Page 39 of Unhinged Obsession

“Isn’t he supposed to be fucking dead?” Noah asks, out of breath as he runs toward us, weaving in and out of headstones.

“Nobody is doing anything that I need them to, so why not this?” I say flippantly, because, of course, the guy we dragged out in the woods and left to decay would be alive.

“Did you check his pulse?” Noah asks. He is the most unhelpful person in the entire world, and I don’t even know why I call him. I’d be better off doing this alone; at least that way my blood pressure would be at a decent number.

“You were there, asshole. None of us did. He fell and cracked his head open. Why the fuck would I think to check his pulse?” I snap, and Noah holds his hands up defensively, like he thinks what he asked is perfectly reasonable in this situation.

I feel Blair grip the back of my shirt like she senses something is coming. Just then, Jonathan steps out from behind a monument of a founder of the Black Crown Society. How fitting. It depicts him riding a rearing horse, and I can’t take any of this seriously right now.

Jonathan loses the mask, tossing it on a random grave before walking toward us. I pull out my gun and shoot him in the leg right around his knee without any forethought. I don’t give a single fuck anymore… well, negative fucks because I started at zero anyway.

He screams, and I hear Blair gasp behind me, but I push her to stay back there. I don’t know if he has a gun.

“Well, if a gaping head wound didn’t kill him, I don’t think a shot to the patella is going to do the trick,” Noah says in a sing-song voice while Jonathan groans in agony, trying to flip over on his stomach, presumably to try and crawl away.

“No shit, I want to know why he did all this before I kill him,” I say, waving my hand at him without the gun. If I accidentally shot him, no one would believe it wasn’t on purpose with the way we bicker. “And where the fuck did you learn a word like patella? Have you even ever been inside a classroom at this school?”

“Guys, can you do this later?” Blair peeps out, coming to stand next to me as Jonathan flips over on his stomach completely, letting out a howl.

“Not this school,” Noah wiggles his eyebrows suggestively.

“You know what, I don’t even care where you’ve been or what you’re doing, but patella was a weird choice,” I say, nudging Blair between my brother and me as we advance on Jonathan.

When we reach him, I kick him hard in the ribs, forcing him to roll over and look up at me. “What the fuck is your issue?” I ask, pointing my gun at his head. I want him to know that if he makes one wrong move toward Blair, I’m going to blow a hole in his face.

“You dragged me out in the woods and left me for dead, and you want to know what my issue is?” Jonathan screams. “The Society has cameras all over this school. Do you know what they’ll do to you when they see you kill me? You’re done for, and you’re too stupid to recognize it.”

My wife is the one who leans down and speaks to him. I keep an eye on his hands to make sure he doesn’t have an opportunity to harm her in any way. “Newsflash, buddy, the Moretti’s have a murder of their own, caught on tape and sent to none other than Caiden Grey for safekeeping. They could drag you out in front of the cathedral and set you on fire right beneath the Black Crown emblem, and no one would be dumb enough to touch them.” I can see my little dove is vibrating with anger.

It seems like the blood is draining from Jonathan’s face. I’m not sure if it’s the stark realization that he does not, in fact, have the upper hand in this situation or if it’s the gaping hole in his knee.

“That’s how you got them to pair you together for the ceremony?” Jonathan asks, and I’m not sure why he cares.

“We’re not paired together for the ceremony. We’re married. Husband and wife,” Blair says to him. “Til’ death do us part.” She slaps Jonathan in the face, grabbing his chin and making him look at her. “Did you beat up my best friend and leave her to die in a horse field?”

“Obviously, I mean, he’s been fucking with us…” Noah starts, but I reach out and flick him in the Adam’s apple because I want to see where she’s going with this line of questioning.

“No,” Jonathan says. “I left the notes, but the other stuff was…” he trails off, coughing up blood. I guess I kicked him a little harder than I originally thought.

“That was who? Who hurt Paris?” Blair’s voice is not loud, but it’s deadly. “Did you drug me and change my clothes? Did you look at my naked body and then dump me off in the cathedral for other men to look at me?”

I almost fucking forgot about that.

I shoot him in the other knee, and he screams in pain, writhing on the ground like the little bitch that he is.

Blair looks up at me, and I shrug. “I can’t be held responsible if you’re going to bring up your naked body.”

“No, no, no!” Jonathan screams. “I told her she was getting messy. I told her…”

“Who was it?” Blair asks again, but I can hear the relief in her voice that it wasn’t Jonathan who took her clothes off.

Noah nudges me with his shoulder, and when I look over, I see that his mood has shifted and he’s serious. “Let me do it,” he says, nodding his head toward Jonathan. “For Ivy.”

Without question, I hand Noah my gun. His relationship with Ivy is really complicated in a way I don’t care to understand. That’s his deal, but I know how I would feel if some asshole tried to force himself on my wife.

I’d have already blown his head off, put it back on, and done it three more times.

Jonathan reaches up and tries to grab Blair, and without missing a beat, Noah shoots him in the face three times, hopefully killing him this time.