Page 7 of The Dare

He was naked!

“I don’t know,” I said. “I panicked and ran off. Oh, but I also dropped my phone.”

That realization made me slap my forehead and groan. What the hell was I going to do now? I needed my phone, but I couldn’t possibly go back in there now. My mind conjured up the image of him naked once again, but my glance had been so fleeting that some of it was a blur. Mostly, I didn’t get a good look at his cock.

Not that I wanted to. Not at all.

“We’ll have to go get it,” Jenna said.

“I can’t.” My reply was too quick and the edge of panic was a little too obvious. She narrowed her gaze at me, suspicion in her eyes. “I mean, I’m embarrassed. It was stupid to go in there in the first place. I just want to wait a while. Until he’s definitely asleep.”

“Okay, I guess. But you need your phone. We’re going back in a little bit.”

I wanted to say no, to argue against going back into that room at all. But if I did that, my friends would want to know why. I wasn’t sure what held me back, but I just didn’t want to tell them he was naked. I didn’t understand it, but I felt an urge to keep it to myself. As if seeing him like that was an experience that belonged to me.

Maybe I was just too rattled to think straight.

So, we waited an hour. I didn’t want to keep playing Truth or Dare, and my friends picked up on that without being told, so we drank the rest of the wine coolers and hung out until we were sure that Atticus must have gone to bed.

Even then, I was reluctant to go back. But I needed to. I couldn’t function without my phone. No social media? No texting? No access to my school email? It wasn’t something I could do without.

Olivia could tell I was nervous, even if I didn’t specify why, so she came with me when I went back to Atticus’ room. This time, the house was truly quiet. My uncles had gone to bed, so there was no one around. Olivia opened the door to Atticus’s bedroom when I stood there staring at it for a moment, unsure of what I would find on the other side.

What was even more disturbing was that I wasn’t sure what I wanted to find.

But there was nothing. The room wasn’t dark this time. A lamp had been left on, illuminating the room in a golden glow. The bathroom door was also left open, so it only took seconds to realize that Atticus wasn’t here.

“He’s gone?” Olivia’s eyes met mine, filled with confusion. “Where could he be in the middle of the night?”

I shrugged. “Who knows what he’s up to? Nerd convention?”

Olivia chuckled and shook her head. “One of these days, he’s going to get sick of your snark.”

I scoffed as my eyes scanned the floor near the door, looking for my phone. “What’s he going to do?”

Olivia didn’t answer. Instead, she got down on her hands and knees to look under the dresser. “No phone. You’re sure you dropped it in here?”

“Of course I am.”

I looked around the room and realized that there wasn’t luggage in here either. No suitcase or duffel bag. Atticus had taken off, and if I had to guess, he had my phone with him.

But where did he go?

Chapter 6

Atticus

Fuck.

I couldn’t believe that Molly walked in on me naked. I never would have expected that. I didn’t even think that anyone would still be awake when I got back to my room.

After dinner, I slipped away quietly without anyone noticing, leaving to go back to my rental cabin across the lake. The body had to be dealt with, and I couldn’t put it off any longer. The last thing I wanted was to deal with a stinking mess.

So, I dug a hole out in the woods behind the house. I dragged the body, wrapped in plastic, to the hole and buried it. I’d never done this before, and it was a pain in the ass to bury a body. Digging a hole deep enough to keep the body from being found was more difficult than I thought it would be. It took hours, and by the time I returned to my family’s cabin, I was covered in sweat and dirt. My arm and back muscles ached, and I wanted to rip my clothes off. I didn’t bother driving back to the rental cabin just to shower. None of the family members even knew I was renting the damn thing, and I didn’t want to raise awareness to it. I took my time in the shower, letting the hot water run down my body to provide some relief.

The last thing I expected when I stepped out into my dark bedroom was to have a light shining in my eyes. I flinched, blinded for a moment, but there was no mistaking who it was when I heard a feminine gasp of surprise.

Molly. She was in my fucking room. Then she was gone in the blink of an eye. I only saw a flash of her dark hair as she ripped the door open and ran out of the room.

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