Page 26 of Anarchy at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys 4)
With my knife buried in the dirt, I readjust my grip, until I’m holding onto Kali’s neck.
Just like Victor did to Kyler earlier, I lean forward with grim determination. Now that I’m in the same position, I can see why he did it. Why he knew he needed to do it. The dark will always play by its own rules. It’s all well and good to want a superhero, but it’s impossible to expect someone made of light to fight the shadows; they might disappear when there’s a ray of sunshine, but they’re not gone. They’ve just retreated. The night always returns, after all.
Kali drops her knife in her frenzy to get to my hands. That’s her mistake, losing that blade. Maybe, if she’d gotten lucky, she could’ve plunged it through my heart.
A gunshot echoes in the woods around me, a strange serenade mixed with the wicked metal music taking over the little ghost town. I barely hear it though. I’m too focused, too zoned-in. How could I not be, in that moment? A moment I’ve been waiting for, for what feels like forever.
Besides, there’s an intimacy to strangulation. I can see now why most murders carried out this way are between people who know one another. There’s a level of connection here that’s hard to explain.
My archenemy … her face, it turns red then blue. Her eyes bulge out of her skull, like two mean pits in the moonlight. She struggles fiercely and then starts to twitch.
I can’t do this.
The thought hits me so hard and so fast that I gasp like I’m the one being strangled.
I release Kali just as she begins to go still, and she pulls in this awful, choking breath. It’s wet and raspy, and it sounds like death incarnate. Shoving up to my feet, I stumble away and vomit into the bushes, bleeding everywhere and hating myself. You’re too weak, Bernadette, my mind hisses. You let Billie go, even though you shouldn’t have. And now, here, even knowing what she’s done to Aaron, you can’t finish it.
Am I too much the tortured, awful, self-righteous superhero? Are my morals tying my hands? Or is it something else?
I’ve talked a big game all night, to the boys, to myself … I promised and craved bloodshed. So why? Why? Fucking why?!
You’re better than Kali, that’s why, something inside of me says, and I stand up straight, turning to look at her. Kali is struggling to her feet, but I can’t let her get ahold of either knife so I move quickly back over and clock her in the face as hard as I can.
She falls to her ass in the bed of wet dirt and pine needles while I collect both knives from the forest floor.
“Where is Aaron?” I ask, standing above her and wishing she were smart enough to tell me. She won’t. I’ll have to keep her here; Havoc will show; she’ll die a horrible, gruesome death of her own orchestration. And I’ll let them do it because, as much as they’ve become my pets, I am truly and wholly theirs. “I will not ask you again.”
Kali laughs at me, turning over so that she’s on all fours. I allow her such an undignified fucking position. Her panties are showing. They’re red, a thong, crotchless. They don’t go with her dress at all. Not that lingerie needs to, but … it’s just a show of trying too hard. Desperation, that’s what they look like on her. A different girl could wear the same panties and look fierce. But not Kali.
“Aaron is dead, you moron,” she scoffs, each word like gravel as it slithers past her snake-like lips. “You really think I’d keep him around?” Kali uses a tree to get to her feet, still gasping and wheezing in such an awful way that I wish I’d just killed her when I had the chance. “A big-dicked pet? I raped him once and finished him—which is more than Neil ever did for Penelope, huh?”
Red flashes across my eyes, and I know that she’s just done it, pushed a button that can’t be undone. I’m going to kill her, and this time, I’m not going to stop. I go for Kali, but when she turns, she has a tube of lipstick that doesn’t look quite right.
Fuck my life, it’s a stun gun, isn’t it? They make those, you know, for women’s self-defense. They hurt, sure, but they’re not nearly as powerful as say, a TASER. I should be fine. Should, being the key word.
The air crackles with electricity as Kali shoves that gold tube into the stab wound on my side as hard as she can. My body revolts, my fingers tightening around the knife blades and then releasing. I end up on my back on the forest floor, biting my own tongue and convulsing.
