Page 38 of Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are

“Maybe the drugs you took?—”

“It’s not the fucking drugs. I was here. Nate came in through that door”—she pointed to it—“and stabbed him.”

My heart thudded dully in my chest as I tried to reason with her. “Babe, there’s nobody in here. Look at the floor…it’s clean. There’s not a speck of blood anywhere. Maybe it was a different room?”

“No, it was here. Right here!” Skyler pointed to the floor, then looked at me. Her eyes filled with tears of desperation. “What the hell did he do with the body?” She stormed past me, shoulder-checking me in her rush to leave the room, but I seized her arm before she could walk out.

“You’re high, Skyler.”

“Let go of me.”

“What are you gonna do? Walk down there and accuse him of murder?”

She wrenched free, swiping a hand over her face before shaking her head as if I disappointed her. “You don’t believe me.”

“It’s not that I don’t believe you,” I reassured her, “but you’ve taken drugs.”

“So have you,” she argued, pointing at the rumpled sheets on the bed. “I know what I saw.”

As she walked out, I ground my teeth and let my head fall back between my shoulders. “Fucking great.” I looked around the room again at the pristine floor, cream walls, and the chair pushed against the desk. Nothing was out of place.

The floorboards behind me creaked, and I spun around. Nate pushed off the doorframe, walking deeper into the room, in no hurry to reach me. “Why are you alone in here?”

“Skyler left,” I replied with a sigh. I’d have to find her, make sure she stayed out of trouble.

“Are you looking for something? The party is downstairs.”

His masculine, citrusy scent teased my nostrils as he slid past me to peruse a small bookshelf near the window. Nate was incredibly handsome with his dark hair and sharp jawline that seemed to tic continuously in that alluring way, and he knew it. When he pinned his steel-gray eyes on me, my clit preened.

“Skyler thinks you hurt Lewis.”

Not a single reaction flickered across his features. “Is that so?”

I stayed silent, sensing a shift in the air. The floorboards creaked again beneath Nate’s weight as he approached me with his hands clasped behind his back. He leaned in close, his moist lips brushing my ear. “Maybe you should keep an eye on her.”

A shiver rippled through me and then his heat disappeared.

As he exited the room, he called out, “Keep the drugs away from her. We’re out in the middle of nowhere.” He grabbed hold of the doorframe and looked at me over his shoulder. “The last thing we want is a paranoid girl imagining stuff.”

When he was gone, I bit my lip. Something felt off, but I couldn’t decide if Skyler was high, or Nate was lying. Skyler said Nate killed Lewis in here, but nothing was out of place. Not a speck of blood. Nothing.

My gaze landed on the bed again and I slowly made my way up to it. Lowering into a crouch, I peeked beneath it. There was nothing there except for dust bunnies. Still, something wasn’t right, or maybe it was the drugs talking.

SKYLER

The very minute Nate entered the living room, I flew up from the couch and shoved his chest, causing a scene. “You killed him!”

The others paused, looking over at us as I pushed him again. Nate stumbled back and held up his hands defensively. “What are you talking about, Skyler?”

“No, don’t do that to me. You killed him. I saw you.”

“What are you talking about?” Lily asked, rising from the couch.

Alice and Harper stared at us from across the room, where they had been dancing before Nate returned. We had an audience, but I didn’t care. They all needed to know what he’d done.

“Nate killed Lewis.”

Silence descended on the room and Nate released a scoff before walking past me, flopping onto the couch and kicking his feet up on the coffee table without a care in the world. Alice snorted, then turned around and swayed her hips to the beat. No one took me seriously. I looked between them all, my eyes watering with tears the longer they ignored me. “Where is he, then?” Sweeping my hand around the room, I choked out, “Where’s Lewis? Dustin?”

---