Page 48 of Don't Watch Alone
I heard another voice behind me.
“She slaughtered them. Or it could be self-defense… or maybe we’ve got a psycho on our hands. Who knows?!”
They think I can’t hear them. My fingernails bite into my palms. Maybe they can see the blood under them. Maybe they can smell the rage, the sickness, the thing that crawled out of me in there.
An EMT presses a bandage to my shoulder where the crowbar caught me. I barely feel it. My eyes are fixed on the mall’s huge entrance, a dark, endless void, like a mouth thatswallowed me and regurgitated someone unrecognizable.
I know I’ll never walk away from tonight. It’ll reproduce in me, emerge when I shut my eyes. I will see their grins, terror, and desperate pleas. I’ll feel my arms swinging, again and again, because I couldn’t stop. Because some fucked-up part of me didn’t want to.
I’m not a hero. I’m just the one who survived.
My throat burns as I finally force the words out to one of the cops. “My friends… they’re all dead. All of them. Those two psychos you dragged out on stretchers, they murdered them. They tried to kill me too.” My chest heaves, and I can barely catch my breath.
The cop’s face hardens. “How many bodies are in there?”
“I… I don’t know.” My voice cracks. “Gus, the security guard, is in the security office. My boss… I don’t even know if he was here tonight. My friends—Jade, Derrick, Drew, Eva—they’re all dead. Those sick fucks butchered them. And Tony…” The name comes out of me. “The love of my life…he’s gone!”
The grief overwhelms me, and I break down crying. My body shakes so violently the cop signals for the EMTs. They get me onto a stretcher, wrapping me in a blanket that reeks. My ears ring from the sirens and shouting, and I start to feel a moment of dizziness.
Then I see someone walking out of the mall. My entire body freezes, and my heart stops. Who the hell is that?
“Freeze! Put your hands up!” an officer yells with his gun drawn.
The figure lifts his hands. Under the harsh lights, I recognize him. “That’s Greg!” I scream. “He’s my boss… the owner of the mall and Electric Avenue!”
His knees give way, and Greg falls forward, landing on the pavement. One of the EMTs rushes to him and helps him to the back of my ambulance.
“Where the hell were you?“ I utter, my voice trembling with rage.
He rubs his face. “I was… in my office, drinking my coffee. Then I heard them… those guys. They were laughing, talking about murdering someone in the elevator. I…” He swallows hard. “I hid under my desk. I saw one of them holding… a hand. A real one. Not a fake one either. I bolted from under my desk and hid in the bathroom until it was over.”
I stare at him, disbelief boiling into rage. “You could’ve helped me, you coward! I could’ve been slaughtered with the rest of them!” Tears sting my eyes again.
“I’m sorry,” he mutters, looking anywhere but at me.
“Sorry? That’s all you’ve got?” My voice quivers with rage. “You know what, Greg? Shove your fucking job up your ass!”
If I wasn’t strapped to this damn stretcher, I’d walk away from him. Instead, I turn my head, refusing to even look at him. A cop leads him off, leaving me with nothing but the cold night and the weight of everything I’ve lost.
But my thoughts won’t stop going in circles. None of this makes sense. Why would Christian and Robert kill Mary? And what were the chances that Gus; the friendly security guardwho just happened to move across the hall from me, would be tied up in this nightmare?
Nothing adds up. And as the ambulance doors close, I can’t get rid of the persistent, sickening feeling that I’m missing something, and that this night isn’t done tormenting me.
Chapter twenty-six
Blaiz
Theywheelmeintoa cold, empty hospital room—white walls closing in like a padded cell, fluorescent lights so bright, so sterile, making everything feel unreal. The hospital odor is burning my nose; the smell is curling in the back of my throat like a deadly substance, and I swear if I breathe in too deep I’ll vomit. A cop stands outside the door like I’m some kind of monster, like I’m the fucking one they need to worry about. Like I haven’t already been through hell just to stay alive tonight.
I didn’t go looking to murder anyone tonight; I just wanted to see a horror movie with my friends. I didn’t want any of this to happen. Christian and Robert are dead because if I hadn’t stopped them, I wouldn’t even be sitting here right now. There’d be another sheet-covered body pulled out of that mall, and it wouldhave been mine. So why does it feel like I’m the one under suspicion? Why does it feel like I’m the one wearing invisible handcuffs?
None of it makes sense, and maybe that’s the most terrifying part of it all. The mall is still covered in murder—my friends’ blood soaked into the tile and carpet, splattered across shop windows, puddled in places I can’t stop seeing every time I blink my eyes. All of them... gone. Just gone. And when I think about Tony, it hurts me like a stabbing pain, because how can I breathe in a world without him? Seven years together, ever since we were dumb, awkward kids in middle school, and now... he is just a memory eating away at me.
I try to hold on to something good, something real. My mind drifts back to senior prom, the afterparty, the glow of string lights and laughter like distant echoes. But then the memory turns to something else, something bad. I see Robert’s face from that night—his breath reeking of alcohol, his eyes glassy but locked on me like he knew something that I didn’t. He leaned in close andslurred something about how I should leave Tony, that he wasn’t good enough for me. It felt weird back then, just another drunk idiot talking shit. But I was so wasted, I blacked out before the night was even over, and now I know I didn’t just drink too much.
Someone fucking drugged me. And it had to be Robert.
I must have been drugged at Christian’s party last week as well. And Robert was there. They were both there. The realization hits me—my body tenses up, my blood pressure spikes, and suddenly I’m not safe even inside this room. Why now? Why not back then, when they already had a chance?
