Danny’s face contorts. Something feral flashes through his eyes. Despite all the blood loss, he lunges forward with a scream, arms outstretched like he’s reaching for her.
Hayden doesn’t flinch. He smashes the butt of his gun into Danny’s skull, dropping him to his knees, howling.
“Don’t fucking think about it,” I snap, stepping in front of Lilac. “I’ll cut your head off if you ever try to touch her again.”
Danny wheezes, blood and spit clinging to his chin.
“Even my uncle knew how obsessed I was with you,” he snarls at Lilac. “He let me bring girls here. Let me dress them up like you so I could havesomething.” His voice breaks. “I almost had you.”
My jaw ticks hard. Whittaker was his uncle, or some variation of I guess. They don’t share the same last name, but that doesn’t mean anything.
“I put it in Lexi’s ear that we should come up here. She was so fucking dumb and gullible, wasn’t she?” he goes on, and he sounds so unhinged in the worst fucking way. “I made it sound so forbidden. Breaking into the crazy old professor’s gothic mansion. She had no clue he was my uncle. She convinced you girls to snoop around, and she was too fucking stupid to realize I was setting it up! It wasn’t until she started inviting the guys that shit went sideways. Especially when your brother and your fucking guard dog showed up uninvited.” He’s just rambling now when he says, “He was just like me, you know. My uncle helped me kill them, taught me how to cut their necks just right. But they weren’t you. They could never be you. ”
It’s not just a confession. It’s a breakdown. A guttural, primal release of everything he’s held inside.
Lilac stares him down, eyes full of disgust.
“Why did you want to hurt me?” she asks, and her voice shakes. “What did I ever do to you?”
Danny loses it.
“Nothing!” he screams, spit flying. “That’s the whole fucking point! You never did anything to me!”
He lunges again, but Hayden kicks him square in the chest, not hard, just enough to knock him back into the dirt.
“He’ll stomp your face in if you touch her,” Hayden says flatly. “If you want to be put down humanely, I suggest you simmer down. Is there anyone else up in the house?”
“No! It was me and my uncle, you dumbass,” Danny slings the slur at Hayden, but his bloodshot eyes never leave Lilac.
“I wanted you,” Danny says. “I would’ve given youanything.But you never noticed me. You pulled away if I so much as touched your shoulder. I was invisible to you because I wasn’t some big dick hockey player who just wants to fuck you like the whore that you are!”
The second the word leaves his mouth, I move.
Lilac flinches, and I pull her into my chest, hand cradling her head, shielding her ears.
I lift my gun and unload one bullet to Danny’s neck and another one between his eyes.
Danny drops, laid out on his side like a puppet whose strings were cut.
I lower the weapon slowly, then press a kiss to Lilac’s temple.
“No one,” I murmur against her skin, “is going to call you a name and think they’re going to live another second.”
A rustling draws our attention and Ramsey stalks out of the woods, brushing leaves off his jacket, looking annoyed as ever. I didn’t notice he wasn’t here this whole time.
“Where the fuck did you go?” Hayden asks, checking his own gun before sliding it into the band of his jeans.
“I don’t have time to stand around and listen to a sniveling little bitch whine that no one wants to suck his shrimp dick,” Ramsey mutters. “I just walked up to the house. No one alive inthere. Must’ve just been him and the old man letting him live out his morbid little fantasies.”
“You could’ve been killed,” Lilac says, disbelief written across her face.
Ramsey shrugs. “I’ve got places to go, people to see, lives to ruin.” He chuckles, and I feel Lilac finally start to relax in my arms. The tension in her spine eases just a little.
“I can’t believe all this,” she whispers. “The girls he killed… just because he couldn’t get to me.”
“Oh, there’s at least nine girls up there,” Ramsey says casually. “Throats slashed. All wearing the same light purple skate dress thingy.” He waves a hand like he couldn’t care less what it’s actually called.
“Girls from our school?” I ask, already knowing I won’t like the answer.
