Page 110 of Hide And Seek

“That was before you opened your stupid mouth,” Sutton said, rolling her eyes.

“Guys! Enough! How many times do I have to tell you to stop sniping at each other?” Caitlin said. “It’s not helping!”

“How about you stop telling us what to do?” Sutton fired back. “You’re not even at risk here. So you can stop pretending any of this matters to you.”

Caitlin’s eyes widened. “Excuse me?”

Sutton gestured wildly around the room. “Did you forget what’s happening?” she said. “It’s only Legacies getting killed.”

“We don’t know that for sure. He could start going after other pe—”

“Justlook!” Sutton shrieked, cutting her off. “There were sixteen of us at the start, and now there’s seven! But you Dirtbags? Seventeen at the start, still seventeen now!”

“It doesn’t mean we aren’t in danger. He might start going after other people next. We have no way of knowing.”

Their argument kept going, voices overlapping, sharper and angrier now. Jasmine leaned in beside me, her shoulderbrushing mine as she grabbed a protein bar. “This is getting bad,” she muttered.

“I know,” I said quietly. “I think it’s time to tell them about Rhys.”

“No.” She shook her head immediately. “Absolutely not.”

“Jasmine, we have to saysomething.”

She shook her head again. “We don’t actually know if it’s him or not, and you heard Sutton last night,” she said, voice low but urgent. “If we accuse him and we’re wrong, they could turn on us. Kick us out to fend for ourselves.”

“I don’t think they’d actually do that.”

“It’s not just that. They might even think we’re making stuff up to divert attention from us, becausewe’reactually the real killers.”

I sighed. “We’re just going to have to take that risk.”

“Wait. I’m not done.” Jasmine lifted a palm. “Think about what happens if we tell everyone about Rhys and our suspicions, and we actually turn out to be right.”

I blinked. “Um… the case is solved?”

“Think a little more short-term.”

“I’m not following,” I said, minutely shaking my head.

She took a deep breath. “Right now, he’s leaving us alone. Probably because we’ve been feeding him, and also because he’s got a raging boner for you,” she said. Her gaze flicked briefly toward the door. “So if he really is the killer, then right now we’re pretty damn safe. Especiallyyou. You could probably go and dance in the woods at midnight and you’d be fine. But if we expose him and accuse him… what do you think happens then?”

My stomach instantly started churning. “We make ourselves his number one targets.”

“Exactly. So I’m sorry, but until we have enough evidence to prove that he’s actually guilty, I think we need to keep our mouths shut.”

“But how are we even supposed to get any evidence at this point?” I shot back under my breath. “He’s anticipated everything so far, and he’s covered—”

“What the fuck are you two whispering about over there?”

My head snapped up. Sutton was staring straight at us, arms folded tight across her chest.

“Um… what?” I said.

“I asked what you’re whispering about,” she replied, eyes narrowing.

“Same thing as everyone else,” Jasmine said. “This fucked-up nightmare we’re all stuck in.”

“Oh, really?”