Page 19 of Overcast

The only thing I’ve learned about him or have received.

“Swing while you have a chance,” he provokes, taking another step so that, if I did try to hit him with it, I could reach.

“What do...I get if I don’t miss?”

Shut up, Stormi.

“You’re not going to get a cookie, but I can make your death a tad bit quicker for the effort.”

My whole body tenses at his monotone words and the fact that nothing has changed.

I’m nobody to him.

A human life that has the similarity of a rock. You can throw it, skip it, paint it red, it’s still just a rock.

A thing.

I’m no match to his brute strength or the crimes that he thinks I’ve committed.

He’s out for evident revenge and someone to point the finger at, but he has the wrong person.

I’m the girl that draws hearts on pieces of paper when I get bored and read books when there’s nothing to do at the library. The closest I’ve ever come to harming someone was the one time I stepped on the neighbor’s cat.

Other than that, I’m a damn lamb about to get sacrificed for the sins of another.

And the frightening part of Emric’s promise is that he looks like a killer. His tattoos give him an “I like pain” vibe because why would someone get inked on the side of their neck?

A psychopath.

He probably lifts dead people instead of iron weights with the size of his muscles. That and the fact that stabbing a person and drowning them doesn’t phase him at all. He could strangle a giant with his forearms, poke your eyes out with his thickset fingers, and pummel you into the cement with his stocky shins.

He is the big, evil monster that came out of the closet and eventually caught me off guard. Except I won’t be waking up from this nightmare. It’ll end with me dead without getting out of Oakdale and finally doing something with my life when I get my degree.

“I don’t understand...what you think I did,” I manage to gradually push through my lips. “But I didn’t hurt anyone. I don’t have...” I choke on my next choice of words.

I don’t have friends.

Besides the cute guy who gives me a smile from time to time when he comes to study at the library or the girl who asks me if I have an extra hair tie—that’s about it.

Emric advances closer. “Do you have a twin?” I slowly shake my head as I identify where this conversation is going—nowhere. “Then I’d say my twenty-twenty vision is still pretty accurate.”

“I’m telling you the truth,” I counter quickly. “I didn’t hurt anyone. Do I look like I could do such a thing?” A soft gasp breaks from my lips as both of his legs stand on either side of me.

Slowly, he begins to lower himself, descending over me and, while my worry is that he’s going to touch the blade residing in my flesh, I fear he’ll do something else.

His scent encircles my space. It’s not a cigarette that he’s smoking but a blunt. The skunk-like smell hitting my nostrils as he pinches it between his lips and carries itself into my clean air.

I hate him even more now.

“When are you going to start talking? I’m not a patient man—” He dares to steal a look at my leg. “—as you can see.”

“I already...told you.” My voice still sounds broken and weak.

As much as I’d love it, I can’t be cocky and self-assured like him right at this moment. The mocking self-assurance he illuminates because I bet if the tables were turned, he’d still be acting the way he is now.

Brave.

Confident.

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