Then there was just Livy’s closed casket and me. A tear slid down my face, and despite how horrible this situation was, there was a part of me that, through Livy, was standing in a place that had been meant for me.
My hand shook as I carefully put my rose on Olivia’s casket. Despite our differences, I would have never wished for her death.
Death came for Livy, but I had a strong feeling it had been looking for me.
Grayson was hurt. I could tell by how he took off, but I couldn’t bring myself to regret what had happened. Still, I felt a bit guilty since we had been growing closer.
Micah and Cruz were talking on the other side of the island. Cruz was teasing him, but even though Micah blushed, I could tell Grayson’s abrupt departure had bothered him.
Gray took on so much on his own, which was just another thing he felt he had to do. The text had been sent to him, but it was meant for all of us.
The door opened, and the three of us stared at it.
“Gray?” I called after him.
I began to have second thoughts as he just stared at us. Without another word, he turned around, and I felt a pang go through me as I saw his name scrawled across his jersey.
Was he mad? Upset? Did he find something out?
I went after him, his well-being more important than what my sisters would think of me, and the fact that I was violating the girl code.
“Gray,” I said.
Almost everyone was too drunk to notice that I was calling after him. He stopped as if he was waiting for me to catch up. His face turned, and I wished he would take off the mask so I could see the expression on his face.
A thrill went down my spine as a shot of adrenaline, fear, and lust spread through me. With resolve, I kept pushing past the crowd after him. Just as I got closer, a bunch of guys from the hockey team began to bump one another right in front of me. They all towered over me, which made it difficult to see. When I finally cleared them without them toppling over me, I saw that Livy had been doing the same as me—except where I failed, she succeeded. When I saw Grayson drag Livy outside, I stood there in disbelief.
My feet refused to move. I stood there a few seconds later, waiting for him to emerge once he figured out it wasn’t me he had in his arms, but as the seconds ticked by, he didn’t come back.
Well, fuck him.
Here I was, trying to make him feel better, and he didn’t care if he had Livy or me. Then again, what kind of hypocrite was I? I couldn’t even make up my mind between guys.
Screw this party. Screw the notes. Screw everything. I was ready to call it quits when the lights went off, and people began to scream.
Everything after that was a mess. I wanted to forget about the lake, but never like this. Death was roaming around, and I had a feeling it would be back for me.
3
MICAH
“Ready?”
I could feel Grayson’s eyes on me as he started up his SUV, and I shook my head. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be ready.
“Me neither.” His confession was quiet, tentative, almost as if he didn’t want to tell me, but I could read him so much more easily now. Even if he’d acted like he wasn’t apprehensive about what we were going to do, I could see he was on edge, from his clenched jaw to the way he was gripping onto the wheel like a lifeline, and his left leg restlessly bouncing as he swung the car onto the road.
We left the hockey house behind, but Grayson turned left instead of right at the end of the street. My breath stuttered when the Zeta Gamma Theta house came into view. Grayson glanced over at me, easing up on the gas and slowing the SUV to a crawl. Black material had been draped across all the windows and even covered the door, a clear sign that they were in mourning.
“This is so fucking hard. It’s not right that she’s alone right now,” I whispered, and in my peripheral vision I saw Grayson nod in agreement.
“I know. I wish there was another way.”
It was so difficult to stay away from Ava, and even more difficult to act like everything was normal. Even though the four of us had agreed that it wouldn’t be a good idea to be seen together—other than me with Grayson, since that was easy to explain away—and I knew it made sense, all I wanted to do was to go to her.
It made me sick to my stomach to think that not only was someone dead, a girl I’d known, but I was almost certain the target had been Ava. It all added up. The threats, the person dressed the same as Grayson, with Grayson’s fucking name across their back, Ava and Olivia appearing so similar from behind that even I’d done a double take…
And now we had to leave Ava at the mercy of this psycho. The only comfort I had was the fact that Grayson and Cruz were both in agreement that our stalker would be lying low for a while after everything that had happened. With the heightened interest from both the college faculty and the cops, it was a hot story. Although the local cops and the college had worked together to suppress the details in the wider community, it was all anyone at Blackwell U was talking about. There was no way our stalker would risk more attention right now.
