Page 3 of Start A War (Saint View Psychos)

Axel.

Caleb glanced at me like I’d lost my mind. “Bethany-Melissa!” he hissed. “Can you shut that thing up?”

I still couldn’t move.

Caleb leaned over and peered at the phone. “Who’s Axel?”

Hearing his name out loud was enough to finally shock me out of my stupor. “No one. Never mind. Sorry.”

I silenced the ringer, pulling it away from Caleb and pushing back in my chair so fast he had to grab the back of it to keep it from falling over.

“I’m going to the bathroom.”

Without waiting to hear if Caleb said anything in reply, I spun on my heel and hurried for the safety of the ladies’ room, my phone still vibrating in my hand.

I never made it to the bathroom. The moment I was out of the ballroom and into the hall, I hit the green answer button. “Axel?”

The sound of labored breathing came down the line. “Bliss?”

“It’s me. What’s wrong? Why are you calling?” I swallowed hard. “Is it money? If you need help, I can’t ask Dad but I—”

“Do you want some Goldfish crackers?”

I stopped breathing.

Memories I’d fought hard to forget flooded back, swirling around my head in a tumbling dark mass, sinister and terrifying.

“Why would you ask me that?” The words came out as barely more than a croak, the tremble in my voice matching the one that had taken control of my fingers.

There was nothing but his breathing.

“Axel! Talk to me! Why would you say that after all these years—”

The crack of a gunshot, even down the phone line, ripped a scream from my chest. On instinct, I threw my phone across the hallway and covered my ears, shrinking down and cowering like I was five years old again, in my mother’s vermin-ridden trailer, my big brother the only protection I knew.

I stared at the phone with terror clawing at my throat. “No,” I whispered, the word coming out as a sob. “No. No.” I crawled across the floor, my dress tugging and twisting and dragging along until I had the phone to my ear again. “Axel? Axel!”

There was nothing but a deathly silence on the other end.

My heart pounded against my rib cage, and my whispers turned to screams. “Axel!”

There was no reply.

But I heard his voice in my head anyway.

Do you want some Goldfish crackers?

It had always meant one thing.

You’re in danger. Hide.

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