Total pages in book: 121
Estimated words: 117820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 589(@200wpm)___ 471(@250wpm)___ 393(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 589(@200wpm)___ 471(@250wpm)___ 393(@300wpm)
“Oh my God,” I breathe, unable to comprehend what I’m seeing. What is happening?
“Come on!” Kane yells at me, extending his hand over Mr. Martin’s body that’s blocking the doorway. “Don’t step in the blood.”
His eyes are wide and alive, the blue is vibrant with excitement and fear. His long hair is tucked behind his ears but some of it is cutting across his face in a different direction to his parting. I don’t know why I’m noticing these things, like the fact he’s wearing the same clothing as yesterday, or the fact he’s here at all.
“Come on! The cops are coming, that shot would have been heard for fucking miles! MOVE YOUR ASS!” He grabs my bicep with his uninjured arm and yanks me towards him.
I carefully step over the puddle of blood that is growing by the second, and the lifeless man that I’m almost certain was about to hurt me. I knew it too, yet I still came. I had a feeling but I just thought that he’s an adult so he wouldn’t, but then look at Mee-maw. She’s an adult and she hurts me all the time.
“Wait,” I utter, pulling back when Kane starts to drag me away.
“We don’t have fucking time.”
I drop to my knees by the blood and reach carefully into Martin’s back pocket. With some yanking, I get the wad of cash free, watching his closed eyes for any sign of life. He’s still breathing.
Kane grabs me again as I pocket the money and we run from the store which he unlocks using his sleeve.
We go around the back and duck down an alleyway between homes, then cut through somebody’s yard and keep going until we’re almost at the school.
He stops me suddenly. Panting as much as I am from the exertion.
“You went there to help him move shit around and then you left for school,” Kane says, shaking me to get my attention. When I don’t immediately look at him, he pinches my cheeks with his finger and thumb. “Give me your fucking eyes, Imogen. I need to know you hear me.”
“I hear you.”
“Okay. But only if they come to you. Don’t go to them.”
I start to look away again, unable to hold the intensity of his gaze but he gives my cheek a gentle pat and presses my body into a brick wall.
“Immy, repeat it.”
“If they ask, I left for school and he was… he was fine.”
“Exactly.”
My brows pull together. “Did you shoot him?”
“What? No!” He pushes a hand through his hair and snags on the knots. “I put a board on the ground with a nail on it. He fucking stood on the nail but I didn’t know he had a gun. He shot himself the dumb fuck.”
I close my eyes and tears leak from the corners. “Maybe we should just tell somebody.”
“Give me your fucking eyes.” They ping open and he shoves me hard against the wall. My head aches where it hits it and a gasp chokes me. “How fuckin’ stupid are you? Huh?”
“What did I do?”
“You never should have gone there, you seen how he looks at you!”
He’s right, I ignored the signs.
“You’re so stupid, Imogen. So fucking stupid.” With another shove, he steps away and leaves me shaking and reeling. “Go to school. Stupid fucking cunt.”
“Don’t talk to me like that,” I yell, running up behind him and pushing him by the shoulders, he stumbles forward a step before spinning to face me, fury in his bulging eyes.
“Then stop being so fucking dumb and naïve!” He spits at my feet, his blue eyes glowing with rage. “And keep your mouth shut. Don’t let me remind you.”
Sirens pass us by, and he doesn’t even flinch, he just carries on to school like it’s no big deal that he just almost killed a man. Or aided in his fate at the very least.
26 years old
“Are you fucking insane? What you’re going to smash up a dead lady’s home to get my attention?”
“Always had to be extreme with you, Immy. You fucking loved it when I went wild for you.” He brings the cigar to his lips and pulls it into his mouth before releasing a waterfall of smoke that he sucks through his nostrils. The effect is mesmerizing.
“So… what?” I ask, dazed by him for a moment. “This is you going wild for me?”
He eyes me with a dark gaze as he blows the smoke away from us both. “This is me wanting to talk.”
“We’ve got nothing to say to each other.”
“We got everything to say to each other.”
I shake my head and wrap my arms around myself. “Say what you want to say then. I’m not promising I’ll listen, or even care, but I’ll make a good effort to trick you into thinking that I’m doing both.”
Looking me up and down, he rolls his tongue over his lip. Why does he do this? Stare me down like he’s searching for all of the cracks in my mask while working out how to break them.