Page 37 of If You Dare

There’s no sign of anyone anywhere. No break or ripple in the water’s surface. I kick out, aiming for the shallow end again. I’ll hit the showers and let them have the pool to themselves.

But when I kick out again, my foot catches on something.

No, something catches onme.

An enormous hand circles my ankle and yanks me down beneath the surface.

Water rushes past my ears, up my nose, into my open mouth.

My lungs scream for air. No chance to suck in a breath before getting pulled under.

I land a kick on what feels like someone’s shoulder with my other foot and manage to break the surface, coughing and gulping down a bit of air before they pull me down again, this time by the waist.

Their hands release me and instead find my head, pushing me down. I claw at their arms.

Hisarms.

Through the spinning water, I can just make out the swim trunks on Wes Novak as he attempts to drown me.

This is it. This is when he really kills me.

He lets me break the water’s surface to gulp down a breath only to shove me under again. Over and over. My lungs are burning, chest caving in on itself.

This is how Chloe must’ve felt in her final moments. Floating in the water, unable to move. Unable to save herself.

They say drowning is painless, but nothing has hurt this much since they told me Chloe was dead.

I claw at Wes’s arms holding me down, kick at his knees. Fighting to survive. Fighting for one more breath, one more chance to make things right.

Just as the muscles in my arms and legs start to give out, my chest collides with the hard metal edge of the pool so violently, I heave.

The hands that were just drowning me finally release me and I cough up water onto the tile. My entire body aches and convulses as my lungs simultaneously hack up water and try to suck in air.

Water sloshes as Wes climbs the ladder. He saunters in front of me, stopping with his feet just inches from my fingers.

He waits for me to look up at him. Waits for me to peer at the face of the man who nearly killed me. The man I destroyed.

“Now imagine I’m your best friend,” he says.

I squeeze my eyes shut. I have imagined the betrayal that Chloe must’ve felt in her final moments a thousand times. Knowing I was the one sending her to an early grave.

Now Wes wants me dead. There’s no question about it. But he’s going to drag it out as long as possible.

Water drips down from his dark hair to his pecs, a few drops trailing to the abs he doesn’t need to flex. The hard muscles on his biceps and calves could wrap me up like a python and snap me in half.

His body is exactly as I remember it, but I haven’t recognized his face since she died.

I miss the old Wes. The Wes with the cocky grin and the mischief in his eyes.

But he died with his sister.

Chapter17

Before

Wes

Mom callsto tell me Chloe is coming home for the weekend, so I am too. No excuse to get out of it, even when she tells me Chloe is bringing Violet.

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