“The pointis that Vickers only wantedyou. Heshouldhave gottenyou. Then Tommy would still be alive and maybe my life wouldn’t have been so fucked up,” Missy said. “I hated you from the very first time I met you. Tommy only wanted to be with you, and—you know what? Enough monologuing. Time to die, bitch.”
Dani gasped as Missy threw a roundhouse kick into the air. In one swift and unexpected move, she knocked the gun out of Dani’s hand and let out a triumphant yell. Dani stumbled backwards and regained her footing before turning and running into the woods. Missy was already at her heels, cackling.
“Where ya gonna go, Dani? I’m faster than you, remember?”
Dani put her head down and fell into a sprint, zigzagging between the trees in the dark. Missy was right, she was faster and in better shape than her. But Dani had the advantage. She knew the landscape. And even though she didn’t suspect that her supposed friend would be the one chasing her, she had prepared for this very scenario.
“You’reoldand you’reslow!” Missy screamed, her voice echoing through the trees. “You were never good enough for Tommy!”
Thunk.
Stars dotted Dani’s vision and a bright, radiant wave of pain hit the back of her head. She fell to her knees, catching herself in the damp leaf litter. She reached back and touched her head, her fingers coming back wet and sticky with blood. That bitch had thrown a rock at her.
“Yeahhhhh!”
Missy was on her back then, her fingers clawing and grasping at her hair. She pushed her face into the damp earth and decaying leaves, sticks poking and scratching at her lips andeyes. The small, helpless part of herself that Dani always struggled to suppress died in that moment. She wasn’t going to let this jealous, insane woman keep her revenge. Dani’s martial arts training kicked in as she rolled her body, bucking her hips. Missy sailed through the air, taking a clump of hair with her.
“Bitch!” Missy rolled to the side and pounced back into action. She flew toward Dani in a whirlwind of leaf-matted hair but was met with a swift front kick to the chest. Dani took no pleasure in watching her supposed friend fall to the ground, coughing and gasping for breath. She didn’t want to fight Missy/Melody. This wasn’t what she had envisioned at all. But she couldn’t waste any more time or energy on her either. Vickers was who she really wanted. Missy had made her choice, and now Dani had to make a choice too.
Missy sputtered and scrambled back to her feet as Dani took off running again. It hurt her heart to know what she had to do. When the cabin was in sight, Dani knew she was getting close to her target. The plan had been to set up multiple traps around the property as part of their survival school training, but for now, one was all Dani needed. Just a big patch of dead leaves right next to the burnt out tree that had been struck by lightning. Missy’s footsteps grew nearer as she ran through the woods, her fingers grasping at the back of her hoodie as Dani struggled to stay just out of reach. As she neared her marker, Dani kicked her ass into gear and tapped into her energy reserves.
A leap of faith.
A silent prayer.
Dani hurdled over the spot she and her aunt had dug out and covered with a tarp months before. She used all of her strength to sail through the air, landing safely on the other side. Missy screamed as her foot sank in the center of the tarp, releasing the scent of mold and fallen leaves into the air.
A thud.
A crack.
Then silence.
She turned and stared down into the pit. A half-dozen sharpened spears stuck up from a platform in the ground — the very platform that she and Lisa had built. Missy’s body writhed, impaled and bloodied at the bottom of the pit. She gurgled and moaned, her breath thick as she wheezed droplets of foamy blood from the wooden stake in her chest. Tommy’s little sister stared up at her with his eyes; eyes that Dani should have recognized from the start. Blood trickled from the corner of Missy’s mouth, and her body went slack.
BANG.
Dani whipped her head around toward the shotgun sound. Her stomach clenched as she realized where the explosion was coming from.
She had forgotten about Aunt Lisa.
She had forgotten about Matt Vickers.
Dani didn’t have time to mourn. She left Tommy’s little sister at the bottom of the pit and sprinted toward the cabin.
The early morning sky glowed hazy amber, and a cool breeze blew against Dani’s sweat-damp neck as she approached the cabin. Here in the foothills of Appalachia it truly felt as though summer was at an end and fall was on its way. Any other moment, she would have gladly taken the time to breathe in the sweet, fresh mountain air and welcome the start of another day. But at that moment, Dani didn’t have time to smell the roses. She flexed her grip around the handle of her blade and walked toward the cabin.
Everything she had done for the last twenty-five years led up to this very moment. Even though she had worked hard in her career, gotten a new name, had her own home and friends, Dani never felt like she had really moved on. The attack and the murder of her family and friends defined her life in a way that was impossible to shift. On the outside, she was a functioning adult; inside, she was perpetually a scared eighteen-year-old, ready for the boogeyman to jump out of the shadows and claim her once and for all. Her natural instincts to run, to hide, to bescared were hard to push aside all those years ago, but not now. Now she would have her moment of reckoning, her final form crystalized, her blood-splattered cocoon broken free.
She was Dani Spencer.
A blade of vengeance.
Death to the death stalker.
Dani opened the cabin door and spread her wings, prepared at last to meet her fate.
“Hi, Matt.”
