Chapter 18 #3
“Safe to hide,” she murmurs, almost echoing my words. Nodding, she adds, “It could work. Assuming people will leave Kappa to come here within the next hour, I’m guessing we could stay there without problems.”
It’s almost surprising to me that we agree on something.
Not because she’s particularly stupid. I’ve simply lowered the bar for her since she decided to support Brian and his father against Cerys.
If she truly thought for herself, she would’ve stood with her friend.
Not with a rapist. But there isn’t much we can do about that now.
The past should stay in the past, at least for tonight when we have a bigger common enemy. If we weren’t in this scenario, I’d still be holding a grudge.
“Should we go to the attic, then?” Cerys asks.
We all look at her.
Going to the attic could be the difference between her survival and her demise. However, we have to be realistic. She’s hurt and might slow us down, both revealing where we’re headed and making us vulnerable.
“Do you feel up to it?” I say, tilting my head to her wound.
Slowly, Cerys nods. “I feel like the worst has passed.” Her lips curve into a tight smile, and I can tell she’s lying to make us feel better. “The pain comes and goes in waves.”
In waves, like every time she moves and causes the skin of her torso to stretch itself, which is exactly what will happen when she walks or climbs the ladder up to the attic.
“Cerys—”
“I’m fine,” she reassures me before I can get another word in. “I can walk.”
“We’ll help you,” Danny intervenes. “I can carry you.”
Even in her current condition, Cerys has the audacity to look offended.
“Nonsense,” she chastises him. “I said, I can walk.”
I lower myself to the ground in front of Cerys so I can meet her eyes.
“Are you sure?”
The blue in her eyes lacks the usual glint. If it weren’t for the tears gathered in them, they would look void and empty. It sends an alert to my core. She’s not doing well at all and is trying to put on a brave face to avoid holding us back.
“What else can we do? Stay here?” she whispers. “He will find us eventually. I don’t want to be the reason you guys end up in danger. I already feel like it’s my fault.”
Her lips tremble.
I wish I could comfort her and say this is not all on her.
While she’s not responsible for Cupid’s behavior, she does seem to be the reason behind all this.
Why else would he stab her but then let her to live to tell the tale?
He’s had her in his hold twice and hasn’t killed her yet.
So uncharacteristic of him, unless that’s part of his plan.
I think back to the letter blaming her for the deaths and the photos plastered on the walls.
It might not be her fault, but someone is targeting her.
“He did this, not you,” I remind her, taking her hands in mine. “Everything that’s happened tonight . . . He’s responsible.”
Cerys shakes her head. “His letter said that every death would be my fault. I did what he asked, I came back here, yet he’s still killing.
” Her voice cracks as she reaches the point of no return, caving under the pressure of her injury and all the trauma that has unfolded tonight. “Why is he doing this?”
Without knowing what else to say, I throw my arms around her, wrapping her in a gentle hug, careful not to hurt her.
She doesn’t seem to mind or care, because she presses herself tighter against my chest and then suddenly the dam breaks.
Heartbreaking sobs wrack her body, making her shoulders heave with every breath she takes.
I don’t know what to tell her.
I can’t share the theories I’ve come up with because it would only make her feel worse.
Begging for help, I look to Danny, silently asking him to waltz in with his charm to save the day.
Thankfully, he gets the message and approaches us with one of his radiant smiles, the one that can light up an entire room. The corners of his eyes crease with emotion. I watch in wonder at how he manages to be a beacon of light even in the darkest situations.
“Cerys, it’s not your fault,” he reassures her. “We all received letters that put blame on us. We all did what was asked of us, and it was pointless because he had all this planned. We would’ve been here regardless.”
“I mean, some people didn’t do what was asked,” I point out, looking at Bethan.
I remember her venting about it before we discovered there were other letters. She was told to quit her role as president of Kappa, which is something she failed to do.
Guilt flashes in her eyes. “I’m sorry.”
I wave a hand to her, minimizing the importance.
“Like Danny said, he would’ve done this regardless.”
With this level of preparation, Cupid must have been sure that we would be here. The threats were only meant to keep us on our toes, make sure the ones who were out of town came back, and to keep the ones who were already here in place. This spree was bound to happen.
Even if we had ignored the messages, he would’ve found a way to drag us here.
I wouldn’t put it past him to go as far as drugging and kidnapping us.
I find it almost too sickening to think my brain has adapted to this reality with such ease.
How I could go from being too scared to even think about the possibilities to being able to try to figure out all the possible scenarios.
I should be disgusted with myself.
This isn’t a movie plot I’m reviewing, but after everything, my brain is trying to find a coping strategy to come to terms with what’s happened. If it means seeing everything from a filmmaker’s point of view, then so be it.
To distract myself, I rub Cerys’ back in circles to calm her down. After a minute, her cries subside to shaky sniffles every few seconds.
“I don’t want anyone else to get hurt,” she says. “I know what you guys are saying is true, but I can’t shake off the feeling that this is all because of last year; because of me. Do you really think this is Brian’s killer messing with us, Mabel?”
When I first came up with that theory, I only had the letters, and it seemed like a logical assumption.
The messages were threatening to kill, so it made sense at the time to think of the person who had murdered before.
However, I’m not so sure anymore. Brian’s killer seemed to be on our side.
They called him out for being a rapist. It’s the reason why most of campus believed Cerys had killed him.
This feels different.
If it’s the same person, maybe he felt like Cerys owed him something. He killed her biggest threat, only for her to leave campus. Perhaps Cupid feels abandoned.
While I like this theory, there’s also the possibility that Brian’s killer and Cupid are two separate individuals with different agendas.
It explains why the other one seems like he wants to torture her. All the articles and photographs plastered over the house point back to her. Targeting her more than once in the house and letting her go—it’s a twisted game he’s playing with her.
The only thing both killers would have in common is that they’re both using Cerys for their motivation.
“Maybe, but we can’t waste time theorizing about it.” I redirect the attention back to what we can control. “We have to get to the attic, if you’re still feeling up to it,” I add, empathizing with her condition.
Cerys looks down at herself and then nods. “Yes, let’s do this.”
“Wait, the attic,” Danny mumbles as if he has remembered something important.
“What about it?” I ask.
“This is Florida,” he says as if we’re meant to catch what he means. “Attics aren’t like the ones up north, they need proper ventilation, or the high temperatures will fuck the roof up.”
Ventilation.
Understanding washes over me.
“There’s a way out,” I say. “Through the vents.”
Danny nods. “It might be too small for me, but I’m sure you girls could squeeze out, even if it’s only one of you.”
We just need one person to get out, then they could call for help. Granted, it leads to the roof, and whoever goes out there would still need to figure out how to get down to the ground; but maybe the phones would work from there since it wouldn’t be inside the house.
“You’re a genius.”
Danny’s cheeks pinken as he scratches the back of his neck. “Let’s not get our hopes up just yet. We don’t know in what condition Theta has kept the vents. It might be a dead end.”
I shake my head. “It won’t be.”
We need this little grain of hope to get us by, to help us endure whatever is ahead of us.
This has to work.