Page 48 of Ramsay

Wiping my hands on my jeans, I take a slow breath to calm my erratic breathing and step away from the tree, jumping a foot in the air and shrieking, when I spy a dark figure standing a few feet from me.

Laughing, I gasp, “You scared the shit out of me. How did you find me?”

But the figure doesn’t speak. No, he just stands there and looms. My throat thickens and I take a step back because this person came from the direction of the cars.

“Bone?” I whisper.

From one minute to the next, I’m in flight, spinning on my heels and racing through the trees, following my instinct to flee.

Branches slap at my face, and limbs break under my footfalls as I race through the darkness. I can hear him behind me, his steps heavy against the earth.

It’s all I can do to stay out of his reach, and I’m already tired, but I can feel him pressing in on me, his harsh breaths competing with the drumming in my ears.

With a shout, I trip over something hard and slam my head on the ground. As soon as I do, I flip to my back and watch with my heart in my throat as the figure silently looms over me.

“Willow? Where are you? We’re done. Casper’s it now.”

It’s too dark to see more than shadow but when the figure reaches his hand out to me, his fingers white in the darkness, I scream and scream.

Thankfully, he backs away and takes off but lying alone in the darkness, I lose my mind, unable to separate this vision from my nightmares of Carmen reaching out to me desperately, only to fall back in the hole and clutch her neck in resignation.

Bone comes into view and drops beside me, barking, “What the fuck?”

“There was someone, someone chased me,” I rasp.

He glances around before standing and heading off in the direction I point. Dixie kneels beside me and helps me to stand.

Wobbling on shaky limbs, I follow her back to the fire, glancing around me uneasily as she says, “Shit, you’ve bumped your head.”

And like an invitation, a dull throb appears. When I touch my skin, I wince before staring at the blood on my fingers. What just happened?

After a few minutes, the guys return to the fire, shaking their heads and giving me skeptical looks. Glancing between them, I see they’re all wearing dark hoodies. It could have been any one of them, and whoever it was, they were decidedly menacing.

∞∞∞

I’m back at school on Monday morning, sick of myself and the spiraling thoughts I can’t shake. I’ve got a goose egg on my forehead that hurts like a bitch and an emotional hangover.

My parents didn’t come out of their room all weekend, and I fear this may be the breaking point my mother can’t come back from, not that I blame her.

If I can’t escape the thoughts of what Carmen must have gone through, it must be crushing her.

When I pass Sabrina in the hall, I’m reminded of my promise to Dixie and Penny because the texts were only the beginning of what we planned, however getting revenge against a pathetic bully pales in comparison to the shit I’m facing.

I guess, if nothing else, it’s a good distraction, though.

Today is phase two. Dixie paid off some dude to deliver the goods, and I suspect they originated from Ramsay because who else would have something like this on hand? Penny couldn’t find it, as though it had been erased from the cloud forcing us to make a deal with the devil.

Keith agreed to get one of his friends to hijack the audio system, and now it’s just a matter of waiting for the assembly later today.

That and I owe some nameless, faceless dick a favor in return for the audio but it’s worth it to see Sabrina fall off her throne, except I’m uneasy in the face of whether using this information and potentially involving the Sinners is a good idea.

I don’t know if she’s in bed with them after all, thoughts of which put grim images in my head that I force away. I’m not interested in Ramsay or so I tell myself.

I pass Diem in the hall, relieved to see he’s standing because the last I saw of him, he was fighting off the massive dude in the ring while Jagger pulled me into the night.

His brows drop as he looks me over, stopping on the bump on my head before returning to my face with questions in his eyes.

Well, bully for him, I’m not his friend. Ignoring him and his frown, I pass him tiredly. I’ve no energy for the whiplash these boys give me with every mercurial mood and action. I get it—you don't want me around, then stop fucking coming to me.

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