Dead of Summer

Chapter 49

Thankfully, I have the forethought to slow down from my dead run a good fifty feet from the tree Shawn might be at. I come to a stop, panting, my hands on my knees as I gasp for air. My lungs are still sore from the river, along with the rest of me, so I wince when I gulp air and wish Kayde would do that thing where he just appears at my side.

But maybe his superpowers are broken tonight.

“Melody.” I gasp her name as she slows beside me, her eyes sharp and missing nothing. It’s still not completely dark in the camp, but I know when I step into the trees, that will change quickly.

“Yeah?” Her voice is tinged with trepidation, like I’m about to tell her to go back to Otter Hall. Which, realistically, I should absolutely do. But I’d be lying if I didn’t admit having her helps my mental state, at least a little.

Melody is surprisingly cool in a crisis.

“If we find them there…” I trail off, thinking, and wonder if what I’m doing is right. Maybe I should tell her to go back or go somewhere else where she’ll be safe.

But I have a feeling if Shawn is here, I’m going to need Kayde as backup. Even though the knife sits heavily at my back, and I’ve definitely never felt this murder-y before. Is this how Kayde feels all the time? With the simmer of anger just under his skin and something like nausea in his stomach? Surely not. That would be rather uncomfortable.

“If we find them there, I need you to run. I need you to find Kayde.” Especially since I know how little phone service this end of the camp gets. “He’s checking the perimeter for Shawn. That’s the best I can do.”

“I can find him for you, Summer,” Melody promises, her voice flat and free from anxiety or nerves.

I dip my head in a nod and straighten, finally able to breathe, and wish my lungs would stop burning from the oxygen I sorely need. My steps are long, and my stride is quick as I make my way toward my third favorite tree, taking a path that will get me there the fastest. But unfortunately, that also means if Shawn is there, he’ll see me coming.

Not that I can avoid that tonight.

My steps crunch on the twigs and leaves littering the path, and it doesn’t take long before the upper branches of the huge, climbable tree loom into sight.

As does the flashlight shining up from below the limbs. Voices reach my ears, one of which sounds a lot like Kinsley, and when I turn to glance at Melody, she nods and takes off at a dead run back towards the camp.

Leaving me all alone.

But it’s better this way. I know that for certain, just as well as I know that I never could’ve endangered a twelve-year-old by letting her stay with me when I’ve found Shawn. My steps come to a halt and I fish my phone out of my pocket, crossing my fingers that I’ll have one measly bar of signal.

Naturally, I don’t. My heart twists, butterflies taking flight uncomfortably in my stomach, and I momentarily consider backtracking until I get a signal.

At least, until I hear Kinsley’s raised voice and Liza’s protests.

“Fuck it,” I mumble, slamming my phone back into my pocket. “Sorry, Kayde.” Apparently, I’m a liar. I’d promised him I’d call him before I did anything stupid. I hadn’t intended to do this alone when I know that Shawn is bold enough to try to kill me.

He’s already tried once, after all.

I straighten my back and walk toward the little clearing around my tree like I’m not afraid. Though it’s hard to ignore the terror that makes my fingers shake until I curl them into fists at my sides.

I don’t want to do this.

In fact, I’d rather turn tail now and wait for Kayde to come. I know he’ll handle it for me; hadn’t he been clear about that already? I know he’ll take care of everything, instead of leaving me to deal with Shawn alone.

I’m so afraid to do this.

No one has ever tried to kill me before, and in my opinion, I’m handling it pretty well. But I’ve always been a master of compartmentalization—I can thank my dad for that. Abuse makes for one hell of a motivator to get mental shit in order as much one can.

At the very least, I’m good at pretending like everything is fine, when it’s definitely not.

Shawn and I see each other at the same time. He turns away from Kinsley, who’s tied to a much smaller tree than mine, with Liza at her side. At the sound of my steps they look up, and the black eye Kinsley sports does nothing to quell my anger with the shittiest camp counselor in the world.

“Cute,” I tell him flatly. “Using one of my favorite places totally doesn’t feel intentional or anything. Really fucking adorable of you, Shawn.”

His smile is unfriendly, unkind, and maybe just a little bit unhinged. He shrugs his lean shoulders and flips the knife in his hands from one to the other. When he sees my eyes on it, that grin widens. “Do you know how hard it was to get this back after Nolan and Alec took it out of my room?” he asks, brandishing it at me. “Seriously. I thought I’d just have to give up and go buy another.”

“What, were you afraid you didn’t have enough left of Mommy’s allowance to go to the hunting store for another?” I sneer coldly. “Poor baby.”

His eyes flash a warning, but I’m too far in this to listen or abide it. “Last I checked,” Shawn murmurs, stepping away from the tree where Kinsley and Liza are tied. “I’m holding a knife, and I have them.” He jerks the blade at them, making my stomach clench.

He’s right, and I hate that he is.

“So watch how you fucking talk to me, Summer.” When he lifts the blade again, I raise my hands in surrender, the knife at my back cold against my skin. Grabbing it and diving for him would be stupid. If I’m going to use it, it’s going to be when I have the upper hand, or the element of surprise. For all of my desperation, I’m not sure I want to try to take Shawn in a fair fight.

My best plan is to stall him until Melody finds Kayde, and hope to God they find us.

“You’re right. Okay?” I flex my fingers, stopping at the edge of the little clearing. “You’re right. Though I don’t suppose I could convince you to let them go?” I tip my head toward my silent friends, and Kinsley’s jaw clenches.

“Summer, there’s something wrong with him,” Kinsley hisses, a tremor in her voice. “He’s—” She flinches when Shawn whirls on her, and I’m halfway across the clearing in an instant.

“Hey, whoa, whoa. Kinsley hasn’t done anything to you,” I remind him sharply, coming close enough that he could definitely stab me if he set his mind to it. My nerves tingle, and it’s hard to ignore the fear in my throat that bubbles up to choke me. “Neither has Liza. I thought it was me who’d gotten your panties in a twist, Shawn?” I back away a few steps, maneuvering him away from my friends. It works, and proves that Shawn really must hate me to be so easily distracted from Kinsley’s insults.

Liza, thankfully, stays quiet. Though she keeps her eyes on mine warily.

“So what is it with these dreams of yours, anyway?” I ask lightly. “Darcy tried to explain, but she was crying and I was mad. So…” My shoulder lift and fall in a shrug. “I’m all ears now, though.”

Shawn hesitates. He glances back at Kinsley, stroking his thumb along the knife, and my heart jumps to my throat.

“Clearly not that important if I’m not worth your time. Should I leave? Should we leave so you can have some alone time here in the woods? I hear there’s an elk around?—”

“Shut the fuck up.” His voice is cold and bored. Not quite the manic desperation I’d hoped for. “Jesus fucking Christ, Summer, do you never shut the hell up?”

“Nah,” I tell him with a wry grin. “It’s one of my superpowers, actually. I can talk forever. I’ll probably still be talking when I’m dead.” Instantly I know that’s the wrong thing to say. Especially when Shawn grins and turns on me again.

“Maybe we’ll find out if that’s true tonight,” he threatens under his breath. “Wouldn’t that be fun?”

“Summer, get out of here!” Kinsley’s voice is shaky, and it’s clear that she’s riding the wave of terror and adrenaline, just like me. Her feet scrape in the dirt, and she struggles with the ropes on her arms keeping her and Liza against the tree. “He’s fucking crazy and this whole time he hasn’t stopped talking about you. Just—” she breaks off when Shawn lunges for her, but I’m not far behind.

“No!” I grab his arm, the one not holding the knife, and only belatedly wish I’d grabbed the one in my shorts to stab him with. “Shawn, no!”

He switches direction mid-motion, whirling on me with a white-toothed grin. “Okay,” he agrees, grabbing onto the front of my t-shirt and yanking me off balance. “Okay, Summer. You want to be the center of my attention? Fine.” He leans in close while dragging me closer to him, though I fight to keep my footing in the dirt. “I’d much rather hurt you, anyway.”

It occurs to me, way too late, that maybe him turning on her was a ploy to put me off guard. And that maybe I’m an idiot for forgetting that Shawn is surprisingly smart behind his crazy mask of insanity.

Those thoughts are knocked out of my head, however, when Shawn’s knee slams into my stomach. I gasp around the pain, my body folding inward, and he lets go of me so I can fall to my knees in the dirt in front of him, lungs burning again in exasperation at this new method of attack.

His knife suddenly finds my throat, and I try hard not to give him any response as he forces me to tip my head back and look up at him. “Here.” Bending down, he grabs a coil of rope from the pile of hunting supplies near the tree. “Put your hands behind your back, Summer. And if you try to run I swear to God I’ll gut Kinsley while Liza watches.”

That’s not an option. Putting my best friend in danger has never been an option, but this feels like an awful turn of events. When he walks back to me, however, I can’t do anything else except what he tells me to, and I can only pray he doesn’t find the knife at my back.

Somehow, that’s my one bit of good luck. He doesn’t find it, and his tying of my arms is sloppy and overdone. It still sucks, and my arms are still held fast, but he doesn’t notice the bit of space between my wrists, just as he doesn’t notice the outline of the blade I’m hiding.

Now if I can only use that to?—

I don’t see his punch coming. Not until his blow knocks my face to the side as both Kinsley and Liza make sounds of shock and protest. My face burns, tears threatening to fall, but I force them to go away by squeezing my eyes shut, then look up at Shawn around the burning pain in my jaw.

“Feel better?” I ask, bracing my legs on the ground under me. “Did you get that out of your system—” This time I have enough warning to brace for the hit, but God, it still hurts. Pain washes through me; it’s the same kind of pain I remember from the bad times, when I’d been a kid and my Dad was too keen to hurt me when the alcohol hit.

It doesn’t feel any better now to be punched in the face than it did back then. I groan and crumple to the ground, my hands jerking against the ropes holding them captive.

But I can’t try to slip free. There’s no way he won’t notice, when he’s this close. “So…the dreams?” I push, wondering if I can get him talking. Bored Shawn seems like a recipe for disaster, and he’s mad enough at me, or so it seems, that I’m hoping I can distract him enough to wait this out.

Even if that means getting punched a few more times.

“Darcy should keep her fucking mouth shut,” Shawn spits, quite literally, and I flinch when it lands on my cheek. It’s decidedly less hot than when Kayde does it, and I rub my face in the dirt to get it off. After all, dirt and blood is better than anything of Shawn’s. ”But okay, you want to know?” ?He bends down and drags me back up into a sitting position, eyes brighter than I’ve ever seen and filled with sparks of what might be anger.

Because it can’t be anything else, but he seems positively unhinged right now.

“I dream of how fucking stupid you are,” he purrs, leaning close. “I’ve dreamed of killing you since that first summer, when you had a crush on me. Fuck.” He looks away and scoffs a laugh. “You know that year, I thought maybe I had a crush on you as well. I thought that had to be it, because what else could it mean when I couldn’t get you out of my head?”

Kayde would say that’s some form of obsession. I’d say Shawn was dropped on his head at birth. His hand tightens in my shirt and he sneers in my face before continuing. “Then I started dreaming of you dying. Of me killing you. Isn’t that just so messed up?” His laugh is cruel, and I stare at him, unimpressed. “Bet you never thought you’d meet someone who wants to murder you for the fun of it, huh Summer?”

Well, actually…I glance away from him, still unimpressed and wondering how I can fake it. This would’ve been a lot more impactful a few weeks ago. Shawn is just late to the game. But I can’t hide that I’m afraid of him. I can’t hide that I really don’t want to die tonight. Especially by Shawn’s hand.

“I, uh, certainly didn’t,” I answer, eyes squeezed shut as I try to chase away the rest of the pain in my face, or at least bury it somewhere in my mind. “Any particular reason? Any, I don’t know, trigger? I’ll be honest, Shawn…” Eyes widening, I lean forward until we’re only a few inches away. “I really thought all this was over Darcy not getting Kayde.”

“Maybe it’s over Kayde getting you,” Shawn purrs, mirroring me by leaning in. Kinsley whimpers somewhere behind him, but neither of us look at her.

Which is great, because I don’t want him to. I’ll do anything to keep him over here with me, instead of there with her and Liza.

“Is it? You just said you don’t like me like that,” I remind him, head tipping to the side. “So what does Kayde have to do with it? Hell, what do the kids you almost killed have to do with it?”

“I wanted to see how it would feel. Nolan and Alec really were an accident…mostly,” he admits. “But Emily? Well, she looks a little like you, don’t you think? Same eyes.” He reaches out to tug on a lock of my hair that’s fallen from its ponytail. “Same hair. I looked at her broken little body on those rocks and thought to myself that it might be you. And do you know what that was like?”

“I can guess, seeing where we are now.”

“It was perfect. But it wasn’t enough. It’s not enough to just push you off a cliff. And I’m kind of glad that weirdo in the woods stopped me from killing you. But I was so close, wasn’t I?” His fingers curl in my shirt, tugging pointedly, and I try to hide the horror I feel from my face. “Does your chest hurt? You breathed in so much water I swore you were a goner. Any bruises? I tried to make that fall hurt.”

There’s really, really something wrong with Shawn. He’s not like Kayde, or Grey, or maybe Melody…No, he’s something else entirely.

Something that really doesn’t deserve to be breathing.

“Could’ve been worse.” I shrug, trying to keep my cool. “I’m honestly still a little unclear on how this whole thing started. Could you try explaining it again? In simple words, please. I am post-almost-drowning.”

His smile turns sweet, and instantly I realize I’m about to regret this entire day. Sure enough, Shawn hits me in the face again, his fist cracking against my nose before he lets me fall to the dirt amidst Liza’s and Kinsley’s shrieks of protest. They don’t stop, though, and when Shawn turns on them, I blink through tears and hook my ankle around his, throwing him off balance.

“I wasn’t done,” I protest weakly, tears streaming down my face along with blood from my cracked nose. “So don’t ignore me, Shawnathon.”

“That’s not my name.” But he turns on me anyway, brows raised. “Where the fuck did you get Shawnathon from?”

“I don’t know. It sounded stupid. Isn’t that reason enough?” I taunt, struggling to sit up again. “Weren’t we having a conversation?” Without Kinsley and Liza here, I wouldn’t be so bold. I also wouldn’t have gotten close enough to him for this to happen.

But I’ll do whatever I have to to keep him away from them. I can’t not, when their lives are in danger. And all I have to do is hold out until Kayde shows up.

If he shows up, a very unhelpful voice whispers in my brain. And if it isn’t too late.

Shawn does turn at my words, though it’s just so he can kick me hard back to the ground, and takes advantage of my position when I curl onto my side to slam his shoe straight into my solar plexus.

I wretch, my hands clenching around the rope, and wonder how long I can realistically last before he finally does just kill me.

Another kick has me gasping for air, but when Shawn drags me back to a sitting position, I only give him an incredulous, half-manic laugh and a crooked grin. “You kick like a little girl. And not the kind of girl that comes here to camp. The kind of little girl too delicate to camp,” I clarify.

For a moment, Shawn just looks at me. Then he hits me again, and sends me right back to the ground, only to drag me back up as I groan around my throbbing, bloodied mouth. “What is the matter with you?” he laughs, incredulous. “Summer, in case you haven’t gotten the memo, I’m going to kill you. Right here. Right in front of them.” He gestures toward Kinsley and Liza, but I refuse to look at them. “You should be terrified of me.”

“Yeah? I should?” I blink, still grinning stupidly. “Okay, I’m feeling a little faint, so lean in here. I’ll tell you a secret.” It’s such a stupid thing to say, but he leans in anyway until our faces are nearly pressed together. “The truth is, Shawn…” I look down, then flick my gaze up to his. “Compared to my dad? You’re a preschooler in a sandbox throwing a tantrum.”

And with that, I slam my forehead against his with an audible crack that has me reeling and immediately wondering if I’m going to vomit.

But it has Shawn doing the same, and he falls back onto the ground as I do, my hands scrabbling for the knife at my back as I twist and try to free myself. I squirm and writhe, moving my arms past the point of pain until they’re screaming, but the ropes are tighter than I’d expected, and all too soon I’m being yanked up to a sitting position so roughly that my t-shirt tears.

“I’m not playing around, Summer!” Shawn sneers in my face. “And I’m not your fucking dad. I’m not going to walk away once I’ve had enough. I’ll make you afraid of me?—”

I spit in his face, and with some satisfaction, watch the mix of blood and saliva dripping down his cheek. Shawn’s face curls in disgust, and he snarls as I continue to scrabble at the ropes holding me.

All I have to do is get free. He doesn’t know I have the blade, and in my desperation, I’m willing to do something stupid.

But the shine of a blade isn’t in my hand when it appears. It’s in his. Shawn lunges, deaf to Kinsley’s scream, and pain blooms in my shoulder as he lets the blade sink in a few inches just under my collarbone before yanking it free.

Instantly, my mind goes white with pain. It’s a struggle to pull myself out of it, and my mouth falls open in shock.

He stabbed me.

He really, actually, stabbed me.

It burns more than a punch or slap ever could, and for a moment, all I can do is try to wrap my mind around the dizzying, searing pain.

Not that Shawn seems keen on giving me the chance. He slashes the blade along my thigh, missing my femoral artery but still scoring deep enough that I worry I’m going to pass out. My escape attempts have come to an end, and when he shoves me down on my back, straddling my hips a second later with the knife still in his hand, all I can do is look up at him in a pained, desperate daze.

“Beg me,” he snarls, leaning in close. “Beg me not to kill you, Summer. Beg me to kill one of them instead.” His eyes are bright with desperation and excitement, and his hand trembles on the hilt of the knife.

So I smile sweetly, trying not to cry, and let out a soft, exasperated sigh like I’m only mildly inconvenienced. “Oh, Shawnathon,” I murmur, shaking my head at him in disappointment. “If only you weren’t so bad at this.”

His face contorts, and when I see the muscles in his hand flex, I at least pat myself on the back with the strangely disconnected part of my brain.

As far as last words go, they really aren’t that bad.

I wonder if Kinsley will have them etched on my gravestone.