Page 22 of Kiss Slay Replay

“Anything. Everything. Always.”

“I did want to get you alone. I just didn’t lie to do it.”

“You like me,” he says.

“Again, with the arrogance.”

“I—” He stops. Talking. Walking. Breathing. He’s not looking at me anymore; he’s looking past me.

“What is it?” I ask, swiveling on my heel. There’s the row of quaint white cabins. The lake. The woods. Mosquitoes. Birds. “What?”

“Uh. Nothing.” He squints. “I thought I saw…”

“Saw what?” I ask, with an urgency that seems to fluster him. His eyes go wide.

“We were kidding around about that satanic shit, right?”

“Yeah. Why? What’s wrong?”

He rubs his jaw. “Just…I want to check…”

He changes direction, heading back toward the cabins.

“Wait.” I follow him, my heart a battering ram. All I can think about is the figure in black. What if I was wrong to keep my mouth shut? To dismiss the dread, suppress the panic? It’s such a trap, isn’t it? I say something and suddenly, it’s a problem, I’ve got a problem. I don’t say anything and just delay the inevitable. “Danny.”

Please, please, please let this not be a problem. Let it be nothing.

He approaches the first cabin. He stands at the back corner, hands on his head. “Okay…Whoa.”

I come up behind him, and I see it, and it’s not nothing.

My knees go weak.

There’s a vulgar smear of red sullying the white cabin.

It’s a very distinct shade. And it’s wet. Fresh.

“I’m being paranoid,” he says. “Yeah?”

“Danny. Danny. Danny…” I need to say something other than his fucking name. My mouth isn’t working. My brain isn’t working. I am nothing but fear.

He takes another step and the ground squelches under his weight. The noise tips our gazes down. By the dregs of daylight, it’s hard to determine what the ground is soaked with. The grass has been disturbed—there’s a chaotic pattern in the blades and some patches have been ripped out completely.

“Uh…” He leans over, peering behind the cabin.

How did it get so dark so fast? The sun has abandoned us.

“There’s nothing back there,” he says, turning toward me. “Hold on. What’s that?”

He points at the grass near my feet. I look.

It could easily be mistaken for a golf ball. But I know exactly what it is.

A problem.

He bends down. He picks it up. He grips it between his thumb and index finger. “Uh…what? Is this…”

A Halloween prop. A macabre sphere of plastic. A fake eyeball.