CHAPTER 25
“That thing, that moment, when you kill someone, and everything around becomes hazy and the only thing in focus is you and this person and you realize that that person is the only person that you’re supposed to kill for the rest of your life.”
—Not Never Been Kissed
“Fuck,” Wes mutters as we catch our breath in another VIP room.
When we made it up the stairs, we bypassed the hallway I had run down with Laurie and Jennifer.
It’s important not to retrace your steps too much; what was a safe place in the past can turn on you this far into the film.
Instead, we headed for dark scary hallway four, Wes’s hand locked around mine until we spotted a room that had a partition in front of the doorway.
The top of the solid divider stands at my chin height, obscuring the view of the room from anyone stalking the hallway, and as soon as we’re on the other side of it, we plant our backs to the surface and slide down to the floor.
“Wes—”
Still trying to catch his breath, he gasps, “I can’t believe—Another person—And we were arguing—And he just… Fuck.”
He rubs his least bloody palm against his forehead, like he’s trying to erase the sight of John running toward Heart Eyes from his memory.
Maybe he’s trying to erase this whole night while he’s at it.
Wes has taken the lead on so many things, and I can see it’s starting to take its toll.
It’s a weight he shouldn’t have to shoulder—it’s not like he’s more equipped to handle this than the rest of us.
If anyone should feel responsible, it’s me.
“You couldn’t have done anything,” I murmur.
I don’t know if we could have left that corridor with John and still have made it here, but I do know if Wes had done anything other than drag me away we’d both be dead.
Or at least he would be. Heart Eyes may have kept me around for a spin on the dance floor before he realized I can’t be what he wants me to be and murdered me on it instead.
“I could’ve done something.”
“You did. You got us out of there.”
He doesn’t say anything, but when he lets out a deep, accepting sigh, one that ends in a little shake of his head, my words are enough to pull him back from the corridor downstairs.
His hand slides over the carpet and finds mine again, enveloping my fingers in heat and soft pressure that makes it easy to ignore that both our hands are covered in blood.
He doesn’t make a show of it. There’s no extended eye contact or slow intertwining of his fingers with mine.
He just grabs my hand and tilts his head back against the wall, like it’s the thousandth time he’s done it, like this kind of touch is a normal part of our interactions, and the idea it could be, one day, makes warmth bloom in my chest.
“Are you okay?” he asks, and for some reason that makes me laugh.
Such a simple question that doesn’t have a place here.
Not now that John is gone. Not now that Heart Eyes has performed the “emotional kill” of the evening.
The one the audience feels the most deeply.
Annie in Halloween II, or—As soon as the thought enters my head, I push it out again.
I don’t want to compartmentalize what just happened as another part of the formula.
I don’t want John’s story to end this way.
But the fact it has makes my voice crack when I reply.
“No, I’m not okay. You?”
“Not in the slightest,” he says, and when he tips his head down to look at me and smiles, it’s nice to see our gallows humor matches.
It hints that we may be more compatible than a guy who likes The Fast and the Furious and a woman who’s read every single one of the forty-eight essays in My Favorite Horror Movie four times should be.
It also reminds me of his hero complex and that before John stole his thunder, Wes had every intention of going head to head with Heart Eyes.
“Were you actually going to…”
I don’t even know if I can say it.
“What?” His thumb starts drawing circles on my knuckle, the same kind that caught my attention during our date, and it has the power to pull the question out of my mouth before I can second-guess it.
“Try and stop him? Fight him? The killer.”
“…Yeah,” he finally says after an extended pause. I watch the muscle in his jaw tighten when he adds, “I still might… If it means that you—”
“Please, don’t.” I grip my fingers tighter into the back of his hand and his thumb stops moving.
I don’t want to hear the rest of that sentence, and I don’t want to know what part I play in Wes’s version of how this night ends.
It’s getting harder and harder to convince myself what is happening isn’t my fault when so many people keep dying and I’m still alive.
“Jamie—”
“It’s not going to end that way, Wes. Not with a single kitchen knife and a can-do spirit.”
He doesn’t try to argue, but his thumb starts back up on my skin. I interpret that as him accepting he can’t bring a knife to a machete fight and expect to win.
“Then I’ll figure something else out,” he says after a few more heavy seconds of just breathing and holding hands. “We’ll figure something out, and I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure as many of us get out of here as possible.”
Right.
Because there’s still god knows how many people spread out across the club who are either dead or hiding.
It’s never just been self-preservation for Wes. From the start it’s been about escaping this hellhole with as many people as possible. It’s noble, another thing that messes with maintaining the balance between afraid and horny, but it also puts a target on his back.
Wes is the confident, capable, attractive male lead.
He might make it to the third act, he might be in the foreground of the poster, but if he tries to take down the killer he won’t make it to the credits.
I know he won’t survive it, and the thought of him going up against Heart Eyes and not making it terrifies me.
I glance over at him. His eyes are trained on the ceiling, his eyebrows are furrowed in thought, and again I’m struck by the same realization I had when he first slid into view down in the basement bar.
How he is not the type I usually go for.
How he is imposing and inviting and all these other descriptors that shouldn’t go together, but they do, and somehow, I really, really like how the way they’re put together results in Wes.
I liked John, too, but there was only one scenario that would’ve played out: a nice, safe, mutual affection. One I’ve had before with other Johns. We’d excel in small talk and compliment exchanges, but eventually come to the conclusion our connection was pretty mild and more attuned to friendship.
With Wes, it’s not mild. It’s not safe. It’s risk and reward, desire and depth, foreign and familiar. When I think of Wes I can’t settle on one scenario. The possibilities are endless.
But I can’t tell Wes that. I can’t let on that’s how I feel, because even if I haven’t seen a clock in this godforsaken death maze, I know it’s only been a few hours since we met. And it would be crazy to be having those kinds of feelings about someone you’ve known for only one night.
Spelling-someone’s-name-out-with-intestines kind of crazy.
Wes turns his head and his eyes meet mine, the corner of his mouth tilting up, and it’s then I realize I’m staring.
The running brought out a sheen on his skin that makes his jaw look sharp enough to go up against that machete, and his lips are parted in a way that I could just lean in, slip my bottom lip right into the space between them, then close my top—
“What are you thinking?” he asks.
I’m thinking that even after everything, the afraid/horny balance is still leaning heavily toward horny. I don’t say that, though. Instead I say, “I think we still have a chance of finding a way out of here.”
He nods. We both know this is just a pit stop to get our bearings before we go outside again, but that doesn’t stop his eyes from narrowing, or his head from ducking closer to mine as he asks, “Is that a Leading Lady or Final Girl way of thinking?” Maybe I shouldn’t have told him my theory, not when our lives depend on it being correct, but I can’t deny that the thrill of hearing him speak my language hasn’t worn off.
I still don’t know if I have what it takes to be the Final Girl, and while I’m dressed the part, Leading Lady seems a little out of reach now, too.
Still, if I had to choose one, “Blind optimism? Definitely Leading Lady.”
“Right.” He grins.
He’s close, and it doesn’t seem as if he’s in a hurry to move his head away.
If my confidence was at its peak state right now, I’d think he’d want to kiss me.
But there’s a part of me that refuses to forget how our date ended earlier tonight.
How he couldn’t get away from my table fast enough.
He hasn’t explained why he left so abruptly, and no matter what form it takes or whether it’s retracted, rejection stings.
But it would sting a lot less if he kissed me and made it better.
As if he can read my mind, his eyes drop to my lips and the amusement leaves his face.
“I don’t know how to word this without it sounding crazy, but…”
His voice is a low murmur, the same one he used when he was trying to get me to leave him in the hallway.
We have all the right elements for a situation that warrants that kind of voice: we’re alone, the room is dark, his mouth is a few inches from mine, his fingers are threaded through my own.
This should have been the first time I heard it.
“I’m glad that it’s you and me. Here. Together. I hate that this is happening, obviously, but since it is… I’m glad you’re here. That you’re with me.” He says the last sentence so softly my heart starts to thump rapidly beneath my ribs.
“That does sound crazy,” I say. He’s still looking down at my mouth, and when his teeth graze his bottom lip, I swallow thickly. “But no crazier than…”
Pulling my gaze from his mouth, I look up, into his eyes, and all I see is pupil. Blown out to the edges of his iris. Endless pools come to mind again, and it does nothing to calm my heartbeat. It’s pounding like we’re running away from Heart Eyes again.
“I’m glad you’re with me, too.”
Something changes in his expression as soon as I say it and I get to see that look.
The one from the hallway downstairs. The “as you wish,” “give you my coat when you are cold,” “want the rest of your life to start now” look that makes heat flare up under my skin and my pulse race.
Up close it’s even better. If he wants to kiss me, I can’t remember if there’s a reason I should stop him.
One thick eyebrow performs the smallest of twitches.
“Guess we have matching kinds of crazy then, huh?”
It doesn’t matter if I’m nodding because I agree with him or to let him know he can close the distance, because the space is already disappearing between us.
Our noses bump, heads tilt, the weight of his breath is on my mouth, heat hits my lips, and then the scuff of a shoe sounds from the hallway outside.