Chapter Twenty-eight

I will go home. I will go home and talk to my parents, and we will go to the police and everything will be okay. Except when I round the corner to my street, my house is completely dark. No porch lights. No lamps inside. Not even the pale blue flicker of a television.

Saturday night. Date night. They’re probably at dinner or at a movie or somewhere else. And that’s just too damn bad. This is an emergency.

I immediately remember my cell phone shattering on the street. My psychologist in a pool of blood.

What if he comes after my parents? What if I get them involved and they end up like Dr. Kirkpatrick? The idea sends bile rising in my throat. God, what the hell am I going to do?

The cold has sharp teeth tonight, biting through my puffy coat and turning my jeans into sheets of ice against my legs. I can’t stay out here forever. But where do I go?

Inside, my house is strangely quiet, which makes me jumpy and nervous. I scan my mother’s note on the table and the plate she left for me in the fridge. Dinner and a movie. They’ll be home by midnight.

I stare long and hard at the phone on the kitchen wall, but in the end, I walk away. I can’t lose them. If knowing this puts them in danger, then they can’t know. But I can’t stay here. I can’t sit in this kitchen surrounded by takeout menus and used coffee cups and pretend that my entire world isn’t falling apart. And that my almost-boyfriend isn’t one of the people responsible.

I need help.

Maggie.

I try her phone, and it goes straight to voice mail. Did they shut down her phone? Oh God, are they tracking her too?

I try her home number, and it rings busy. My stomach plummets to my knees. I envision Maggie slumped over like Dr. Kirkpatrick. No! No, she has to be all right. She has to.

The clock in the living room chimes six o’clock, and I cringe. One hour ago I had answers. Answers and a boyfriend and a best friend who was safe. Sixty minutes should not have enough power to change all of that.

I stumble back into the night, desperate to find Mags. To make sure she’s all right.

Snow is falling, thick white flakes that cling to my hair and coat. Christmas lights shine from the windows in my neighbors’ houses, mocking me with their message of peace.

I cut through the Campbells’ backyard, my eyes scanning the brightly lit windows for signs of life. I jog to the back steps, steps that have seen me through skinned knees and late night truth or dare sessions. This place is full of goodness. Every step I take crosses the shadow of a game once played, a ball once thrown. It is the closest thing I have to sacred ground.

I climb the familiar stairs with my heart thundering behind my ribs. I should go around front, but I can’t. My feet feel like lead weights. I have nothing else in me.

I knock hard on the door, banging and ringing the little bell next to the handle. I even call Maggie’s name, but the windows stay empty and the knob won’t twist beneath my fingers.

I’m alone. I don’t know where anyone is or if they’re okay, and it’s cold. It’s so terribly cold.

A sob tears out of me, and I cross my arms over my chest. I’m no better off than Julien now. If I go to the police, they will see a lunatic. The poor, crazy girl with big stories and a ruined future.

The panic that’s been buzzing along my skin for the last hour seizes me like an iron fist, squeezing hard around my chest. It hurts to breathe. Hurts like blades are slipping between my ribs. I try to remember Dr. Kirkpatrick’s words, but all I can think of is the blood on her desk. So much blood.

My arms and legs go numb, and my vision blurs. I feel myself falling, hands flailing at empty air before I hit the steps hard.

The mix of pain and fear takes me like the tide, rolling me under and pulling me out to sea. My eyes drift closed, and I can’t even fight that. I can’t fight anything anymore.

***

“Chloe!”

My name, in stereo, drags me back. Two voices: one high, one low. They are shouting back and forth to each other, words bouncing between them so quickly I can’t pull them apart. They make no sense to me—only noise.

I feel my body lift, the ruthlessly cold concrete giving way to something warm. And then I’m moving. Being carried, I think. The air changes. I feel it happen, the cruel wind giving way to stillness. I feel the heat at once, seeping into my clothes, melting the snow on my face and hair.

“T-tell me she’s b-breathing.”

Maggie. I turn my face toward her but can’t seem to manage to open my eyes. She’s not the one carrying me though. She’s not strong enough.

“She’s breathing,” Adam says.

Adam. Adam’s carrying me. I take a breath of cinnamon and soap and leather. And then I open my eyes.

“Oh, thank G-god,” Mags says. I hear her sniffle.

Adam doesn’t say anything. He just tips his head skyward and breathes hard. The fragile flesh beneath his eyes is so dark it looks bruised. I know that I should be mad at him, but it hurts me to see him like this.

I touch his face without even realizing I moved. He looks down at me, anguish etched in every feature.

“I did this to you,” he says.

His words lance through my middle, bringing tears to my eyes. I bite my lip and turn away from his face, but somehow I move tighter against his chest too. I don’t know why.

I think I might hate him.

And I know I love him.

I don’t even know which is worse anymore.

Maggie looms into view, eyes puffy and red. “You s-scared me half to d-death.”

“I’m sorry,” I say. My voice is stronger than I thought it would be. My mind, though, is still reeling. “How are you here?”

“I live here,” Maggie deadpans.

“And I was convincingly desperate,” Adam adds.

Maggie nods in agreement, but it seems impossible. She all but commanded me not to trust him. Now they’re all buddy-buddy?

She seems to read my mind, waving a hand dismissively. “We’ll cover all that later. Let’s g-get you on your feet.”

Adam scoots back from me, giving himself the space to stand up. I shiver on the floor. It’s colder here without him against me. When I look up, I see them both, hands outstretched to help me up.

I reach for Maggie with my right hand and Adam with my left. Our fingers connect, and the floodgates open.

I shouldn’t be driving. I don’t even know why I’m in the car or where I’m headed, but my head is pounding and swimming at the same time and it’s hard to see the road with the snow pouring down like this.

I lick my lips, recoiling at the acrid, lemony tang in my mouth. An image of Blake flashes through my head. We’re in his house. In his father’s office. We’re shouting and then we’re not. I shove something into my purse when he’s not looking. I try to remember what, but it’s all in jagged pieces now.

I’m terrified. Struggling against someone. No, it’s fine. I’m fine. Blake kisses me at the car. Smiles and tells me to take care of my head.

No, it doesn’t make sense. I was at Blake’s but…There is nothing but blankness. I feel stuck, like a badly copied music track. There are blips of silence in my evening.

Not right. It can’t be right. My head hurts so bad. And I’m so cold. Where the hell is my coat? Why am I driving?

My car slides a little coming up to a red light. I try to pump the brakes, but the back end fishtails to the left. I hear my purse slide off the seat, dumping on the floor. The car comes to a rest, and I grope blindly through the mess on my passenger mat: lipstick and wallet and my iPod and then—what the hell?

My fingers close around a black box. Something rattles inside, tinkling like glass. The sound turns my stomach to lead.

I have to hide it.

The snow falls and my head reels. Everything blurs. There are snowy streets. And then I am walking. I watch my feet crunching through a thin layer of snow. I hear myself grunt and feel the agonizing burn of the snow I’m shoveling away barehanded.

My head spins and spins. It aches and I feel sick. Just sick. I open my eyes and I am back in my car. Driving again. I see dirt under my fingernails. The box is gone. I don’t know how. Oh God, I don’t know.

I feel a sob shake my shoulders. I’m so cold. So sick. I pull out my phone and blink hard, trying to clear my vision. I tap out the only number I can think of and wait for it to ring.

“Don’t tell me you’re stuck on number twenty-nine,” Adam says by way of greeting.

I try to keep my voice normal. “Can you meet me?”

“Yeah. What’s wrong? You don’t sound right.”

“I’m okay,” I say, swerving over double yellow lines. I’m not okay. I’m a million miles from okay. I glance around, getting my bearings. The school bus lot blurs by on my right. “Maybe we’d better meet at the school.”

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

I shove my phone deep into my jeans. Then I park in the front lot. I’m shivering in my sweater, so I can’t stay out here. The latch on the cafeteria door is ice-cold, but I move it up and left, leaning on it hard like Adam taught me.

I slip inside and feel the quiet surround me completely.

It’s darker than dark. I feel my way through the tables, my eyes fixed on the red exit sign glowing at the back doors. I need to sit down. Like now.

I don’t understand why I’m here or why it’s so dark or what I’m so freaked out about. I just need to rest for a minute. I just want to close my eyes. I stop in the first classroom I find, study hall from last year. Thank God. I can just sleep. Just for a minute.

Everything feels slow and dull. My eyelids droop as I slide into my seat from last year. I sink down low in the desk, watching the snow fall like tiny white butterflies. It is the last thing I see.