She did, she has to have.
Keaton swears beneath his breath, and one lonely tear rolls down my cheek. I know exactly what he’s going to say before he says it.
Don’t say it, don’t fucking say it.
“I found her…” He pauses, and I can hear him swallow before he continues, “I found her on the side of the road earlier tonight.”
I feel my ribs bend, the weight of his words crushing me. Silent cries gurgle in my throat.
She can’t be, she’s not dead,there’s no way.
“Alive, right?” My fist white knuckles my cell when he doesn’t reply. My eyes almost pop out of my head as I repeat, “You’re with her now, right?” I almost growl the question.
Silence.
“Keats,” I whisper. “Right?” I’m panicking.
“Fuck, Blaine, I’m so sorry.” He exhales sharply. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
She’s gone.
I begin to tremble uncontrollably. My teeth smash down on each other, and I try so hard to clench them together, to rein in the sound ofourterror. “Where?” I croak.
“Between Shadow Heads and Devil’s Peak. She was on the side of the road in a shallow ditch. It’s like whoever dumped her there wanted her to be found.” His voice is full of rage, a simmering kind of fury, the kind I know my brother is well acquainted with, the very one he welcomes.
“How?”
He exhales raggedly, and I can almost see him when I close my eyes, rubbing one of his tattooed hands over the top of his head nervously.
“Blaine.” Hesitance laces through his voice.
I swallow tightly, then command, “Tell me.”
Keaton is tough, but as he talks, I can hear his voice break,and that fucking terrifies me.
“Her throat was slit, deeply, and there was a gunshot wound in her forehead.”
No.
A violent cry rips from my throat, my phone colliding with the stage floor with a loud thunk as I feel every bone in my body ache.
The brush of Caleb's hand is soft against my spine, though his voice is a distant echo even while he is right next to me. “Yeah, bro. I’ll get her home. I’ve got her. Thanks, I’ll call you.”
“No, please no, please don’t do this. Please, just slit my throat or shoot me in the head, not like this.”
They killed her.
The same way I begged for it.
They’re sending a message.
They aren’t done with me.
I scream so ferally, the sound ricochets off the walls and comes back to take me out. It pierces through my chest, exposingmy hidden wounds, the ones that should have stayed buried, the very ones that had no fucking right to resurface.
I’m bleeding out on what was once my stage of hope.
It’s not fucking fair.
