Chapter 44
FORTY-FOUR
JESSICA
Rain doesn’t look worried at all as she struts up to us and drapes herself over the trunk, looking more like a stunning front-page model than a kidnapper. “Here’s the thing,” she begins, “Kane is never going to do anything about this bitch because she’s a woman.”
I cross my arms and raise a skeptical ‘go on’ brow.
It’s easy to see where she’s headed with this, but it’s still fucking crazy.
A mild breeze causes a lock of her purple hair to slide loose from behind her ear and get caught in her lip gloss.
She tucks it back and says, “Your man is a good man and would never hurt a woman, even if she’s the spawn of the devil.
But us?” She points at us each in turn. “We would. We won’t let her get away with what she did to Kane and his brother. ”
“Rain, this is crazy. You’re talking about crossing a line we can’t come back from.”
She gives me a deadpan look. “She fucked your man. No, let me rephrase that since it isn’t hitting home. She didn’t just fuck your man. She forced herself on your man. Repeatedly.”
I wince, heart pinching. It’ll never get easier to face the truth.
I look at Ava, hoping she’ll have a level head, but she holds her hands up and says, “Don’t look at me. I repeatedly told her what a bad idea it was.”
“Oh, come on,” Rain says, exasperated, “you jumped at the opportunity to help.”
“Correction, I objected on moral, legal, and common-sense grounds before I folded. You’re too pretty to say no to.”
Rain opens her mouth and immediately shuts it, then says, “What? Do you hear yourself? You jumped at the opportunity to drug her.”
“I think you’re exaggerating now.”
I slowly drag my hands down my face. “How did any of you even think it would be a good idea to kidnap the senator’s wife? We’ll go to prison.”
Rain waves me off. “No one will find out.”
I gesture wildly. “It’s the senator’s wife, for fuck’s sake! Of course, we’ll get caught.”
“We covered our tracks,” Ava reassures me when I start to pace.
Yeah, I’m sure they did, because they’re that fucking subtle, right?
Rain waits for me to kick the shit out of the rusty Volvo and then calm down. But when I’m finished, I don’t feel any better. Now I’m just sweaty and stressed instead.
Rain tries to reason with me. “Don’t you want justice? Revenge? Don’t you want her to suffer for what she put you and Kane through?”
“Of course I do.”
“Excellent. Now’s your chance. Let’s knife the bitch.”
My eyes bug out. “Knife the bitch? You’re insane. We can’t kill her.”
She moves past me to open the trunk, and it pops open to reveal the senator’s wife whimpering beneath the gag. “That’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
“Oh god,” I groan, fisting my hair as Rain hauls her out with superhuman strength. What the hell are we doing? The senator’s wife is crying, pleading, trying to get away, but her ankles are tied, and she crashes to the ground.
While she wriggles like a squirming worm, I massage my temples. It’s too late to set her free now. There’s only one way out of this unless we want to spend the rest of our lives in jail.
I’m not going to jail over a woman who thought she could come between me and Kane. Maybe Rain is right.
Knowing Kane, he’ll handle this through his dad and leave it at that.
This woman will walk free and probably do the same to someone else that she did to Kane and Cash. No, fuck that. She’s not hurting anyone else again.
I kick her, and she cries harder. Pathetic. This is the bitch who made Kane’s life hell.
“That’s the spirit,” Rain says after she retrieves a gun from the glovebox. “Put some more anger into the next kick.”
I take the weapon off her and say to Ava, “Are you sure you still want to be friends with us? It’s not too late to back out.”
Rain snorts. “She’s the mastermind behind this.”
Ava flicks her off her shoulder with a proud glint in her eye. “I can be resourceful.” Then she sneers at the sobbing woman on the grass. “I want to see her suffer after what she did to Kane.”
I cock the gun with a shrug. “Okay then, let’s do this.”
I’ve never killed anyone, but there’s a first for everything, right? I can do this.
Nudging my chin toward the house, I continue. “Let’s take her to the back of the property.”
Rain retrieves a pocket knife from the car, cuts through the duct tape around her ankles, and pulls her to her feet. Beverly shakes her head, eyes wide and pleading. I tell her to move, pressing the gun into her shoulder. She stumbles forward, nearly tripping over the tangled vines on the ground.
I think about all the times I didn’t hear from Kane for days because he was with her. I think of her hands on him. Her lips.
As we round the corner, I’m vibrating with anger.
“Look what I found.” Ava hurries to catch up, holding a white mask.
“Now that’s just fucking creepy,” Rain mutters when Ava puts it on and steps in front of Beverly. The woman sobs even harder, and that’s starting to get on my nerves.
Ava walks beside Rain, nudging her arm. “Maybe there’s truth to the legend, after all.”
“Just put the mask back.”
I hold out my hand. “No, give it here. The mask is creepy.”
Ava takes it off and hands it to me, and I put it on, ignoring the musty smell of damp wood and moss. God only knows how long it’s been out here, and who wore it last.
“This will do. Turn around.”
Beverly is trembling as she finally faces me, crying so hard that snot is dripping from her nose.
I need her to fucking talk, so I march up, rip the gag from her mouth, and step back to aim the gun at her head. “Any last words, lady?”
More tears. More trembling. I’m already bored.
“I-I’m sorry,” she stammers, sniffling, “I didn’t w-want to do it. My h-husband f-forced me.”
I tilt my head, sneering at her through the mask, though I actually enjoy seeing her cry out of fear. “You want me to believe that? You were more than happy to taunt me back at their house that day. Remember? When we had dinner?”
She shakes her head and lifts her hands in front of her like a shield, duct tape around her wrists. “P-please, I’m s-sorry.”
Ava inspects her nails. “I’m sure you were sorry when you rode his dick.” She levels a hard look at the crying bitch. “I saw him break down. I watched you break him piece by piece. Your sorry means jack shit.”
Rain snickers, exchanging a glance with me. They’ll be friends in no time.
I shoot the ground near Beverly’s feet, and she screams. I wait until she looks at me again before I say, “You’re just jealous because he didn’t want you.”
Her eyes flash with hatred.
I shrug. “Touché. Money can’t buy everything.”
It must suck to have all the money in the world and not be able to buy the one thing you crave... Kane’s attention.
Or maybe she got off on the power she had over him. Maybe she didn’t want him to want her. Maybe she enjoyed taking it.
Fucking bitch.
I lift my gun again, about to shoot, when my gaze trails behind her.
Would you look at that?
A well sits half-hidden in the trees, swallowed by bracken and moss as though the forest has been trying to bury it for years.
It’s perfect.
“Go!” I gesture with the gun.
She blinks in confusion, not understanding what I’m talking about, then glances behind her and shakes her head.
God, I’m so done with her and her pathetic crying. She won’t get any sympathy, not from us.
Fed up, I walk over to her and grab her arm. She can beg all she wants; she brought this on herself, and I’ll deal with the consequences later. I won’t let her hurt Kane again.
She pleads. “No, no, no, please, I’ll do anything.”
I drag her to the well.
When she refuses to walk, Rain shoves her from behind, and Beverly stumbles forward.
The well’s stones are slick with age and darkened by rain and lichen, and stacked in a crooked circle that leans slightly toward the creepy cabin nearby.
As we reach the well, I spin Beverly around, force the gag back into her mouth, and grab her jaw to make her look at me. The creepy mask came in handy. I like to think this mask will be the last thing she sees.
Beverly is staring at me through the holes, her eyes so big that I can see the stark white of the mask reflected in her irises.
“You can scream all you want. No one will hear you.”
The trees press closer, their thin branches spreading across the sky, casting long, twitching shadows over the well’s mouth.
The wooden beam above it has warped and split, and the old rope hangs stiff and black with rot.
I peer over the edge, seeing the frayed length disappear into the dark depths, and every so often, a drop of water echoes from somewhere below.
Yes, this is perfect.
“Let’s drop her in.”
The others move in to help. Beverly tries to get away, darting left, but Rain is faster.
She stops in front of her with a cruel smile and asks where she thinks she’s going, then says, “We’re having so much fun.”
Beverly shrinks back with a cry, shaking her head and searching for a way out. There is none. She could run into the forest, but she’d die out there.
I fist her hair, and Ava and Rain help lift her up. Beverly puts up a real fight, screaming, struggling, kicking.
Adrenaline surges through my veins as we finally get her over the edge, and I grunt from the effort when she makes a final attempt to grab hold of the slick stone, clawing and snapping off her nails in a desperate bid to stay alive.
My old self would have been appalled by this, but there’s a breaking point, and we’re well past it now. I don’t feel an ounce of guilt when she finally falls into the well.
For a second, her shrill scream echoes off the stone wall before a sickening sound cuts it off. Then there’s a hollow splash.
We lean over the edge, peering over the edge with our hands braced on the slimy rock.
“Do you think she’s dead?” Ava asks.
Strands of Rain’s hair get caught in a breeze that drifts through the trees, bringing with it the scent of pine. “She’s badly injured if she is not.”
I clench my teeth. “I hope she’s fucking dead. Let her rot down there.”
From below, I hear the faint tap of water hitting stone. We listen carefully for any other sounds, like signs of breathing or whimpering, but there’s nothing.
Pushing off from the well, we head back to the car. I take off the mask and hang it on a rusty plant hook on the side of the cabin.
“Hear that?” Rain asks, cupping her ear as we step out in front of the cabin. “It’s the sound of one less bitch in the world.”
Ava drapes her arm around my shoulder. “Feels good, doesn’t it?” I laugh, and they laugh too.
And just like that, the world feels a little lighter. Because they’re right… I can sleep better now, knowing the woman who hurt the man I love won’t be around to hurt him anymore. She got what she deserved.
We head back to the car. The sun is dipping lower in the sky.
If we don’t leave soon, we’ll be stuck here after dark and I have a feeling that’s a bad idea. There’s something about this place, something not right, and while I can’t quite explain it, I can feel it.
The sooner we get out of here, the better.
When I go to open the door, a scream slices through the trees behind the cottage, and I freeze with my hand on the handle.
For one breath, the whole forest falls silent. No wind, no birds. Nothing.
The memory of that thin and terrified scream rising from beyond the back wall has chills skittering across my back.
And then it comes again, a long, drawn-out, pained wail from the well.
Looks like she isn’t dead, after all.
I exchange a smile with my friends.
Rain shrugs and says, “Who is hungry? We should stop by that new burger joint in town.”
On cue, Ava’s stomach growls. “God, yes. I could eat literally anything now.”
I tap the roof. “Let’s go.”