Nightfall (Devil's Night 4)

But instead of looking at Damon or Michael when he said that, Kai met my eyes, a knowing smile playing behind them. I flipped him off, and he just laughed silently.

“Blood would be better,” Damon pointed out, plucking his cigarette back, taking a drag, blowing the smoke up to the sky, and then flicking the butt off somewhere. “Come on. We’ll pick someone. Someone who deserves it. Stalk her—or him—watch them, plan how we’re going to get away with it, dispose of the body…”

I shook my head, only half listening as I scanned the parking lot again for Em.

“And then watch this town lose their minds at the danger lurking right under their noses,” Damon said. “It’ll be fun.”

I heard someone breathe out a laugh again, but then silence fell, and no one said anything.

Because while no one was ready to do more than entertain the idea as a joke, not one of us doubted that Damon was somewhat serious.

He might even already have someone in mind.

“I’m so glad you’re on my side sometimes,” Michael told him.

But Damon just took out another cigarette and lit it, musing out loud. “We’d be bound together in the secret forever.”

“Yeah, well, there’s no one I want to kill,” Kai said.

Damon just stared up to the sky before bringing the cigarette toward his mouth again. “Lucky you,” he murmured.

I looked down at him, his gaze still on the clouds, and I couldn’t help this feeling in my gut.

Michael and Kai needed something to happen, and I… I already felt it coming.

The first bell rang, and we all headed indoors, students racing up the steps and trying to maneuver their way down the halls.

She’ll be in class. She never misses school.

After stopping at the lockers and dodging conversations the others got tangled in on the way down the hall, I finally dove into lit class with my book and binder, looking to see who she planted herself around, so I knew whose ass to move.

But as I looked, I only spotted Chase Deery and Morgan Rackham in the classroom. No one else.

I stopped for a moment, faltering. Fucking great. This was what I got for rushing and trying to pretend like I wasn’t rushing. Now I got to sit here like a dumbbell, and if she came in and sat far away, I couldn’t move, or else she’d know I was waiting for her.

And I didn’t want her to know I was waiting for her.

Continuing to a seat toward the windows, I took out my phone, pretending to look busy.

People drifted in, filling the seats, but I didn’t look up as Kai, Michael, and Damon surrounded me.

As the minutes passed, I barely registered the teacher talking, the papers shuffling, or the nudge on my shoulder to pass the new packets back.

There was only one thing I was aware of as I sat there.

She wasn’t here.

Maybe she was taking her time. She hated this class, after all.

But as the class wore on and she was nowhere to be seen, I barely heard a fucking word the whole time.

We started a new book. The teacher passed them out and finished his lecture, and something was due by the end of the week, but if it wasn’t tomorrow, then I didn’t care.

I didn’t give a shit. Where the hell was she?

The bell rang, and everyone rose from their seats, piling out of the classroom, but instead of turning left outside the classroom, toward my next class, I turned right.

“Hey, where are you going?” Michael asked.