Chapter 21 Kaitlyn
Kaitlyn
Of course he stayed with her.
Of course.
For the record, I’m not bothered at all that Caulder refused to see reason and come with us. No, I’m not upset. I’m not even surprised. As usual, I’m the one who has to make the hard choice. I’m the one who has to lead.
I’m the one who has to walk through the trees and bushes and mud and god knows what else in this fucking miserable rain.
“How far away is the road?” I ask Javi, who’s ahead of us with a flashlight he took from the house.
“I dunno,” he says. “I wasn’t exactly paying attention when the Death Van turned off the highway. But I think we’re going the right way.”
I noticed when we left that Javi insisted on going in this direction, which tells me Jay’s body must be somewhere around the other side.
Now we’re following the road we walked hours ago to get to Thornhill Manor.
It was more manageable then, but now the relentless rain has turned it into a mud puddle that threatens to send us sliding with every step.
My shoes squelch beneath me, and my favorite sweatpants are so soaked that I have to retie the drawstring to keep them from falling down.
And, yes, people are dying, but my immediate concern is when this rain is going to let the hell up.
Meanwhile, Caulder and Avery are nice and warm in that kitchen.
Not that I’m having regrets or think they made the right decision.
Not after what Javi told me. But still. The anger coursing through me is a sharp, fast-acting poison in my blood that hums in my arms and legs.
It’s the same anger that Coach Amakawa tells me to channel into volleyball, into my leadership.
“You make that anger matter,” she says. “You let it focus you. You let it drive you. But don’t you ever let it distract you.”
I guess there’s one good thing about the rain—that it’s covering up the tears I feel stinging my eyes.
I never cry, and the raincoat I grabbed is partially guarding my face, but Javi’s perceptive and Marlene…
I don’t know what she’s up to, but her eyes keep darting over to me as she struggles forward, her raincoat swallowing her it’s so big.
Her umbrella keeps catching in the wind, threatening to pull her into the storm.
I gave up on actually using my umbrella, but I’ve held on to it in case I need it as a weapon.
As a result, the rain strikes like little needles on what’s exposed of my face and hands, and I’m shivering with the kind of cold that goes down into the bone.
Thank god I’m coordinated or I’d definitely be on my ass already.
And, Kait, don’t do anything…rash.
You should get to revoke nickname privileges when someone breaks up with you. Especially if they’re giving you bullshit commands.
“You’re thinking about him.”
I don’t know how Javi moved so quietly in all this rain and mud, but he’s suddenly next to me.
Raincoat-less and umbrella-less, with his hoodie soaked through, but he doesn’t look sad or angry.
Just his usual brand of brooding and serious, if slightly more intense than normal.
His eyes, though, unnerve me, the way they practically beg me to be honest.
“I’m just annoyed,” I say, which is true. “He and Avery act like they’ve been appointed by god to be in charge. Sorry, this isn’t about the fucking debate team anymore. People are dying.”
I stumble, snagging my foot on a log, but Javi catches me easily. I let myself lean against him for a few steps, appreciating the steady pressure of him beside me.
“I thought you might be thinking about what he said during the game,” Javi says. “About not, um. Loving you.”
I look at him and let out a sharp laugh. “Uh, no, babe. I’d pretty much forgotten that when someone was, you know. Murdered.”
He looks down, a little guilty, lifting his hand to run through his hair but stopping when he hits his hood instead.
“Right,” he says. “I just thought…”
“You were jealous,” I say, smiling in spite of the general misery of the situation. “Trust me. I don’t give a shit about Caulder or his repressed bullshit.”
Javi doesn’t smile back. “Don’t lie to me, Kait. You’ve never been good at it.”
The sharpness of his words jolts me. They stir the anger back up, but it’s different than before. Not quite the same poison.
“I’m not lying,” I say. “I really don’t care. But it is shitty to say you never loved someone when you dated them for a year.”
Javi considers me. “But you didn’t love him.”
I huff, exasperated. “That’s different.”
“Why?” Javi asks.
“Because she wants everyone to love her,” a voice behind me says.
I whip around, and Marlene’s hovering at my shoulder being a nosy little brat.
“Excuse me?”
Her brown eyes flit to me. “It’s the truth, isn’t it? You wanted Caulder to love you because you want everyone to love you. And you get pissed when they don’t.”
I bark out a laugh. “Mari, girly, I know you’re new—”
“Don’t call me Mari,” Marlene snaps, a bite to her voice I haven’t heard before. I file the knowledge away for another day.
“Fine, Marlene,” I say. “But maybe you’re still getting used to the ecosystem at Coastal. People either love me or want to burn me alive, and I’d actually argue that some people are in both camps. I’m very used to not being loved.”
Marlene doesn’t say anything. She just keeps trudging through the mud.
“Oh, suddenly you’re speechless?” I ask, my hand over my heart in faux shock. “How convenient.”
“Careful, Kaitlyn,” Marlene says, gaze shifting from me to Javi. “You still didn’t answer his question.”
I glare at her, wondering how far I could punt her tiny ass. I turn to Javi, finding his eyes searching me.
“Yeah, okay, maybe I’m a bit hurt that he felt okay telling our whole debate team that he didn’t care about me,” I say, stopping in front of Javi so he has to stop, too. “But the only person I have ever loved is right in front of me, okay?”
For good measure—and because I want to—I take his face in my hands and kiss him. His lips are full and warm, and even while the world continues to shatter all around us, he is grounded. He is perfect and real and, thank god, kissing me back.
“Oh no,” Marlene says from behind us, and the terrified edge in her voice makes me and Javi stop. We look back, and she’s standing, staring at something hidden by a turn in the path, so we retrace our steps and freeze when we see what she sees.
It takes me a second to understand what, exactly, we’re all looking at.
To process it all. We’ve made it to the hill we climbed up from the highway, but the hill itself isn’t really there anymore.
Instead, the ground’s slick, a river of mud cascading down, an enormous tree crossing the path with no discernable way to get around it.
Not to mention the near-boulder-size rocks sliding down in the mud, heading straight at Marlene before she jumps aside.
A mudslide is erasing our only path to the road.
“We can try to climb it,” I say, but Javi only laughs.
“Climb out of a mudslide in the middle of a storm? You can’t be serious. We’d get maybe one foot and then be swept down this fucking hill.”
I look from him to the mudslide, watching as more of the earth is torn away and runs down the hill, disappearing into the dark.
“Nah,” Javi says, shaking his head. “We gotta try to find another path. This is insane.”
I stare at him, then at the mudslide, then at Marlene, her eyes wide and shining in the moonlight.
“We’ll figure out something else,” I say. “Maybe the drive leading up to the house is clearer than this.”
“But Caulder said that would be dangerous,” Marlene says. “That the attackers might be—”
“I don’t care what Caulder said,” I say. “We’re going that way.”
I lead them away, more pissed at Marlene with every step.
Obviously, I don’t blame her for the mudslide—but I do blame her for suggesting I need everyone to love me.
She hit on a weak point, and she almost cut clean through to the bone.
More than that, she threw me off my game, and it’s making me question everything.
Even the decision to come out here, which I was so sure of back in the house.
She’s already seen too much of me, and we’re going to have a big fucking problem if she keeps digging. If she sees more. And worse…What if she tells Javi?
He can’t know. Not this secret. Because he’d never look at me again the way he’s looking at me now. That trust in his eyes? It’d be gone forever.
And I’ll die before I let that happen.