“Serious?” He gestured with his hands at us, but refused to meet my stare. “What the fuck do you think this is? What are you planning to do to her? This is fucked up.”
“Man, come on.” Knife Guy shifted. “Just open the fucking door, you pansy-ass. We’re just going to scare her. That’s all.”
My heart stuttered and my eyes were wide, filling with tears. This isn’t happening. Those words were on repeat. I couldn’t process how my morning had started one way, so full of hope and love, and had gone to Shittyville in a nanosecond.
Bat Guy cursed under his breath as he moved around my flailing legs and opened the door to the basement. My stomach dropped. As I was carried through the opening of the basement, I froze up for a second. The rush of dread was paralyzing. It sank down deep, threatening to drown me.
The familiar landscape of the covered pool tables, the air hockey table, and the picture of Kyler as a small boy with his father snapped me into action.
Twisting my head sharply, I dislodged his hand far enough that I was able to bite down on his fingers. Clamping my teeth onto his skin, I pressed down until I felt his skin pop and a metallic taste exploded in my mouth.
Knife Guy howled and yanked his hand away. His grip on my waist loosened enough that I tore myself free. He blocked the only exit from here, and while every horror movie in the world replayed in my head, I had no other choice but to run farther into the house.
I ran faster than I’d ever had. The soles of my boots were damp and slick from the outside as they slipped over the wood floors. I entered the stairwell at breakneck speed. A weight hit me in the back, throwing me down on the stairs. I caught myself before I face-planted the steps.
“You little bitch,” he grunted, grabbing a fistful of hair as his knees pressed into my hips. He yanked my head back and a wave of sharp pain rolled down my spine as he pulled me up. Twisting onto my side I kicked out, catching him in the shin.
I didn’t see the blow until it landed. Pain burst across my face, hot and stinging. Crying out, I clawed at the hand in my hair.
“What are you doing?” the other guy yelled. “Holy fuck, are you out of your mind?”
Knife Guy ignored him, dragging me up the stairs. My scalp was on fire as we hit the living room and my gaze landed on the bed Kyler and I had built. It was messy from what we’d done that morning and seeing that right at the moment caused nausea to rise in my gut.
This isn’t happening.
“I fucking hate stuck-up bitches like you,” Knife Guy said, pushing me forward.
I stumbled and lost my balance, falling to my knees near the coffee table. Desperation clouded my senses. Full-blown panic set in. “Why?” I winced as my lip pulled. “Why are you doing this?”
“Why?” he mimicked my voice. “You little shits come up here every year and think you own this place, acting like you’re better than us. You’re not. You aren’t anything.”
I blinked against the tears filling my eyes. A cord of familiarity rang inside me.
He dragged me past the coffee table, toward the blankets. “And that fucker Kyler? He thinks he’s the shit, right? Thinking he can boss me around.”
It hit me then, and for a second I couldn’t move as realization sunk in. I knew who it was behind the mask. I almost blurted it out, but clamped my jaw shut. If he thought I didn’t know he was Zach, then I probably had a better chance of walking away from this. At least, I hoped I did, and I clung onto that.
“Come on, dude. This is enough,” Bat Guy said from somewhere behind us. “She’s scared, okay? We need to get out of here. You fucked with their stuff enough already. This has gone too far.”
“Too far?” Zach hissed in my ear, and I shuddered in revulsion. “Like it wasn’t too far when Kyler fucked my girlfriend? Or the fact that he’s with her right now?”
Holy shit—did he mean Sasha? Kyler had mentioned that there’d had been something between Zach and Sasha, but Kyler had said nothing had happened between him and Sasha. I suddenly got the animosity between the two at the bar.
He’d lied to me, actually lied to me. And now Kyler was with her and I was with Zach. How unbelievably fucking twisted,
Kyler had slept with Zach’s girlfriend, once upon a time.
The rusty knife that had been planted in my heart when I’d heard where Kyler was twisted deeper, and then broke off. I was in this situation because of Kyler and his inability to keep his dick in his pants. Plain and simple. The emotional pain slicing through me was just as potent as my stinging lip and aching muscles, and the bruises on the inside would take a hell of a lot longer to fade than the ones that no doubt blotted my skin. The hurting went to a whole new level, cutting in so far I knew there was no chance of repairing this.
That is, if I actually made it out of here alive.
I struggled to get control of my breathing to think around the soul-shattering hurt and panic. “I’m sorry,” I mumbled. My lower lip was numb, causing me to stumble over my words. “I’m sorry that he slept with your girlfriend. I’m so—”
“You’re sorry?” Zach laughed harshly as he shoved me forward. “That little bastard should be sorry.”
Okay. Obviously sympathizing with the psycho wasn’t going to work. Scrambling off my knees, I spun around, aiming for the doorway to the foyer. I could get out the front door, and then what? Run like hell.
I made it halfway across the room before he got hold of my jacket. In a frantic attempt at escape, I tore the zipper down and slipped out of it. I’d almost made it to the door when he tackled me from behind. I hit the floor hard. My cry was lost in Bat Guy’s shouts. Zach roughly flipped me onto my back and the terror amplified, bursting through me. I swung at him, my knuckles glancing his jaw. He caught my hands, easily pinning them beside my head.
“God, you’re fucking feisty for a midget, aren’t you?” Zach laughed, and through the slits of the ski mask, his eyes held a scary gleam to them. “You and Kyler are just friends, huh? Fuck-buddies by the look of it. Yeah, I saw you two in front of the window. Would’ve got you out of the bar sooner if I’d known you were just another one of Kyler’s whores.”
Just another one of Kyler’s whores.
Rage swamped me, a fiery burn that slithered through my veins like poison. I bucked my hips, trying to throw him. “Get off me!”
“Hey!” Bat Guy shouted, his voice a high-pitch squeal. “This is going too far! I didn’t sign up for this shit! Fucking with the house is one thing, but this? Hell no. I’m not a part of this.”
“Whatever,” Zach growled. “Get the fuck out, then.”
Breathing heavy, my eyes locked with Zach’s. How far was he going to take this? Obviously, what was happening wasn’t a part of any plan. Bat Guy was way too freaked out for that to be the case. They must’ve been watching. Saw Kyler leave, and then me. They probably hadn’t expected me to show up in the middle of them vandalizing Kyler’s car. But now? My brain couldn’t go where this kind of stuff ended. This couldn’t be happening to me.
A door slammed shut somewhere in the house, and the last of my hope dwindled. Bat Guy was gone. I was alone with Zach, and revenge glittered in his stare.
Kyler
Coasting over the snow, I cursed under my breath. Way too much time had passed since I’d left for the lodge. Syd probably thought Bigfoot or something had eaten me. I hadn’t intended on taking so long. Good news was that I learned that progress had already been made on the town’s roads, and the main ones were clear enough for slow traffic.
Man, my head was still spinning from what’d happened when Sasha had strolled into the lodge. It solidified two age-old sayings—the past always comes back to bite you in the ass, and no good deed goes unpunished.
Jesus. H. Christ.