16. The Unknown #2
“What is wrong with you-” Kristin’s eyes bugged as she looked down and saw a large knife deeply embedded in her stomach. She gasped as the stranger yanked the knife out. Clutching her stomach, Kristin stumbled backward against the car, smearing her blood on the windows.
The figure slowly approached her… like a predator stalking its prey. Blood spilling between her fingers that covered her wound, Kristin ran back towards the door.
But it was locked.
“Help! Somebody, please help me!” she screamed desperately. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw the masked stranger getting closer. Kristin frantically looked around until she spotted another door and sprinted towards it. With a prayer on her lips, she swung the door open and stumbled inside.
Deja spun around in the crowd and couldn’t recognize a single face. She couldn’t even find her friends. The music and lights disoriented her as she heaved with anxiety, on the verge of a panic attack.
Her phone rang and she answered immediately. “I’ll fucking kill you, I swear-”
“Baby, it’s me!” came Jax’s voice.
Deja felt her chest cave in. “Jax! I-I’m s-sorry! I meant to call you sooner, but he- And then, Kristin- And I can’t find any of them! And he’s gonna hurt them, Jax, I just know it!”
“Baby, try to breathe. I’ll be there in under 15 minutes. Just stay where you are.”
Deja tried not to hyperventilate when her phone buzzed again.
Unknown Number
Backroom.
Kristin stumbled down the dark, empty hallway as loud music boomed on the other side of the wall. It looked like she was in the back storage rooms.
Tears spilled down her cheeks as she tried to ignore the pain. Trying to find a way back to the crowd. Looking over her shoulder, the stranger was merely a few feet behind her.
Taking his time. Watching her. As if he were stalking a wounded animal, waiting for it to die…
“Why are you doing this?!” she screamed. But he didn’t respond. Only the sound of her phone ringing in his hand, while his other hand held the bloodstained knife he had stabbed her with.
“I am buzzzzzzed,” Ari slurred, stumbling into the restroom.
“That’s what you get for downing all those tequila shots. Should be more responsible. Like me,” Shawna said, reapplying lipstick.
“Is that why you’re putting mascara on your lips?” Diamond grinned.
Shawna looked at the mascara, then at the black paint on her lips. “Shit…” she muttered as Ari cackled.
“I thought Kristin would be in here,” Diamond said, searching the stalls.
“Maybe she went back out alreadyyyy and we misssssed her,” Ari slurred, fixing her contacts.
“Try calling her,” Shawna said, wiping the mascara off her lips. “I knew Joseph coming was a bad idea.”
“Forreal…” Diamond muttered as she called Kristin.
Kristin noticed the music getting louder the further she walked. But she still couldn’t find an escape. Trying to evade her assailant, she snuck into a dark room and closed the door before hiding behind a shelf.
With her hand covering her mouth, she tried to control her breathing as the door opened and the stranger stepped inside. As he turned his back to her, Kristin used her remaining strength to shove the shelf on top of him before darting out of the room.
She ran toward the music, the flashing lights disorienting her as the speakers ruptured her ears. “Help me! Please! Somebody!” she screamed. Hearing a door slam, she looked over her shoulder and saw her assailant leaving the room.
Kristin was paralyzed with fear.
When finally… she heard them…
“Why did you guys let me drink this much?”
“Girl, we snatched them drinks outcha hand!”
“D-Diamond? Ari?” Kristin stammered. “Girls!”
“Kristin’s not answering.”
“She probably can’t hear it over the music. Or… maybe she has it on silent cause of Joseph’s annoyin’ ass. I swear he’s why she almost didn’t come out.”
“We should take her to the salon. That always cheers her up.”
“Girls!” Kristin screamed, trying to find them. Pushing open another door, she spotted them standing on what looked like the other side of a large, darkly-tinted, floor-to-ceiling window.
Hobbling towards it as fast as she could, she banged on the window. “Girls! Please help me!”
She looked over her shoulder and saw the masked stranger standing at the door.
“No!” she screamed, banging on the window. “Girls, please!”
“This is why I never condoned them dating in the first place,” Shawna said, reapplying her lipstick. “I knew some shit like this was gonna go down.”
“Kristin deserves better,” Ari said, fixing her hair in the mirror. She saw the mirror shake slightly and furrowed her brow. “...did you guys hear that?”
“Hear what?” Shawna asked.
Ari leaned towards the mirror. “...it’s like… I don’t know… some sort of banging?”
“It’s a mirror,” Shawna said flatly.
“Ari, how drunk are you?” Diamond grinned.
Ari sighed. “Too drunk.”
“Please!” Kristin cried, desperately slapping the window when suddenly a blade went through her hand. She screamed in agony as the blade ripped out of her palm.
Grabbing her bleeding hand, Kristin tried to bumrush the stranger when he grabbed her by the hair and shoved her to the ground. Gasping for air, Kristin crawled backward, painting the floor with her blood. “Please,” she begged, trying to put distance between them. “Please, just leave me alone!”
He crouched down, his unsettling mask staring at her.
Kristin heaved as the blade went through her stomach before violently ripping out, her blood gushing. Her phone started ringing again from his pocket, and Kristin reached for it when he aggressively stabbed her again.
The phone fell on the screen, and Deja’s voice penetrated the air. “Kristin, is that you? Where are you? I’ve been-”
“Deja!” Kristin screamed hysterically. “Deja, please! He’s killing me! He’s-”
“Kristin?!”
Deja’s eyes widened as all the air left her lungs. She felt frozen. The hum of the dead dial tone drowning out the chaotic beating of her heart. “No…” she exhaled. “No, no, no, please!”
She shoved open several doors in the backrooms, trying to find her friend. She frantically dialed Kristin again… straight to voicemail.
Tears stung Deja’s eyes as it grew harder for her to breathe. Her world felt like it was spinning. Like everything had spun out of control, and she had no way of reigning it in.
The sound of someone screaming from outside caught her attention. Deja ran back towards the crowd, pushing through people to get outside before she screamed.
On the pavement in the parking lot… lay Kristin’s mangled body.
Deja stared blankly at the EMT as they covered Kristin’s corpse with a tarp. She could hear her friends sobbing beside her.
She wanted to cry, too. But she was numb. Still trying to process what had happened. What she did wrong. All the ways she could have saved her friend.
“I should’ve never let her go to the bathroom by herself…” Deja muttered. “I should’ve gone with her…”
“Where is she?”
Deja looked up at the sound of Jax’s deep voice penetrating the chaotic confusion. “I’m sorry, sir. I can’t let you through,” the officer said.
“I need to check on my wife,” Jax demanded.
“You’ll have to wait-”
“I will snap your fucking neck-” Jax threatened when Caleb grabbed Jax’s hand.
“She’s right there,” Caleb pointed. “We just want to make sure she’s alright.”
The officer looked at Jax, unsettled by his murderous gaze, before reluctantly stepping to the side.
Deja ran into Jax’s arms as he pulled her into his embrace.
It was only then that she released a gut-wrenching cry.
Jax gave her a few moments to sob before he pulled back and took her face between his hands. “Deja. Baby, are you okay?” Jax asked.
“Th-they’re calling it a suicide, Jax! B-but it’s not! I know it’s not! I heard her- It was him! It was fucking him-!”
Grabbing her arm, Caleb abruptly pulled her away from the scene. “Baby, I need you to breathe…” he whispered, with his hand on her chest. She tried to calm down as she stared into his eyes. “Breathe for me…” Caleb repeated. “Inhale… exhale… good girl…”
Wrapping his arms around her from behind, Jax affectionately kissed the top of Deja’s head. “Sorry,” she said, distressed.
“It’s fine, baby, don’t apologize.” Holding her hand, Caleb looked into her eyes. “Did you see him? My brother?”
Deja’s nostrils quivered as she hesitantly nodded. “He texted me from an unknown number. And when I called him, he taunted me. Like it was some sick fucking game.”
Caleb exchanged glances with Jax before Jax turned Deja around to face him. “We’re going to find him. Until then, you’re going back to the hotel to be with Chloe,” Jax said.
“What? No, Jax, I can’t-” Deja started.
“Deja!” Jax snapped.
“The girls are devastated, Jax! I can’t! I can’t just leave them at a time like this!” she persisted.
Exhaling his frustration, Jax exchanged annoyed glances with Caleb.
“Yeah, Mom, I’m fine… I’m just gonna stay with the girls at Ari’s tonight…
I know… Okay… Love you too…” Hanging up the phone, Deja plopped onto Ari’s couch next to Shawna.
“My parents are going with Kristin’s parents to the police station to help them with…
” Deja trailed off until Shawna laced her fingers with Deja’s.
Deja felt her heart break staring into the bloodshot eyes of her friend’s swollen face, flushed with tears. Pulling Shawna’s head against her shoulder, Deja affectionately kissed Shawn’s forehead.
Sitting in the recliner with her legs folded beneath her, Diamond scrolled through pictures on her phone, her tears splattering the screen. “Oh god. Look how stupid we were in Las Vegas,” Diamond snorted through her tears.
Ari set a tray of tea mugs down to look at Diamond’s phone. “Wasn’t that like… a month after we graduated?”
“Yes. We went broke so fast,” Shawna chuckled, wiping her face.
“'Cause you spent all your money on the slot machines,” Diamond said. “Even after Kristin told you they were set up to play you.”