, but not for Tristan and Kendall.
Both were awaiting trial for the murders of Teagan McKay, Maia Forbes and Camilla Hughes. Apparently Tristan had confessed on the day I was saved, his conscience too much to continue hiding Kendall’s secrets.
They would both go to prison, and not the nice one where Soren had been.
But I hoped Tristan’s sentence would be reduced somehow. He wasn’t a killer. He was just too in love with Kendall to understand that she was sick and needed help.
As for Shea, she had no idea what Kendall was doing, and while I’d been tied up in another room, she was asleep upstairs. After Tristan and Kendall were arrested, Shea cried in the car on the drive home. I haven’t spoken to her since.
“Olly. Seriously. Get a fucking move on. Don’t make me come up there and get you.”
I rolled my eyes.
Life with Soren had its ups and downs. In many ways he’d changed for me. Or maybe he’d changed for himself. He was caring. He stopped partying all the time. He finally put his past behind him and wanted to move forward for once.
He was done, I think. Done punishing Winter Ridge for what happened to his sister. Done staring at a past he couldn’t fix and he’d finally turned around to imagine a brighter future.
But he was still a pompous ass. Still bossy. Still babysitting me and carting me around. Mostly because of my injuries. Even though I was now pretty much healed.
Once that excuse was gone, you can bet your ass he’ll find a new reason to constantly watch over me.
“Three minutes! You have three fucking minutes before I come up there!”
“I’m coming,” I shouted back at him.
Grabbing my purse, I left the boxes for the movers who would be here in the next few hours to pick them up. I left my room and reached the top of the stairs to find Soren standing at the base. He smiled at me with that arrogant grin that both annoyed me and made my heart flutter.
“It’s about damn time,” he growled. “I was two seconds from coming up there to carry you to the car over my damn shoulder.”
Shaking my head, I descended the stairs. “Life with you in California is seriously going to suck.”
“Shut it, Little Olly. You know you love me.” He stabbed a finger toward the front door. “Get out. We need to
leave.”
I ran past him, a squeal bursting from my lips when Soren smacked my ass. After tossing a glare at him from over my shoulder, I opened the door and stopped dead in my tracks.
“Oh, Jesus, fuck! Not you again,” Soren complained behind me. “Are you following us to California? Because, if so, I can rent an apartment next door to ours so you don’t have to go too far to creep on my girl.”
Jonah’s grey eyes lifted over my head to eye the bastard at my back. The corner of his mouth tipped up in amusement. “I’m just here to say goodbye. My flight back east is in a few days.”
“Back to the FBI, huh?”
He looked down at me and nodded. “Simon is back at work following the time he took off, so I’m free to go. I should have left shortly after Kendall was caught, but I decided to stay and help out.”
In a weird way, I was sad to know I would never see Jonah again. But he had his life and I had mine. “Do me a favor when you get there.”
He cocked a brow, waiting for what I had to say.
“Don’t let the bad you chase drag you down with it. Find something that makes you happy, even if just a little bit.”
Jonah inclined his head and smiled.
“You should do that more often,” I said before giving him a hug.
“Okay, this reunion is sunshine and fuzzy kittens and all but we seriously need to get on the road.” Soren shoved forward, grabbed my arm and tugged me along behind him.
Packing me in the car, Soren pulled out of the driveway, while Jonah stood watching us from the front yard. I waved, but then turned to stare out the side window to watch Winter Ridge rush past us.
I wouldn’t miss this town. Wouldn’t miss the kids who lived in it. But in many ways I hoped the future generations would learn something from what happened.
We left Winter Ridge behind in less than five minutes because Soren still had a lead foot. And with it, we left the memories of everyone who was gone.
I hated to think that Kendall would never be saved for what she had done. But I also wanted to believe that Teagan stood watching us leave, her eyes no longer vacant, and that, maybe, she had finally stopped screaming.
THE END