Page 87 of The Resort

And then I hear it. A wail, guttural and garbled, as if rising from the depths. I try to focus my blurred eyes, and when I finally do, I find its source. Logan, running directly at me.

I watch Greta try to stop him, but he easily breaks free from her grasp. Within seconds, he’s dropped to the ground, inches fromCass’s lifeless body. He pulls her head into his lap, heaving sobs shaking his entire body.

A red plume blossoms across Cass’s pink tank top, the rainwater blurring it at the edges like some grotesque watercolor painting. Her eyes stare up at the sky, registering nothing. Her chest is still.

At that moment, I know, just as Logan does, that Cass is gone. She threw herself in front of the bullet meant for me.

“It was for us. It was all for us,” he mumbles over and over into Cass’s ear.

And that’s when I finally feel the rope break free beneath my fingers. I shimmy my hands out of it, going to work on loosening the rope around my legs while everyone is distracted.

I need to get to Alani. To help her.

But before I can stand, Logan’s eyes shoot to me, as if he’s only just remembered that I’m here.

“You.”

Vines of emotion crawl around the word like ivy. The menace of it solidifies in my bones, nailing my feet to the muddied ground. One thought pierces my skull, a phrase my brain sounds out backward and forward in the split second it takes Logan to get to his feet.

The gun.

The thought ricochets through my brain. Logan still has the gun in his hands.

I’m running across the courtyard before he can raise it, and then I’m diving, flying through the air. As the pistol blasts so close to me that I can feel the vibration from the barrel, I fall to the ground behind the picnic table.

The bullet lands just to my left, exploding the mud around me like a firework.

I duck behind the table, bracing myself for him to fire again, but the gun is silent; all I hear are yells and groans.

When I open my eyes, the chaos in the courtyard pauses in freeze-frame. I see Logan with the gun, but it’s no longer pointed at me. And he’s not standing but lying in the mud, just meters away from his dead fiancée. I blink, forcing my eyes to come into focus.

When they do, I see a man standing over Logan. I take in his reddish hair, his freckled skin. I see the blood covering his hand, and that’s when I notice the small knife sticking from the side of Logan’s neck.

My brain registers it in flashes.

Neil stabbed Logan. To protect me.

I watch as Doug and Greta rush toward them, Greta dropping to the ground next to Logan, Doug attacking Neil, fists flying.

I want to do something to stop Doug. To protect Neil just like he did me. But I know it’s futile. I know I can’t fend off Doug, especially when he’s in such close proximity to the gun.

Instead, I run back to Alani, frantically trying to loosen the rope around her hands. Just as the knot comes free, I hear her scream.

“Brooke!” My name comes out garbled from her mouth, and when I lift my head to process why, I see Greta running toward us, her hair—almost white in the light—flying behind her, witchlike.

And then she’s on me. The force knocks me to the ground, the air exploding out of me, leaving me gasping. One of her hands is on my throat, crushing my esophagus, her face knotted in a purgatory between grief and rage. The other hand is pulled back, preparing to make contact with my cheek. She’s strong. But it’s a strength that’s built in studios, on cushy yoga mats. She’s never had to fight. She didn’t have one of her mother’s boyfriends teach her self-defenseso that she wouldn’t keep getting the shit beaten out of her in junior high.

I did.

I manage to shift my head just in time for Greta’s fist to impact the mud next to me. The contact catches her off guard, and her hand unclenches from my throat for a moment, which is all I need.

I flip her easily and crawl atop her so that she’s pinned face down. I pull her wrists back behind her, securing them with my left hand, and I wrap my other hand around her hair. And then, as hard as I can, I shove her head down, as far as possible into the mud. And I hold it there. Just like she held Lucy’s head under the water.

Her body squirms and shudders beneath me, but I don’t let go. I grasp her hair tight in my hand, channeling all the anger that’s flooded my body for years. I don’t know how much time passes. Two seconds? Five? Ten? I imagine the dirt invading her mouth, clinging in clumps to her tongue. I picture her swallowing it, filling up her trachea like an earthy grave.

Time seems to stop at that moment. Nothing is real other than the feel of Greta’s hair wrapped around my fingers, everything else fading into a blur.

Until a sharp sound drags me back to reality.

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