Page 64 of The Blood we Crave

“He didn’t have the same mentality for the future?” I offer with a small smile, releasing a breath and letting my shoulders fall.

This gets him to laugh, just a little. “Exactly.”

I know if I keep poking, he’s going to grow even more suspicious, so I halt my digging for the time being, lifting the papers.

“Thank you for this. I’m not sure if I’ll accept. I don’t know if I can leave here—”

“Why?” he interrupts, standing up straight and watching me with such concern in his soft eyes that it’s hard to believe he’s capable of what the guys believe him to be.

“My friends—I have friends here, and I just…” I bite my bottom lip. “I don’t know if I can leave them yet.”

Conner nods, pursing his lips. “Friends with boyfriends who will lead their own lives far away from here one day? Would they stay for you?”

The question runs cold along my skin.

Would they?

“I would hate to see you end up another pebble in the cobblestone of this damn place. You deserve more than what this town can offer you. In this world, all you have is yourself. You are allowed to put yourself first, to be selfish—”

A scream, loud and piercing, interjects his speech and my mind questioning my friends’ loyalty. It’s pure fear, the echoes from the vocal cords of someone outside in the courtyard.The open windows in the classroom allow it to permeate along the first floor of the building, and I quickly hear noise gathering.

Anarchy.Panic. Fear.

“What the hell?” Godfrey says loudly, moving to the door with me quick on his heels.

We follow the massive swarm of students and faculty pooling out of the building and towards the commons in the center of the school grounds, a large circular building near the recently chopped oak tree that used to stand tall.

The leafy, historic tree was collateral damage during my freshman year. The tree I’d helped Rook set fire to to provide a distraction for Briar and Alistair, a memory that strikes like a match in the back of my mind.

But it is no longer the missing tree everyone is enthralled by.

Conner pushes his way through the chaos, me following the trail of space he makes until we are at the edge of the circle, exposed to the horror that is causing mass panic across the grounds.

I hear someone gasp, a cry of desperation from another, rumbling and whispers that grow louder the longer I stand here. My mouth is dry, and I can feel my heart cleaving against my chest.

At the base of the oak tree lies a human leg, expertly sliced at the joint and bleached pale white. There is a thin white ribbon tied in a bow at the knee and one singular red rose resting against it.

Alistair had warned us of this, told us that the town we had started to wreak havoc on would soon begin to retaliate. We may evade law enforcement, but we had dabbled into an organization that was tired of our meddling.

We’d killed one too many of them.

And all I can think is this was them taking their pound of flesh back.

“Is that…?” I whisper more to myself, but Conner replies.

“Yes.”

Carved in brutal, scrawly script into the milky flesh of the calf is a message. Two words from a serial killer who’d come back to haunt his stomping grounds. A warning from the Butcher of the Spring.

I’m back.

The world begins to spin. In beautiful, disastrous color, it spins so fast that my eyes can’t make out anything other than a blur of pigment. I feel my hand crash to my stomach, pressing into the flesh in an attempt to calm the raging war inside.

He’s back.

That’s not possible, is it?

Henry Pierson is locked inside a man-made rock, cemented behind bars until his body rots to maggot food. There is no way he can just escape a place like that. He can’t be back.

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