“It’s from Josh,” she says. “He wrote . . .” Riley hesitates, and every muscle in her body tenses. “Need some company?”
Any hope I had that this might be over vanishes. Riley tosses Brooklyn’s cell phone, and it skitters across the floor. She drops to her knees, straddling Brooklyn’s bound legs.
“Whore,” she spits, and whips a hand across Brooklyn’s face. Brooklyn’s head smacks against the wooden pillar behind her. I cringe and look away, my gaze falling on the butcher knife half wedged beneath the backpack at Grace’s feet. No one else seems to remember that it’s there.
“Admit it!” Riley screams. I shift my feet to the left, edging slowly closer to the knife.
“Fine!” Brooklyn shouts. She spits blood onto the concrete and stretches out her jaw. “You want me to admit my fucking sins? I did it, okay? I slept with your boyfriend. And you know what the best part is? We’d come here, to this house, and we’d drink your wine, and he’d screw me on your sleeping bag.”
Riley’s face is empty, expressionless, like she didn’t hear a word of Brooklyn’s confession. Without even blinking, she slaps her again. I drop to a crouch next to the knife and slide it out from beneath the backpack. Riley stands and starts to pace.
“Give me that,” she says, stopping directly in front of me. Before I can say a word, Riley rips the butcher knife from my hand.
“Riley.” I stand, no longer thinking about what’s smart or what will convince Riley I’m on her side. If Josh is what sent Riley off the rails in the first place, who knows what she’ll do now. I reach for the knife, but Riley holds it close to her side possessively. “Come on. She admitted her sin, there’s nothing left for us to do.”
Riley shakes her head. “That wasn’t her only sin.” She crouches near Brooklyn again, this time grabbing her hand. “Hand me the Bible, Lexie,” she says.
Alexis doesn’t answer her. Her glassy eyes are fixed on the far wall.
“Lexie!” Riley yells, and Alexis flinches. “Hand me the Bible.”
Alexis takes the Bible out of the backpack and passes it to Riley. “Dirty sinner,” she mutters as Riley slides the Bible beneath Brooklyn’s hand, then spreads her fingers out flat on its cover.
Brooklyn lifts her face. Black eyeliner seeps into the corners of her eyes and smudges around her nose. Her mouth is rimmed in blood. She tries to pull her hand away, but Riley holds it tight, pressing Brooklyn’s fingers down flat with her palm. She positions the knife over the tip of Brooklyn’s pinkie.
“You fucking psycho!” Brooklyn screams. She kicks and squirms, fighting against the ropes binding her in place. “Just let me go!”
“Guys, help me hold her down,” Riley says. Alexis immediately moves behind Brooklyn and grabs her shoulders so she can’t throw herself against the ropes anymore. Grace hesitates, then crouches beside Riley and grabs Brooklyn’s wrist.
Riley moves both hands to the knife.
“Okay, okay!” Brooklyn shouts, fear slurring her words. “I killed the cat beneath the bleachers. It was wandering around my apartment complex, so I drowned it in my bathtub. Then I skinned it with this pocketknife I stole from a kid at school. Is that what you want to hear?”
“I don’t care what depraved thing you did with that cat.” Riley rocks the knife over Brooklyn’s finger and Brooklyn cringes from the sting of the blade. “Tell me about Mr. Willis.”
Brooklyn shakes her head. “He had an accident. What do you want me to say?”
Riley presses down on the knife. There’s a crunch as the blade slices through skin and nail and digs into the leather cover of the Bible beneath Brooklyn’s fingers. My breath catches in my throat, and I clench my eyes shut so I don’t see the tip of Brooklyn’s pinkie roll off the Bible and land on the floor with a sticky thud.
Brooklyn’s screaming vibrates through the basement and echoes off the walls. When I open my eyes again, Riley has another finger stretched across the Bible. Blood drips onto the floor, leaking from Brooklyn’s bloody pinkie. Riley didn’t cut off that much skin. She slid her knife right below the nail, taking only a millimeter of Brooklyn’s finger at most. Still, I can’t stop staring at the bloody stump she left behind.
I back up until I feel the cold concrete wall behind me. Sweat drenches my entire body. I don’t know what’s worse—the stories Brooklyn’s telling or what Riley’s doing to get her to admit to them.
“Tell me about Mr. Willis,” Riley says again.
“I killed him, too!” Brooklyn yells, struggling to pull her hand away. “I waited for him in the auditorium. I wanted it to look like an accident, so when he got out the ladder and started climbing, I . . . I . . .”
“You pushed him?” Riley finishes for her. Brooklyn presses her lips together and nods.
“Yes. Yes, I pushed him,” Brooklyn screams. “Are you happy now, you psycho?”
I taste sour bile at the back of my throat. I try to swallow, but the sharp, metallic scent of blood and the lingering smoke fill my nostrils. My stomach cramps and restricts, and acid rises in my throat. I drop to my knees and my entire body heaves, splattering vomit onto the concrete.
I look up and Brooklyn catches my eye. She slowly shakes her head and her eyes turn desperate, pained. She’s lying, I realize. She’s just trying to survive. I exhale in relief.
“Yes, actually, I am happy,” Riley says, her lips twisting into a sneer. “Now you just have to be baptized.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I work my fingers through the tangled knots binding Brooklyn to the pillar. She barely moves now, having passed out from blood loss or pain, I’m not sure. The stiff ropes scratch my skin, but they finally come loose and pull apart. We’re getting out of here, I want to tell Brooklyn. The baptism will be easy compared with what she’s already been through.
Brooklyn’s eyelids flicker but stay closed. Grace wraps a wad of toilet paper around the remaining stub of her finger and secures it with a few Band-Aids. I avoid looking at the bloody tissues while she works.
“Make sure to tie up her arms and legs again.” Riley sticks a heavy wooden cross and the remaining salt and holy water into the backpack. “We’re going all the way up to the second floor. Don’t want her to get loose.”
“Isn’t there a bathroom on the first floor?” I ask. Alexis crawls around me, toward Brooklyn’s legs, and starts retying the bindings at her ankles.
“Only the bathrooms on the second floor have bathtubs,” Riley says.
“Why do we need a tub?”
“You’ll see.” Riley’s words chill me, but I say nothing. I tie the ropes at Brooklyn’s wrists, leaving them loose intentionally—just in case. Alexis finishes the knot at Brooklyn’s ankles and starts to giggle.
“What’s so funny?” I ask her. Alexis glances up, but her eyes don’t quite focus on my face.
“It’s like she’s not even real,” she says, poking Brooklyn’s limp leg. “She’s like a doll.”
I try not to think too hard about what she means. Riley sets the backpack down next to the wall and grabs Brooklyn’s arms while Alexis and Grace take her legs. Even with the three of them lifting together, they’re only able to get her a few feet off the ground. They crouch as they walk, moving slowly toward the staircase. Alexis’s breathing grows heavier with every move, and Grace already looks like she might pass out. Sweat lines her forehead, and a few fuzzy strands of hair come loose from her ponytail. They stick out of her head at odd angles.
“Sof, can you blow out the candles?” Riley asks, groaning as she shifts Brooklyn’s weight. One of her arms is looped around Brooklyn’s torso, while Grace now holds her bound arms and shoulders. Riley’s face tightens every time she takes a step back. “And grab the backpack?”