Fuck, asking about Leo was the wrong tactic. Tears burned my eyes, but I fought them back.Stay strong.
“Help!” I screamed.
“Shut up!” Kayla raised the knife.
Help would come. I just had to hold her off a little longer. How the fuck could I do that though? What could I say?
Kayla didn’t give me a chance to figure it out. “I don’t even know what Dylan sees in you.” She sneered, using the knife to point up and down my body as she closed the distance between us.
“You talk like an idiot.” Kayla smiled as she pointed the knife at my face.
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t talk or beg or scream. I couldn’t breathe.
“I’ll make Dylan regret fucking with me. He thinks he’s so perfect. Do you think you’re perfect too?” Her deranged smile grew bigger as she slowly moved the knife closer. “You’re not, bitch. I’ll make sure Dyan never forgets it. He won’t want to kiss these dumb lips that can’t talk. Not after I slice them up.”
The cold, hard tip of the knife touched my top lip and I jolted into action. I jerked my head back, away from the knife, and threw my hands between us.
She laughed that evil laugh again and swung the knife back and forth, taunting me. I tried to dodge her. Fuck! The damn bags. A sharp jolt of pain surged up my ankle, but worse, I felt the ground shift beneath me. No! I couldn’t fall. Anything but that.
The truck was my saving grace. I leaned against it, dropping one hand against it to brace myself. The throbbing in my ankle was a horrifying warning that it might not hold my weight.
With a chilling grin, like the villain in a horror movie, Kayla raised the knife over her head.
I tried to block it with my hands.
I was too slow.
Fire. Pain seared like flames across my mouth. I screamed. I couldn’t stop screaming.
Until I felt the blade against my throat. I stopped screaming, but I couldn’t stop the tears streaming down my face.
“Shut the fuck up. I don’t want to kill you, but I will if you make me. Shut. The. Fuck. Up. Bitch.”
I wanted to nod, but I couldn’t with the knife at my neck. I had no choice but to do whatever she wanted.
“Good. I’m in charge now. I’m going to get what I want. I’m going to make sure you and Dylan pay.”
She grabbed my necklace, the one Dylan bought for me on the riverwalk, and yanked, the chain easily giving way. She threw it somewhere behind me, and as silly as it may be, that made me want to cry harder.
“I got that stupid mouth of yours. What’s next?” Her eyes traveled down my body and back up, burning into me with contempt. “Your hair is a frizzy mess. There’s no way he likes it better than mine.”
Kayla’s hand shot out and grabbed a handful of my hair, yanking my head painfully to the side. She whipped the knife, now red with blood, off my throat and hacked it through my hair.She held the knife in one hand and a chunk of my hair in her other. She laughed and dropped the hair.
I felt blood dripping down my chin and neck. My neck stung, and I knew she’d cut me there too, but not like my face. It was like a hundred hornets stung my mouth. I couldn’t even tell where. It burned everywhere.
“You dress like an old lady. You don’t even try to impress him.” Kayla laughed. “I’ll help you make this shirt sexier. Hands up.”
I didn’t move.
“Hands up!”
I numbly lifted my hands, too scared to defy her. Hopelessness filled me. I couldn’t fight her. I couldn’t stop her. I couldn’t get away.
“Good girl.”
Kayla smiled and touched the tip of the knife to the center of my neck. She slowly slid the knife down my throat, over my sternum and down my chest, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. She scowled, her eyebrows drawing down in frustration, like she was the one being wronged. She grabbed the hem of my shirt and raised the knife back to my throat to do it again.
I couldn’t stop the wail that tore from me. She was going to kill me if she did it harder.