Page 12 of Prey

“Some frat guy trying to scare people for fun.” A shiver snaked down my spine when his face remained glued onto me, even after the girls had run down to the bottom of the stairs.

“Your name is Petra,” Cheetos informed me, taking out the laminated fake ID from her bag and handing it to me.

“Petra?” I cringed, inspecting the card, which showed a bad picture of me with a date of birth that perfectly fit me into the correct age range to apply for the kitchenhand job. “Why Petra?”

“Black,” she added.

“Why Petra Black?” I questioned, struggling to get used to a name that was so…not like me. Or maybe Cheetos saw me as a Petra.

She shrugged. “Why not? A name is just a name. You’re not to tell anyone where you got that ID.”

“I swear I won’t say a thing.”

“Because I’ll be taking you down with me for fraud,” she asserted, always keeping her eyes low.

“Wow, you’re quite the spitfire, aren’t you?” I joked, surprised by her ferventness.

Her expression remained blank, unaffected by my comment. “Have you ever had a fake ID before?”

“Ah, no,” I lied.

“Maybe you should rehearse fake information about yourself, like your parents' names and what street you were born, when you get asked random stuff during an interview. Your new ID has you born here in Gothenburg, so you might need to research the city.”

“Wait. How do you know that I’m not from here?” I asked out of curiosity whether I needed to adjust my demeanor so I didn’t appear like an outsider.

“Because you struggle to find your way around.” She hesitated to say more, then added, “I saw you in Stop & Shop earlier, and you seemed lost like you hadn’t been there before.”

“I’m from a little town called Luton, about a thousand miles away from here,” I told her, and she didn’t seem that interested, merely shrugging her shoulders again.

She turned and left without saying goodbye, which was her style. Once she was two seats below me, she stalled and glanced back. “That guy harassing you earlier…yeah, you should do something about that.”

I tensed, wondering how much she witnessed. “Do you have any ideas? I don’t suppose you have access to a hitman?” She gave me a funny look. “Joke. That was a joke.”

“I know,” she said abruptly, as if I were stupid. Admittedly, as I watched her leave, I grew fond of the strange girl with no name.

Naturally, I looked back at the guy in the Scream mask and was taken aback by him still staring at me. Again, I checked to see if his weird gaze was focused on someone else, who I happened to be in the way of, but there was no one there.

With growing discontent, I gathered my belongings and climbed down the steps opposite the masked man. Nerves prickling down my spine urged me to check if he was still there, and I swallowed over a lump in my throat when he seemed to have moved closer, perhaps following me, but stopped walking when I looked behind.

Losing sight of him when I walked behind the locker rooms, my head spun with a thousand scenarios of why he was doing that. Perhaps he saw me as an easy target to make fun of - a nerdy girl with no one to hide behind. It was moments like these that I wished Gunner was here. Like always, he’d sort out my bullies by threatening them with his fist or one of the many knives he collected. I wondered if he collected knives now.

That’s history, and I shouldn’t torture myself by returning to that place.

I heard footsteps walking behind me on the pavement, and when I turned back in fright, it was just a guy walking, swiping on his phone, barely looking where he was going. Basketballs bouncing on the pavement serenaded me as I stepped out into an outdoor court where a group of guys were shooting hoops.

I was lost again in this unfamiliar place, so I took out my phone to map my way back to Hallen Hall. Once I caught my bearings and realized it was better to backtrack, head to the sports field again, and go from there.

A tickling sensation on the back of my head urged me to touch my hair, assuming something was there. Nerves prickled all over me as nasally breathing brushed the back of my neck. I propelled forward away from his imposing figure and was startled when I came face to face with the Scream mask.

The guys on the basketball court laughed at my reaction, and impulsively, I reached for his mask to pull it off, but he stepped out of my reach, wagging his finger at me. My cheeks burnedfrom the embarrassment of being mocked, but hot rage stormed my body, tensing my muscles.

“Asshole,” I fumed as he reached for my hair, and I smacked his arm away before hitting the ground running while yelling, “Stop following me, you creep. Demented coward pursuing a lone woman. I should call the campus police on your ass.”

Once I made it to the other side of the court, I checked to see if he followed and was relieved that he hadn’t moved. His peculiar head was tilted thoughtfully while his hand stroked his plastic chin mockingly to incite laughter from the basketball guys. As I ran, the guys jeered and cackled, wolf-whistling as I shot them my deepest scowl, adding to their laughter.

My enthusiasm for being at Gotland was quickly dying, replaced with hatred for everyone and everything. I had yet to have a single pleasurable moment since I got here with that prick, Shaun, and someone breaking into my room and leaving a message that may not be for me, but still, it hardly helped my nerves.

And now this?

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