“I thoughtyouwere Russ.” He threw his arms around her in a hug. “You’re alive!”
She patted his back with the hand that held the bread knife. “Yeah, I’m fine. No thanks to you.”
She’d almost made bruschetta out of him, so they were even. “I thought you were right behind me,” he said.
“I was trying to figure out who that guy we saw was. What were you doing under the car?”
“I was about to go inside the cabin and I heard someone. I guess it was you.”
“Freddy—” Carrie had the face of someone with bad news, like a doctor about to tell him he had a terminal disease. Freddy braced for the worst. “That guy we saw…I’m not sure if you noticed. He was holding an axe and wearing a buffalo plaid jacket. I think it was Russ. He was the right height and build.”
Freddy snatched the vape pen out of his pocket and desperately inhaled. For once it didn’t help. He’d been right. They were in theSlashercabin, and now the Slasher was coming for them.
Carrie glanced around, searching the shadows. “Have you seen anyone else?”
“I guess no one’s back yet.”
“There’s still time. Hopefully they found Michael.”
Her brow creased with worry. Freddy shook his head. This was what taking the initiative got you. Mikey wanted to be the leading man, and now he was lost in the woods, if not butchered by Ranger Russ.
Gravel clung to Freddy’s sweaty palms. He wiped them on the front of his hoodie. He was filthy from rolling in the mud underneath Russ’s car. The same mud smeared the front of Carrie’s formerly pristine white tank top, from where he’d hugged her.
“Sorry about your top,” Freddy said.
Carrie glanced down at herself and gave a weak smile. “It’s okay. Camouflage. If I’d known we were going to be hunted in the woods, I wouldn’t have worn white.”
“Patrick neglected to mention that highlight of this weekend when he invited me,” Freddy grumbled, unzipping his hoodie. He took it off and shook it out as best he could. A trail of mud and gravel in the cabin would lead Russ right to him. “I don’t know why I came. All I wanted was to brag to the newSlashershadowcast that I’d stayed overnight at the cabin. And now Ranger Russ is out for blood. Fuck, I always knew he was creepy. You could tell just by looking at him. Those buggy Peter Lorre eyes. He probably still lives with his mom.”
Okay, Freddy still lived with his mom, too, but that was different.
“Though I haven’t seen Mrs. Meachum around for a while,” Freddy added. “Someone had better check their house to make sure there isn’t a Norman Bates situation going on there.”
He tied the sleeves of his hoodie around his waist, and suddenly realized Carrie had gone very quiet. He glanced up. She took a step back, her eyes wide. His pulse began to race and his opened senses picked up a shifting of leaves behind them.
“He’s standing right behind me, isn’t he,” Freddy croaked, anticipating the slide of steel between his shoulder blades. It figured. Talking trash about the bad guy had summoned him, like it did in movies.
Carrie took another step back, but she didn’t run. Not yet. “Freddy?”
She turned on her flashlight and pointed it at the chest of his striped shirt. Freddy threw up his arms to shield his eyes from the light. “Hey!”
“What is that?”
Freddy glanced down at his spotlit torso. It was hard to tell with the red stripes, but there was definitely something dark splattered across the front of his T-shirt. More mud?
Then it dawned on him and he laughed. “I got caught in the splatter zone at work. This year’s shadow cast uses twice as much fake blood as we did.”
“The mask in your van—” Carrie gasped. “It’s been you all along, dressing up like the Slasher.Youalmost killed Tiffany.”
“What? What’re you talking about?” Freddy’s thoughts crawled sluggishly as he tried to process what she was saying.
“Did you do something to Michael?”
What? Did she even know him at all? He laughed again, but the terrified expression on Carrie’s face told him it was the wrong reaction.
“What have you been smoking?” he demanded.
Carrie winced like she’d been slapped. Right. He forgot she didn’t do drugs, except for that time she accidentally ate too many of his brownies.
