Her tender gaze traveled through the windows and among the stretch of skyscrapers that still didn’t block any sunlight from reaching inside the new place. “You really think he’s out there, don’t you?”
I shook my head, laughing under my breath. “I know it’s silly.”
“There’s nothing silly or funny about a vigilante killer stalking you, Lina.”
I grimaced, sudden, inexplicable anger flickering inside me. I didn’t like the way she describedhim, even though it might be true. “Stalking is a big word.”
She gaped at me. “Lina!” Then her eyebrows shot high in shock. “Please don’t tell me you… Did you… Have you actually seen him? Has he ever talked to you? Did he fucking touch you?”
“Oh my God. What are you…?” I shook my head fast. “I haven’t seen or talked to anyone. This is probably all my stupid imagination, but if, and only if,heexists and is out there, I don’t thinkhe’s a…stalker.” More like a dark guardian angel.
“No?” She crossed her arms over her chest and cocked a brow at me.
“Yeah. What ifhejust did it to protect us, you know?”
She snorted. “And nowhe’s out there keeping an eye on us in case another asshole comes our way?”
I busied myself with the boxes, escaping her taunting gaze. “Like I said it’s silly. I just...”
“You’re still thinking about how easily we got into Bellomo, aren’t you? You still think that murderer has a hand—”
“Don’t you ever?” I looked at her over my shoulder. “Things like that don’t just happen to people like us, Nicky.” That miracle—even though I was forever grateful for it—was too good to be true.
“Nobody does stuff like that for people like us without expecting something in return either. It’s been four years. Don’t you thinkhe’d have showed up by now, asking for whatever the hell he wanted in return from us? From you?”
I stacked a couple of boxes to take them to my room and shrugged. “I guess so.”
“C’mon, Lina. You know what? I think getting into that school was Karma’s way of making it up for the shit we had to go through, but that’s all the luck we’ve received. Everything else was our hard work or are you telling me that we haven’t busted our butts to stay in that school, that I haven’t studied my ass off to get that scholarship?”
I left the boxes and spun. Then I held her arms, holding her gaze. “Of course not. You worked really hard for this. You graduated first in your class for God’s sake. You earned that scholarship fair and square.”
“Then why are you still thinking that weird shit? There’s no one out there, Nicky. There’s only us. Baldi girls versus the world. We don’t need saviors. Only each other.”
I smiled and nodded in agreement. Nicky was everything to me. I had no clue what I’d do without her. My life without my sister was unimaginable even though we were so different. She was the organized, in your face, confident realist, and I was the quiet, all over the place dreamer. She kept me in check, and we balanced each other out.
I almost dismissed the wholeheidea, borrowing her logic, when my gaze dropped to the violin case nestled in the top box of my stack. My mind drifted to my last birthday when I found it wrapped in my dorm room right on my bed. The most precious gift I’d ever received in my whole life. “What about the birthday gifts that miraculously appeared on my bed?”
“One of the perks of being born on Halloween. The guys at school were messing with you for a good spook.” She went on with the story she’d told me every time my fears got the best of me. Every year our friends gathered money and got me a present, but instead of just giving it to me, they left it on my bed with no card or note or anything, made it look like it came from a stranger and then teased me about it.
I never believed that story. The gifts—a gold necklace with an angel pendant, a watch, a pair of silver earrings with pink tourmalines, and the violin—were really expensive, and said friends denied buying me any gifts when I confronted them. Nicky had always said it was part of the act, but no one was that good of an actor.
“There wasn’t so much to do for fun at our school, and we barely got out. The guys did it for the kicks.” She shrugged, as if stating the obvious. “Besides, Bellomo was a freaking vault. No stranger could have come in without getting caught.”
“That I can’t argue with.”
She gave my arm a gentle squeeze and pecked my cheek. “I know what you’re thinking, Lina, but we have no guardian angels or secret admirers looking out for us and giving us nice things. It doesn’t work that way.” She leaned in and whispered, “Especially if they’re psycho stalking killers.”
Anger bubbled in me again. At Nicky…and at myself. It was crazy how I wanted to shake her and demand she never callhimthat again, how I wanted to defendhimeven though he might have never existed, and ifhedid,he’d be exactly what she saidhewould be.
Why would anyone defend a psycho stalking killer?
Why would I wanthimto be real?
And above all, ifhewas, why couldn’t I wait to meethim?
Chapter 4
Tino
