last breath, but there was a tiny part of her—the
Romeo and Juliet
part, the Heathcliff and Catherine—that thought for the briefest second that maybe this moment was what she’d always been meant for.
Maybe she’d been born to die by this boy’s hands.
Situation: What would it be like to have an out-of-body experience? To watch someone kill you? When she was dead, would he put flowers on her grave? Would she haunt him, now and always?
“The game ends now.”
The words brought Claire back to the present. To the terror. To the chilling understanding that death was never romantic; there was a difference between being stalked and being wooed.
Do something
.
He was closer now, close enough that she could feelthe heat of his body on the other side of the blanket. Her heart beat faster. Her side ached like someone was splitting the bones with an ice pick.
You need a weapon. A way out. Something. Anything
.
Slowly, her killer peeled the blanket away from her face. His features—each severe in its own right—came together to form an expression that was somehow gentle, full of longing. It made him look like someone who wanted something, wanted it as badly as Claire had wanted just one person to scrawl a private joke on the pages of her yearbook.
Me. He wants me
.
Claire had read about this kind of knowledge—the kind you felt in your bones, from the tips of your toes to the top of your skull.
She’d read about it, and she’d believed in it, and she’d imagined it. But she hadn’t spent even a second wanting it herself, because she’d been too busy trying not to long for simpler things—smiles from strangers, someone to eat lunch with, parents who took her picture on the first day of school.
He’s going to hurt me. I’m going to die
.
Claire couldn’t hear herself think over the sound of her body’s terror—the certainty that be it kiss or kill, there would be no escaping the predator stalking her now.
I can’t stop it. Nothing I do will stop it. Can’t think. Can’t speak. Can’t move
.
Claire could feel hysteria bubbling up in her stomach and traveling like an air bubble through her throat. When it burst out of her mouth, she thought for a moment that she might have thrown up, but then she realized that she was giggling.
Like a lunatic.
And God must have had an awfully twisted sense of humor, because a second later, so was the boy.
Nix could not remember laughing. Ever. He’d tried once. Practiced. But with no one to listen, it was a horrible sound, and it hadn’t brought him half the feeling of a single cut—long and thin—in one palm.
But now he was doing it. He was laughing. At Claire, clutching that blanket, giggling like a fiend. For a second, he thought that it would be enough, that this one moment would be enough to keep him and hold him and warm him for an eternity. He could kill her now.
Cut himself off, before this addiction went too far.
He dropped silently to his knees beside the sofa, bringing himself to her level. He cleared his mind, pushing away all thoughts of her—
her expressions, the sound of her laughter, the feel of her skin
—and concentrating on a single word.
Null
.
She deserved this. For the life he’d been forced to live, for making him wonder and long for things best left unwondered and unlonged for, she deserved it.
He rose from his knees into a crouch. He closed his eyes and breathed in her soft, sweet scent—sunscreen and cinnamon—and then he reached down and placed his hands on either side of her neck.
Make it quick
.
7
Claire had, not surprisingly, imagined what death would be like. In fact, close to one-sixth of her Situations had ended with her own untimely demise. She’d run into flaming buildings and jumped in front of bullets meant for those she loved, and she’d died of leukemia and gotten hit by cars—loads of them, as ironic as that was.
But she’d just never imagined going out like this. More whimper than bang. Desperate.
Romeo and Juliet
part, the Heathcliff and Catherine—that thought for the briefest second that maybe this moment was what she’d always been meant for.
Maybe she’d been born to die by this boy’s hands.
Situation: What would it be like to have an out-of-body experience? To watch someone kill you? When she was dead, would he put flowers on her grave? Would she haunt him, now and always?
“The game ends now.”
The words brought Claire back to the present. To the terror. To the chilling understanding that death was never romantic; there was a difference between being stalked and being wooed.
Do something
.
He was closer now, close enough that she could feelthe heat of his body on the other side of the blanket. Her heart beat faster. Her side ached like someone was splitting the bones with an ice pick.
You need a weapon. A way out. Something. Anything
.
Slowly, her killer peeled the blanket away from her face. His features—each severe in its own right—came together to form an expression that was somehow gentle, full of longing. It made him look like someone who wanted something, wanted it as badly as Claire had wanted just one person to scrawl a private joke on the pages of her yearbook.
Me. He wants me
.
Claire had read about this kind of knowledge—the kind you felt in your bones, from the tips of your toes to the top of your skull.
She’d read about it, and she’d believed in it, and she’d imagined it. But she hadn’t spent even a second wanting it herself, because she’d been too busy trying not to long for simpler things—smiles from strangers, someone to eat lunch with, parents who took her picture on the first day of school.
He’s going to hurt me. I’m going to die
.
Claire couldn’t hear herself think over the sound of her body’s terror—the certainty that be it kiss or kill, there would be no escaping the predator stalking her now.
I can’t stop it. Nothing I do will stop it. Can’t think. Can’t speak. Can’t move
.
Claire could feel hysteria bubbling up in her stomach and traveling like an air bubble through her throat. When it burst out of her mouth, she thought for a moment that she might have thrown up, but then she realized that she was giggling.
Like a lunatic.
And God must have had an awfully twisted sense of humor, because a second later, so was the boy.
Nix could not remember laughing. Ever. He’d tried once. Practiced. But with no one to listen, it was a horrible sound, and it hadn’t brought him half the feeling of a single cut—long and thin—in one palm.
But now he was doing it. He was laughing. At Claire, clutching that blanket, giggling like a fiend. For a second, he thought that it would be enough, that this one moment would be enough to keep him and hold him and warm him for an eternity. He could kill her now.
Cut himself off, before this addiction went too far.
He dropped silently to his knees beside the sofa, bringing himself to her level. He cleared his mind, pushing away all thoughts of her—
her expressions, the sound of her laughter, the feel of her skin
—and concentrating on a single word.
Null
.
She deserved this. For the life he’d been forced to live, for making him wonder and long for things best left unwondered and unlonged for, she deserved it.
He rose from his knees into a crouch. He closed his eyes and breathed in her soft, sweet scent—sunscreen and cinnamon—and then he reached down and placed his hands on either side of her neck.
Make it quick
.
7
Claire had, not surprisingly, imagined what death would be like. In fact, close to one-sixth of her Situations had ended with her own untimely demise. She’d run into flaming buildings and jumped in front of bullets meant for those she loved, and she’d died of leukemia and gotten hit by cars—loads of them, as ironic as that was.
But she’d just never imagined going out like this. More whimper than bang. Desperate.
Similar Books
