Page 7 of Saint

One night, I got bored and snuck out to wander the halls. A girl my age had been brought in after slitting her wrists. Her blood soaked the sheets wrapped around her forearms, and she was so pale she matched the stark white walls of the room they put her in.

I heard them say she wouldn’t live.

But she did.

She did.

Only this isn’t that day, and we aren’t where anyone can help us.

“Hmm.” The stranger takes a step toward me. His black boots cut into my line of sight as he steps into the pool of blood on the ground. “Interesting.”

Interesting?

My blood boils at his comment. I should be afraid. I should probably run. But with the bubble of rage ripping through me, I look up at him with narrowed eyes instead. I face the neon blue glow of his grinning mask as he gleams down at me against the backdrop of a star-speckled sky.

“You killed him.”

The stranger ticks his head to the side, watching me. “And you’re sad about it?”

Liam’s body is still. Cooling, even as the heat of his blood still warms my hands. His eyes are wide and empty as they stare up at us.

“Of course I’m sad about it.” I release Liam’s throat and sink back onto my heels. “He’s my boyfriend.”

Blood paints my hands. Coats my arms. Drips on the bare skin peeking through my fishnets. But Liam is gone.

The masked stranger steps forward, reaching a hand for my jaw. He smears the blood from his fingers onto my cheek, and at first, I think it’s an accident until he smears in a little more.

“He’s not worth your tears, Violet.”

I jerk my face from his grip. “You don’t know that. You don’t know me.”

An amused chuckle escapes him as he stands taller, towering over me. And I realize that I’ve not only chosen not to run, but I’ve put myself on my knees at this psychopath’s mercy.

“I know enough,” he says.

“Well, I don’t know you.” I roll my shoulders back, hoping he won’t see me crumbling if I put up a strong front. “Why did you do this?”

He stands over me, silent. My shoulders shake outside of my control when he won’t stop watching me.

“What do you want?” I tip my chin up. “Who are you?”

“So many questions.” He holds up the bloody blade between us.

Drawing his other arm up, he cleans it off with the cuff of his sleeve. The cool silver shines in the moonlight. I wait for him to slash it through my throat next.

“You can call me Saint.”

Saint. When there’s nothing less holy than him standing over me.

“Your name is Saint?”

He shakes his head slowly, toying with his blade. “Might as well be. I saved you.”

“I wasn’t in danger,” I argue, wishing I’d stop trying to piss him off, so I level my tone. “At least, not until Liam picked you up.”

A cloaked chuckle comes from behind his mask, but it isn’t amusement. It’s dark. Sick. Sadistic.

We face each other, soaked in my boyfriend’s blood. The pavement digs into my knees, and a pebble cutsthrough my skin, but I barely feel it with the adrenaline coursing through me.

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