26. Twenty-Six #2
He roared, moving faster than I could have anticipated.
Suddenly, I was staring down the barrel of a gun, one he’d pulled from God knows where.
In a blinding, flashing second, there was a deafening bang, and an explosion of smoke that made it impossible to see anything other than white smoke which filled the tiny space completely.
“Birdie!” I screamed for her, dragging the fire extinguisher, as I battled to find her in the haze. It was impossible to hear anything either. My ears rang, thanks to the gunshot. Turns out action movies weren’t lying about that one.
I didn’t find her though. I found Francis.
Like me, he stumbled through the smoke trying to grab anything within reach to anchor him.
His eyes were mostly closed, thanks to the white powder, even as he howled.
Then, out of the smoke behind him like an avenging angel, my beautiful girl, appeared.
The white powdery insides of the fire extinguisher coated her body entirely.
It mixed with the blood on her chest making the word ‘MINE’ carved above her right breast in jagged, crooked letters, look even more horrific than before.
That word on her chest, the knowledge that it was put there by the monster in front of me, unlocked the bloodlust that had been brewing inside me.
Before I knew it, my arm was moving again, slamming the extinguisher into Francis’ head.
Hard enough to knock him over. Then again.
And again. And again. Thanks to the smoke, I couldn’t tell what part of him I was hammering into, just that I was hitting flesh. But that wasn’t enough.
My right hand was ready to take over. I knelt over his now groaning frame and stabbed.
Just once, not because I wanted to stop.
I wanted to keep burying that short blade into him over and over until he would never touch my beautiful bird again.
But when a soft hand wrapped around my wrist, I stilled immediately.
My hearing had started to return enough that I could hear Birdie, begging me, “Bren, Bren, please, we have to go.”
She was right, of course. We’d gotten so fucking lucky.
But if Francis or Mitchell recovered enough to fight back, there was no one way we’d get lucky a second time.
She pulled me toward the door, or where we thought was the door, since it was still hard to see anything clearly.
Toni felt her way along the wall, moving her hands up and down across the wood, trying to find the gap.
I let her hold my hand, uselessly. All I could look at was the splatters of blood that coated my arm, and down to the tip of the knife, where more blood dripped in thick rivers across the silver metal.
In the moment, stabbing Francis had felt like the very best kind of revenge, now it made me wonder what else I was capable of, if there wasn’t a monster hidden inside me.
“Got it!” Birdie cried, swinging open the door, and there was no more time to consider what had just happened.
Opening it created a vacuum that sucked fresh evening air inside the small room.
It also sent the powdery smoke still hanging in the air billowing outward, with us behind it.
It wasn’t yet night, but it was getting darker.
We were well into evening now but if anyone saw us in this state, we’d either have to explain or worse, we risked putting them in Francis’ warpath, too.
I looked at Toni, still naked from the waist up, both of us bloodied, and ghost-like.
There was no explaining this. Nor was I entirely sure that Francis wasn’t about to come out of the cabin behind us, gun first.
“We have to run, T.”
She looked up at me, blue eyes nearly vacant.
The adrenaline spike that had kept her moving thus far was fading.
The expression on her face was so close to the one she’d worn when Xav and I had found her nearly catatonic after her last run in with Mitchell.
I couldn’t let her slip away like that. Not now.
I shook her a little, “Birdie, we have to hide.”
She nodded. This time, she let me pull her, as I started to run.
Hand in hand, we ran aimlessly into the forest. Unlike us, Francis didn’t have years of history here.
He could follow the paths, but he didn’t know these woods.
Not like us. We ran past mine and Toni’s cabin, away from the Village.
Vaguely, I knew if we kept running, we’d hit the ropes course and climbing wall.
If we ran a little further than that, well, we’d be standing on top of Nick’s corpse.
Probably. That thought made me ill, so I pivoted, taking us in the direction of the water.
Lake Ganawen’s shoreline was littered with mature trees, large boulders, and a thousand little dips and crevices where we could hide.
And worst-case scenario, if Francis did find us there, my Birdie, the strongest swimmer I knew, would be able to get away. When we got close enough to see the lake’s black glittering surface through the trees, we slowed to a walking pace.
“Bren,” she panted, now that we’d both stopped running, each desperate to catch our breath, “If that’s what happened to me, where’s Xav?”
“What do you mean?
“Xav was supposed to meet me in Abbi’s cabin.
It was all part of a plan I made with the girls, so he and I…
” her voice faltered as panic took over.
She was shaking and unsteady on her feet.
I swarmed around her, letting my arms wrap her up completely.
Against my chest and shoulders, she shook, her heart still pounding.
I pet the loose ends of her powdery hair, gently whispering to her, “I’ve got you Birdie. I’ve got you.”
Even in my arms, she shivered, and like an idiot I realized she was still only half-dressed.
She was likely freezing. If shock was setting in, it would only get worse.
I didn’t have a sweatshirt or anything to offer her, so my ruined tank top would have to do.
I released her just enough to rip it off my body and drag it down over her head. Smoothing it over her skin as I went.
“There. That’s a bit better,” I said, trying to comfort us both, but I could still make out the cruel mark on her chest.
“Birdie, I think we need to get cleaned up.”
“Xav?” She questioned.
“We’ll find him. I promise. Right after we get ourselves cleaned up a bit. We can’t exactly go walking around camp like this. What if we run into some kids?”
We both looked down. We looked like something out of a horror movie. There was a small gap between the trees caused by a wide, flat rock at the water’s edge and I pulled us both towards it.
“I know it’s not ideal, baby, but at least the lake water will get rid of all this shit.” I gestured to my own powdery arm. She nodded.
I got in first. The water felt almost warm in contrast to the night air.
It was shallow enough that I could stand, the gentle lapping of the waves hitting me near my shoulders.
Birdie slid her hand into one of mine, while my other hand held her hip as she slipped off the rock and into the water.
Toni was tall, but not quite tall enough to stand without being nearly submerged.
So, I reached for her body, pulling her back into a hug.
Unbidden, her legs wrapped around my waist, and I felt the press of her against me.
In any other circumstance, this would be a dream.
Especially as my hands wrapped around the perfect muscles of her thighs and ass.
I spun us in the water. Keeping her supported, I did what little I could to get the residue off our skin.
Once that was managed, or managed as best as I could without letting her go, which I was absolutely not doing, maybe ever again, our faces and hair were the only parts of us still baked with white.
“Hold on tight, Birdie,” I warned, “We’re going to go for a bit of a dip.
” She tightened her legs around me, and I fought back a groan, as I bent my knees, pulling us both down until we were totally underwater.
Only for a second, though, and when we came back up, both of us looked a little more human.
Well, I probably did. Toni looked beautiful.
Perfect. Angelic. After everything she’d been through tonight.
After what I now suspected about her family.
After everything. Here she was, still moving, still standing. I was in awe of her.
“Birdie, I-” my brain struggled to find the right words to tell her, but I didn’t get the chance, as a peal of sharp, wild laughter cut out across the otherwise quiet lake.
“What was that?” Toni asked.
Both of us looked around. Now that my eyes had adjusted to the dark and the stars had come out, I had a better idea of where we were.
We must have run past the library, because, in the distance I could see the masts of the sailboats, black against the navy sky, and rocking ever so gently with the waves.
Neither Toni nor I said anything. In the otherwise still night, nearly every sound stood out, including a loud shushing sound that had clearly come from the boat dock.
Toni pointed to it and we both turned to look.
I couldn’t see anything, other than the boats that were always moored there.
I tipped my head in that direction, letting Toni’s body slide away from mine.
Then, just like I’d done so many weeks ago when I followed her and Xav, I started to swim slowly, with my head up toward the dock.
Toni did, too. Of course, she was faster, and her strong breaststroke meant she was ahead of me in seconds as she moved with such fluid grace.