Page 90 of Reckless
Brittany the bitch was still alive, somehow. Even with all that blood in her room, even with me being framed for her freaking murder—a murder that never really happened, obviously. She’d been faking it this entire time, hiding away somewhere, letting herself wither away to skin and bones.
I know. I couldn’t believe it either. That bitch Gone Girl-ed me.
The world was hazy as I stood there, watching Archer leave. My mind was racing, and I was freaking the fuck out, texting Vaughn and Dante. Both had come to the service, but neither had sat by me. Dante ducked away from my mom anytime she was near, and Vaughn knew enough to steer clear. They both had wanted to come to the hospital, but I told them no, that it would be too much to explain to my mom.
One big shock at a time.
“You all right?” Jacob asked, moving to stand beside me.
“I… I think so.” Honestly, I wasn’t sure. This all seemed surreal to me, like it should belong on a soap opera, a TV show, and not in my life. I bit my lower lip when I felt Jacob’s hand on my back. Not an intimate touch, but a touch to let me know he was there, and he wasn’t going anywhere.
It wasn’t long before Archer was out, heading back toward the waiting area. He pulled me aside, away from everyone else—something that was only possible because Detective Wilde was still talking with Ollie and my mom. Jacob scowled but let him take me.
“She’s…” Archer swallowed, clearly having a rough time speaking. “She said she’ll tell the police that you took her, that you’re the one who hurt her, if I don’t break up with you and go back to her.”
The old me would’ve been scared, but the old me was naive. The old me was frightened of the psycho tendencies of Dante and Vaughn. The old me was blind to the truth.
The new me? The new me got instantly pissed.
“When I asked her about Deetra and Chelsea, she made it out like she had no idea what happened to them,” Archer said, his blue eyes desperate for answers. “I don’t think she’s the one who killed them.”
Right now, I didn’t care about Deetra or Chelsea. The only thing I cared about was telling the bitch off, making her realize that I was here to stay and she couldn’t threaten or bully me to get what she wanted. Archer was mine now, and as far as I was concerned, that girl could go be gone again.
I pushed past him, ignored his pleas to wait. My feet took me down the hall, and I barged into Brittany’s room, immediately closing the door. I met her eyes with a frown, a scowl I hoped rivaled Jacob’s.
Brittany’s eyes were watery, and she glared at me. She’d looked better. Gone Girl-ing yourself wasn’t too fun, apparently. “Get out,” she whispered. “I don’t want to talk to you.” When I made no moves to leave, she started to reach for the button on the side of her bed to call for a nurse.
I darted toward the bed, grabbing her wrist and holding it tightly. She was too thin, too weak and slow to stop me. “I don’t think so,” I said, practically growling out the words. “You and I need to have a chat.”
She tried to pull her wrist from me, but she couldn’t. Her other arm was hooked up to IV drips, so she couldn’t move it much, either. “Let me go—”
“No. I’ll let you go when I’m finished.” I leaned toward her, my black hair falling off my shoulders and brushing against the wrist I held onto. “You tried to frame me for your murder, unless you forgot. I don’t know about you, but I’m not going to take that sitting down.”
Her eyes wouldn’t look at me. “Okay, message received.” Was she crying? I couldn’t tell.
“I’m not afraid of you,” I went on, squeezing her wrist hard enough to feel the bones inside. “And I’m not going to sit back and let you weasel your way back into Archer’s life. He’s happy with me. He wants me, and that’s something you will never have, so you can go back into your hole and stay there. The world was better off without you in it.”
Brittany shut her eyes, grimacing out, “I hate you. I hate you so much.”
“I know,” I said, letting her wrist go. I figured by now my point was made. This wasn’t going to get her back on top of Archer; this wasn’t going to get her anything except a missing finger. “And I don’t give a shit. Archer’s my boyfriend now, and no matter what you do, I’m not giving him up.” Spinning on my heel, I headed to the door. When my hand rested on the handle, seconds before I was about to yank it open, Brittany whispered something that made me stop dead in my tracks.
“When I get out of here, I’m going to kill you.”
I’d like to say her threat surprised me, but it didn’t. If she was willing to go so far as to fake her own death and kidnapping, it wasn’t too much of a stretch that she’d do the real deal when it came to me. She loathed me with her entire being, but you know what? The feeling was mutual. If that bitch came at me to try to kill me, I’d fight back.
Once again, the old me would’ve reacted differently, but the me of today simply shrugged and said “Okay” before walking out.
Bring it on, bitch.
Mom looked at me like I was crazy. Me, and not Archer, whose mother’s funeral was just yesterday and interrupted by his crazy psycho ex. You’d think she’d treat us both the same, but she let Archer eat his breakfast in silence while she took to being the typical mom she always was.
“I don’t think you should go to school today,” she said. “In fact, I think you should maybe take a week off.”
She didn’t say this because Brittany had told me she was going to kill me. No, I’d told Archer what she’d said, along with Jacob, and I’d texted it to Vaughn and Dante—that way there was a record of it in writing, just in case it happened and the bitch caught me by surprise.
Nope. My mom told me this because she was once again afraid that someone was out there, kidnapping students. Probably the same one she thought was running around killing everybody.
And, okay, obviously the killer was still out there. Was it Brittany? Archer certainly didn’t seem to think so, but her threat to me made me believe otherwise. You never knew what someone was capable of.
