Carter Reed

everything was groggy. Nothing made sense, and my back was killing me. It protested when I uncurled from the ball I had formed and spasms shot up. I nearly screamed, but threw my hand over my mouth to muffle the sound. I couldn’t make a sound. A sixth sense instantly reared, but then I frowned as different noises came from behind me. A pot clanged against a pan, and there was a sizzling from something being fried, which was quickly covered with a curse before the fire alarm went off.
    I rolled over as found myself on half of a mattress, pulled into a corner of a living room. Peering over the two couches in front of me, that boxed me into the corner, I remembered.
    We were at Ben’s.
    Mallory had been screaming and crying. Mallory had been raped.
    I dropped back to the mattress with a thump.
    Jeremy Dunvan.
    Panic swelled in me, but then the front door burst open. I jumped back and screamed. I kept screaming when it banged shut and people ran to the living room. And, even as I saw it was a friend, I couldn’t stop the scream.
    “Jeremy.”
    My own voice haunted me. The bang of the gun came back and I felt the kickback in my hand again.
    “You have to be quiet. People will hear.”
    With an anguished gasp, I closed my mouth and fell over. Bending forward, I buried my head into the pillow. Another scream rushed through me. What had I done with the gun? Oh god. There was evidence. I couldn’t remember where I had put it.
    Soft hands touched my shoulder. “Emma.”
    I heard Amanda’s voice, one of the few that I trusted. She knelt beside me and gathered me to her. “Come on. Lift up.” Her finger slid underneath my chin, and she raised my head. I gasped for breath, but I couldn’t breathe. My entire body wrenched forward, and I started to pound my chest. The panic swirled in my chest. It was suffocating me. Oh god. The gun.
    Slap!
    My head snapped to the left, but I never felt the sting from her hand. It was enough to pull me back so I could breathe again. I looked back as I felt my pulse slowing down and grasped Amanda’s elbows. “Thank you.”
    She brushed back some of her blonde hair and smiled. It was a gentle smile, but I didn’t care that it was from pity. I grabbed her and held on with all my might. She had no idea, she couldn’t have, but she was there. I drew in a ragged breath.
    “Amanda.” Ben stopped in the doorway between the kitchen and living room. He had a white apron tied around his waist and he was shirtless. The jeans he wore underneath were wrinkled and ripped at the knees. They looked like he had slept in them, but then I saw the tear streaks on his chest and realized that he had slept in them. He had held Mallory during the night.
    She waved a hand to him. “We’re fine. We’ll be there in a second, okay?”
    He narrowed his black eyes.
    I frowned as I saw how his black hair was messed, like a hand had run through it over and over. I saw the red nail marks on his chest and I shot to my feet. “Are you kidding me?”
    “Emma.” Amanda shot to her feet beside me. She tried to block me, but I pushed aside all 98 pounds of her.
    “You slept with her?! You had sex with her last night?”
    He frowned and scratched at his chest. My eyes narrowed as I saw more scratches, long and red. They ran the entire length of his skinny torso. They stuck out against his pale skin. A different sickness came over me. It gurgled up from deep inside and threatened to spew out, but I couldn’t move. I could only look in revulsion.
    He sighed as his hand lifted to his hair. It fisted around a clump of his black strands and pulled at them before he took another deep breath. His shoulders slumped then and the hand dropped to his side. “What do you want, Emma? She didn’t want to feel him anymore. She wanted to feel me. She wanted another man’s touch.”
    “Did it work?” I spat out. I already knew it hadn’t.
    His head fell down. The towel he held in his other hand slipped to the ground. Then he lifted bleak eyes to me. “She’s been crying ever since.”
    “Ben!”
    “Oh, come on, Amanda.” His arms went wide. “You weren’t here. I was the only one. I didn’t know what to do. Mallory was a complete mess the entire night and this one,” his hand pointed at me, “was a zombie too. This was the first sign she was alive since that night. I thought I needed to take her to the hospital too.”
    My heart stopped. “You didn’t.”
    “No.” His eyes flashed with disgust. “But I