“I’ll get us a meal together,” Lee tells me. “You go shower before the hot water runs out.”
I lift my eyebrow at him.
“You forget, Lex. I’m married to a woman. I know how feral you ladies can get once the water runs cold.”
I grin and squeeze his shoulder as I pass him. “You’re the best. Literally. You’re my favorite of my best friends’ husbands.”
Lee snorts and gives me a sly smile. “I’m the only husband in the group, so it’s easy to be the favorite. But I suppose you can be my favorite of Capri’s friends, too. That is, until Teagan comes to save us all with her witchy magic and final girl power, or whatever it is you ladies say.”
“Lee!” I gasp, trying to hold back both tears and laughter. “Since you love me so much, you won’t mind if I use all the hot water.” I head for the bathroom and lock the door behind me before erasing the fake smile from my face.
What I didn’t tell him is that I’m not sure if I actually have any best friends left.
The water scalds my skin in the best way possible. Is there really anything better than a boiling shower after the most tiresome and adrenaline-rush-filled night of my life? No, there isn’t. Being cooked alive might not be the worst way to go out.
I let the water rinse away all the grime and hard truths of the day, and finally allow myself to have that breakdown that I’ve been holding off on.
It’s clearer than ever that I’ve been wrong about everything.
My tears mix with the scalding stream as I fall to my knees and cry harder than I think I’ve ever cried before.
What kind of friend am I?
I allowed myself to pursue a man I knew my best friend was falling in love with. I can try to rationalize all I want about how I was in the right to go after him, but at the end of the day, I’m the problem. If Josh had wantedme, he wouldn’t have gone after Teagan. He would have chosen me.
Josh let me become the worst version of myself, and at the end of the day, I justified my actions for what I mistook as love. I can’t speak for his actions in our affair, but I know what we had wasn’t love. It was obsession and jealousy on my part.
Both of which I regret more than anything. And now we might all be killed because of some psycho-thriller-writer, and I may never be able to tell Teagan how sorry I am.
I might never get to right all my wrongs.
A knock on the door pulls me out of my melancholy. I stave off another sob that threatens to escape.
“Hey lassie,” Lochlan says from beyond the closed door. “We’re going to have a group meeting here in a bit.”
Wiping my eyes and rinsing the last of the soap down the drain, along with all my emotions and regrets of my life, I shout back, “I’ll be right out!”
When I get out of the shower, I find a pair of black sweatpants along with an oversized purple hoodie waiting for me. The outfit is truly horrendous, but I can’t really be picky right now. At least it’s not flannel.
I head out to meet the rest of the group and find them all sitting around a large oval table. There’s an empty seat with what looks like a microwaved meal and two bottles of water waiting for me. I give a nod ofthanks to Sammy and dig in. The food is disgusting, but I’m so hungry it doesn’t even matter. I wolf it down while listening to the others speak.
“We have the element of surprise now,” Lee explains. “What we should do is use one of us as bait and then take the Axeman down ourselves. It’s five to one, there’s no way he’s walking away from an ambush like that.”
Kristi crosses her arms across her chest and chews on her thumb as she stares up at Sammy. “What do you think?” she mumbles.
Sammy sighs and shrugs. “I don’t know. It could work. But it’s risky to whoever we use as bait. I won’t force anyone to volunteer for that, and I’m sure as shit not going to. I barely escaped him the last time.”
“Neither am I,” Kristi agrees. “Sorry, but I don’t know you guys enough to trust you.”
Lochlan scoffs and slams a hand on the table, making us all jump. “We saved your life, Kristi! We risked ours to make sure you made it out alive. I don’t want to hear another thing about trust. If we don’t have trust, we have nothing. And I, for one, will trust these two blokes with my life.” He points to Lee and me and gives us a wink.
Something in my chest tugs at his admission. I look back and forth between Lochlan and Lee and realize that somewhere between the cabin and here, we became true allies. Friends, even. And I’ll go down swinging for them, too.
I get to my feet. “I’ll be the bait.” Lee and Lochlan immediately argue. I hold up a hand to stop them. “Look, I’m no use with a weapon, but I’m faster than the rest of you. He can’t kill me if he can’t catch me, right?” I ask before continuing. “But that won’t happen because I’m trusting you idiots with my life. So let’s kill this douchebag and get back to our people.”
Lochlan gives me a salute and then hoists what I think is a crossbow over his shoulder, his green eyes shining with pride. “With these supplies, we are no longer the hunted. We are the hunters.”
Chapter twenty-four
