Darkness begins to fall and I’m pretty sure that the press will give up soon. It isn’t that interesting a story. I haven’t murdered anyone, I haven’t done anything worthy of them sticking around for days on end, so I assume they’re going to go soon. Once they do, I’m out of here. I don’t know where I’ll go, but somewhere away from my house. At least for a while.
“This isn’t running away,” I remind myself. “This is just getting some space.”
Once I’m in a safe place, I’ll message Sal and let her know to avoid coming to the office for a while. As long as I still pay her as normal, I’m sure she’ll be fine. I guess there’s no guarantee that she’ll remain loyal to me, but I can’t really fight that.
I’d like to think she would, but with all this going on, there isn’t much chance.
I glance back at my bag, mentally checking everything off on the list that I’ll need, and once I have, I dart my eyes back to the window. Soon enough, they’ll leave. It can’t be much longer.
Ring, ring…
Like I have been doing all day long, I keep leaping on my phone the moment it rings. Any number I don’t recognize I don’t answer because it’s generally a journalist, but even though it’s only been a few hours, I crave the voice of another human, like I’ve been in solitude.
/> “Nova?” My heart races a million times faster. “Oh my God.”
I haven’t heard from her all day despite numerous attempts to contact her, and that’s had me worried. Thank goodness she’s finally ringing me now. Relief washes over me, this is the first good thing to happen to me all freaking day long.
“Hello?” I gasp out. “Nova.”
“Ah, Zane.” A smug male voice answers instead. “It’s good to finally speak to you.”
“Who is this?” I snap, the anger rolling back through me again.
“I cannot believe you’re acting like you don’t know me. We’re friends, aren’t we?”
“If we were friends, I would know who you are.”
“We know each other. You know that we’ve been in the same place at the same time, lots and lots. You can’t deny that we know one another.”
“I…” I don’t want to think about who this might be. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Okay fine.” The mystery voice lets out a frustrated sigh. “I’ll be honest. It’s Jeremy.”
I half suspected, but hearing this crushes me. It absolutely destroys me. Knowing that Jeremy must be with Nova is awful. Now, I assume this is going to be the call telling me that she’s gone back to him and to leave her alone. Since it’s coming from her cell phone, she must have agreed to it. And that’s the hardest part of all.
“Jeremy? What do you want?”
“I just wanted to let you know that I’ve been speaking to Nova…”
I hang my head low, blue with sadness. It’s happening, she’s done with me, it’s over. Much as I knew it the moment I got the note, it still really aches to know that I’ve lost her.
“Let’s cut to the chase, is she back with you?”
He cackles loudly, the sound radiating through the phone. “Oh no, she isn’t.”
“Right… so, what’s going on then? Why are you contacting me?”
“I just want to let you know that Nova is dead.”
The world falls away from underneath me, I can barely keep standing upright. It’s almost as if someone has whipped the carpet away and now I’m tumbling, falling, tripping. I can’t stop that sensation from flooding me. I reach out to grab the window sill to keep me upright.
“What… what are you talking about?” I gasp desperately. “What do you mean?”
“Do you not know what dead means? You hang around with shady characters, don’t you?”
Hot blood rushes to my ears. “You fucking asshole, that was you, wasn’t it?”
“I tried to warn you. You don’t take away something that belongs to me.”