Page 145 of Puck Princess

We go back and forth, treating Spencer as a punching bag.

My ears are ringing. My head is raging. My heart is throbbing in my chest to the point I think it might stop.

With each hit, I can see the blood hemorrhaging from what I think might only be a flesh wound. His eyes roll back in his head.

When Lance draws back to hit him again, I stop him. “Wait.”

Lance turns to me, his jaw clenched. “We can finish him, O. I’ll make it look like an accident. Like he got shitfaced and jumped from the roof and?—”

“No.” I shake my head, letting Spencer slide down the wall in a half-conscious lump. “He doesn’t deserve it.”

If I kill him and get caught, I’ll be thrown in prison. I’ll lose out on a lifetime with Callie and our daughter.

Spencer Santos isn’t worth all of that.

But it’s more than that, too.

“He doesn’t deserve to die,” I say. “We could let him bleed out right here and now, but that lets him off the hook. I want him to pay. I want his dad to pay. I want their lives to be ruined. I want him to rot in a cell, not a grave.”

Lance takes in a deep breath and lets it out hard.

I know I’m right. I’m also not a murderer. Even if Spencer did try to kill my family,I am not him.

I am not Spencer Santos or Miles Solomon.

I am not my father or any of the other men who slinked in and out of my home.

I am better than all of them.

And I’m going to save Spencer Santos’s life.

47

CALLIE

“Why isn’t he here yet?” I ask, shifting on the hospital bed. The scratchy blankets scrape against my skin and the thin mattress makes my lower back ache.

I think staying here is doing more harm than good.

No matter how many times I told Kennedy I was fine—that Spencer didn’t actually hurt me—she insisted that we go to the hospital. All I want is to go home.

I don’t even know if we can get back in the building.

The more I think about it, I’m not even sure if I want to. Not after what just happened.

The feeling bouncing around my chest is telling me to find home, to get somewhere safe. But that isn’t a place. It’s a person.

It’s Owen.

“He’s coming.” Kennedy checks her phone with pursed lips. “Lance said they’re on their way right now.”

I look at the clock on the wall. The clock on my phone. The clock on the corner of the muted TV screen that is playing a rerun ofFriends.

But I can’t relax. I can’t watch TV or drink the little plastic cup of juice or do anything but pick at the tape on the pointless IV they jabbed into my arm because Owen isn’t here yet and Spencer is running free.

I drum my fingers on my thigh, my foot twitching with energy I shouldn’t have. It’s late. I should be asleep. I should be exhausted. But my body is humming.

“Did Lance say how far out? Should we call them? Maybe we should?—”

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