Page 28 of Pack Kasen: Part 1

I’m not sure at what point I stopped waiting to die and start getting pissed off that he’s not just getting it over with. The moment sneaks up on me as I count down the seconds, then the minutes, then the hours, until I lose all track of time.

I have a graduation speech to give, the end of my semester to wrap up, friends and acquaintances I wouldn’t mind saying goodbye to before we all go our separate ways, and preparations to start a job in one of the best accounting firms in the city.

Instead, I’m caged up like an animal.

Calleditby a band T-shirt wearing Viking meathead.

So maybe he’s notactuallya meathead or even a Viking, but what gives him the right to steal me from my life?

Yes, the guy is hot, but he’s also a tool.

Hours later, the Viking with the terrible excuse for manners, returns as I’m struggling with an unexplainable bout of fatigue probably caused by lack of water.

My head is pounding, my mouth is dry, and all I want to do is sit. Standing feels like too much effort. Lying down is easier, so I do that.

I can only assume he must know how thirsty I am because he walks into the room like he owns it, sipping from an icy cold bottle of water as I’m struggling to remember what water tastes like.

“Four dead, and they were all connected to you,” he says, sipping from the water bottle that every time I look at it makes my mouth feel gritty like the Sahara Desert. “You’re like a black widow.”

“It sounds like you’ve been doing homework.”

Those guys who were watching me on campus must have been talking to the other students for him to know the victims were my exes. Watching me from a distance wouldn’t have been enough.

When he takes another long draw from his bottle, I can’t help studying the condensation forming on the outside. “My enforcers are good at what they do. I’m surprised the cops didn’t take you in for questioning.”

Enforcers.

Another unfamiliar word to go along with all the others.

I drag my eyes from the bottle. “They were looking for an escaped animal from a zoo.”

“Yes,” he says with a smile so smug I itch to smack it off his face. “Seems I’ve put you in the perfect place.”

I don’t dignify his comment with a response.

“That last one. My men heard whispers that you and he were dating for a while. So why’d you kill him? He dump you for a cheerleader?”

I stare straight ahead, wishing him away. “I didn’t kill him, and he did not dump me for a cheerleader. I broke up with him.”

He laughs. “Yeah, right. He cheated, right? He was a jock, and not just a jock, the star quarterback.”

I can see where this is going, and there is no way I’m going to sit here and let it.

Getting up from the floor makes me briefly lightheaded. I shake off the sensation and walk over to him, looking him in the eye.

“Doug was a nice guy who would walk any girl home at night to make sure she got home safe. Didn’t matter if he knew her or not. He deserved to have a normal life with a normal girlfriend instead of thinking that I was out cheating on him because I could never tell him what I was,” I say with quiet intensity. “That’swhy I broke up with him. So joke all you want, laugh, mock me, but don’t youdaresay another word against him. He was worth ten of you.”

For one second, his sneer slips.

He doesn’t make a sound as he leaves, but he tosses the half-empty water bottle to the ground, as if he wants it to taunt me. And itdoestaunt me because I watch the rest of the water in the bottle spill across the floor.

The jackass.

The other guy who followed him in but remained standing near the door frowns slightly as he watches me.

“Your friend is a tool,” I say, turning away from the spilled water before it can make my mouth feel even drier than it does already. “You know that, right?”

“There is more to Aren than you see.”

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