Page 28 of Anarchy at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys 4)
“You killed him,” Kali says, but she doesn’t seem quite so sure of herself which I like.
“He left,” I whisper, finally daring to look up at her. She’s standing against the moon, so I can’t see anything about her other than her silhouette. Since I’m bathed in silver moonlight, I bet she can see everything, right down to the finely painted bones on my skeleton mask. “When the boys and I confronted him. We couldn’t very well kill a cop and he knew it, so we gave him a choice …”
“You’re a liar!” Kali screams, stepping forward. Her hands are shaking now, not so sure of herself as she thinks. “He wouldn’t leave me here like that. We had something different; we understood each other. No, no, you killed him. You and those dirty, rotten Havoc boys.”
I smile at her, aware that in the next thirty seconds, one of us is going to die. I’m going to make sure of that.
“He ran away because he didn’t care about you, Kali. Nobody does.” I pause and shake my head, slurring my words a bit. Guess that’s what an electric shock will do to you. “Nobody but me. I loved you like a sister, too, like an equal to Penelope. But you fucked me over. And for what? A chance at a pageant you didn’t win? A jealousy that was unfounded because Aaron could never love you when he was made for me?” I pause and grasp fully onto the bit of stone. If I time this right, I can hit her with it. It’s hard to take a shot at someone when a brick of cement is being lobbed at your face. “You threw away my love for something cheap and replaceable. I hope that, wherever you go after this, you remember that.”
“Neil is dead,” Kali repeats, like it hasn’t quite hit her yet. Maybe she really did love him? Monsters can love other monsters. I know that because I am one, and I love as fiercely and deeply as the earth. “He’s dead and you killed him.”
I shove up to my feet, throwing the bit of broken headstone and hitting Kali with it. The gun goes off anyway, but it misses me by several feet as I make the split-second decision to leave my knife and charge her. If she keeps the gun, it’s over. That’s it. No more Bernadette Savannah Blackbird. No more Havoc Girl.
The boys might never be the same again. I don’t hold a ton of credit to my own worth, but … I think that they might.
Our bodies collide, and I manage to get the gun, putting it up to her forehead and staring down at her. This time, I don’t hesitate. I won’t, not anymore.
The barrel of the gun rests against Kali’s pale skin.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her, because I am.
And then I pull the trigger.
But nothing happens.
With a scream, Kali takes advantage of my surprise and my blood loss to shove me off of her. I’m cold now, and shaking. Fuck, I’ll probably need a blood transfusion the way Aaron did, on a school nurse’s couch during the witching hour.
Kali dances away as I sit in the grass, panting, my hand on my side, trying and failing to stop anymore of that awful bleeding.
“You’re not so clever as you think, bitch.” Kali moves over to something in the grass. It’s too dark for me to have seen it, but she seems to know exactly what she’s looking for. I watch in horror as she turns and, bathed once again in moonlight, slams the magazine back into the pistol. Fuck. That was a clever, move, I have to admit. “Goodnight, Bernadette,” she tells me, lifting the weapon up and putting her finger on the trigger.
I see her hand flex and tense as she goes to pull it, and I close my eyes at the sound of a gunshot. We’re out in the open now, so the boom rings sharp and clear, scaring away a murder of crows that were nesting in the trees.
When nothing happens, no sharp slice of fire and pain, no flood of darkness, I open my eyes and find Kali on her knees. She doesn’t stay there for long, shaking and bleeding and staring down at her chest like she’s as unsure as I am as to where that shot just came from.
“Bernadette,” a voice says. The sound is dark with pain, but clear and sharp and oh so familiar that I want to cry.
Aaron. Aaron. It’s fucking Aaron!
I look up as he appears at the break in the stone fence, holding his weapon on Kali but his eyes on me.
I’ve never seen anything so beautiful as that, as Aaron Fadler with blood on his face and hands, a grim frown spread across his full lips. He’s as dark as he is light, the perfect dichotomy. Moonlight streams over him in a silver blanket, making his chestnut hair shine.
