It was a picture of Kill leaning on Gemma. If it hadn’t been for the annoyed look on her face, they would have appeared intimate. The red lettering stated:
He's done with you.
You'll be mine soon.
My hands shook, figuring Jason wasn’t going to stay on the sidelines much longer. And why should he? The restraining order was no longer a concern. When someone touched my shoulder, I screamed, my defenses to all the times Jason would come up behind me to hurt me surfacing.
“Hey, Faith. What's up? I was calling your name, but you didn’t hear me.” Trent stood there with weary eyes behind his black-rimmed glasses. I tried to hide the paper, but he was quick and pulled it out of my hand.
“What is this?” he asked, waving the picture in my face. I turned my head, not wanting to see it again.
“It’s nothing,” I replied, snatching it back and shoving it in my bag.
“I don't understand. Is Kill cheating on you? Is one of his girlfriends threatening you? Is it Jason?” He stared at my bag where I stuffed it.
“It’s nothing. Kill and I were never together. I just broke up with Jason, and I'm not looking for anything serious. Jason's just trying to scare me,” I said, wanting to drop the subject.
“It's something, alright. Have you told Kill about these?”
I looked up at him sharply. “No, I haven’t told him about these. This is my business to deal with, and you’d better not say anything.”
He threw his hands up in surrender. “I was just trying to help. I won’t say anything to anyone, but will you at least talk to me about it?” he pleaded. “I hate the way our friendship ended... I miss you.”
He moved as if to touch my face, but dropped his hand when I shied away from him.
“I miss you too, but I don’t think we can go back to the way we were. It's uncomfortable.” I shrugged and leaned against my car. My phone vibrated in my bag, but I didn’t move to answer it.
“I know it's awkward, and that’s all my fault. But you are my friend, and it seems like I'm the only one who knows about these notes. So, let’s take it one day at a time. What do you say?”
I had to admit I felt some relief at having someone else who knew about the almost-daily threatening letters. Remembering how I’d judged Kill too harshly, I thought maybe giving Trent another chance would be the right move.
“Alright, one day at a time,” I agreed, and he smiled happily.
“Would you like to go get a cup of coffee?”
“Sorry, I promised Kill I would run with him.”
His face turned to stone, and I instantly regretted agreeing to try and be friends again, but his stony expression vanished as quickly as it had appeared.
“You're still hanging out with him, even though he's doing that?” He motioned to my bag.
“It's not what it looks like. We were never together. He can do whatever he wants,” I lied.
“I’m sorry; it isn’t my business. I just don’t want you to get hurt. So coffee later this week, maybe?”
I nodded my head. “Yeah, I'll text you my schedule, and we'll see when we can get together. I really need to get going; see you later, Trent.”
I waved as I backed away, and he waved back enthusiastically. When I got home, Kill was waiting for me on the couch, talking to Van.
"How was your first day, sis?" Van asked.
"Same ol' thing. What did you guys do today?"
"You know, killed some things, saved the world. The usual," he answered motioning toward his controller.
“My heroes." I laughed. "Let me go change, and we can go for that run,” I said as I sprinted upstairs.
The first thing I did was stash my newest letter in the box inside my closet. I changed quickly and walked downstairs to see Kill still sitting on the couch, waiting for me alone.
