Dead of Summer

My eyes screw shut as well as I fully hide in his coat and am unable to look at anything except the backs of my eyelids. “I’ll do anything,” I whisper, this time knowing he can hear me. “If you’ll please just…stop.”

I expect him to shake me off. To laugh and kick me to the ground, best-case scenario. Worst-case, I expect the ax to bite into my arm or my shoulder before he uses it to shut me up forever. Just like he wants to do to everyone else here.

But, inexplicably, Kayde waits. The only sound in the darkness is the breeze running through the trees, and the rustling of the leaves touched by it, as I hold on to him and just breathe.

“Well?” He sounds amused, and one hand comes up to brush against my knuckles, where my left hand is nearly wrapped around his chest in my panic of grabbing and holding onto him. “I’m waiting, sweetheart. Pretty patiently, I might add. After all, I’d hate to rush you, but we are on a bit of a time limit here.”

“Let me just…” I trail off, trying to grasp at any straw I can think of.

Though the only one that comes to mind is bad. Awful, even, and I know it won’t work, so as awful as it is, it’s obsolete the moment it forms.

But I need to buy myself some time to think of something better, so I blurt out, “I’ll do anything for you. Anything you want, if you just stop and, and don’t do this. Please.”

There’s nothing he could want from me that would be worth not killing a camp full of kids and young adults. But hopefully I can shock him into standing here long enough for me to think of something better.

Because, God, there has to be something better than this.

“Summer.” Kayde’s voice is half groan, half purr, and he manages to turn himself in my arms until my hands are gripping the front of his jacket, my face pressed nearly to his sternum as I jerk back enough to look up at him. “You can’t say things like that to me.”

“Why?” I ask quickly, needing to keep the conversation going.

One of his hands reaches out, and he tilts my chin up so he can survey my face more easily. “Because if you say shit like that, then I’ll have to believe you. And if I believe you”—his smirk catches and pulls his full mouth wide—“then I’ll make you live up to what you just offered me.”

What? Out of any response I’d expected, this certainly isn’t it. My pulse flutters, and he switches his grip on my chin to curl those long, graceful fingers around my throat instead.

“You weren’t serious.” He chuckles, eyes goading. “But I’m going to make you regret those words, anyway. What exactly are you offering me, hmm?”

There’s a lump in my throat, but I swallow around it before softly, nervously breathing out, “Anything,” into the scant space between our mouths. “I said anything.” I try to will some kind of confidence into my tone, but I’m sure I fail splendidly. “S-so I meant it. Anything.”

“I could make you regret your anything,” Kayde promises me, no hesitation in his response. “You understand that, right?”

Quickly, I dip my head in a nod, though I can’t tear my eyes away from Kayde’s face. “Then…” God, my mouth is so dry I can barely talk. “Then make me fucking regret it,” I finally challenge through numb lips as my eyes narrow into something less fearful and, hopefully, more taunting.

He wavers. I can see it on his face, and especially in the way that he looks over his shoulder. “Oh, Summer,” Kayde sighs. “Summer, you’re going to be the death of me here.”

If only.

“All right. Okay.” His gaze snaps back to mine, and I find him more serious than he had been a few moments ago. “You want to do anything for me? Anything to keep me from killing your best friend and those sweet, precious kids you like more than you want to admit?”

A jerky nod is my only reply. I can’t trust my voice to betray how terrified I am, though I’m sure he’s well aware of it by how hard I’m still gripping his jacket.

“Then let’s talk about exactly what you’re agreeing to.” His hand comes up and he cradles my face in his palm. When I try to pull away, however, he gives a soft murmur of dissent, and follows me with his hand. “Don’t you fucking pull away from me, Summer. Not unless you want to end this little chat now.”

“No! I mean—” I stop trying to jerk away, and will myself to move back into the space I’d been occupying before. My cheek finds the warmth of his palm, and there’s a small flicker of approval in his eyes as he cradles my jaw.

“You’ll do anything I say, and I don’t mean right now, exactly. Starting now, you do whatever I want. Whenever I ask or tell you to. Don’t worry,” he adds, seeing me shift uncomfortably. “I don’t like an audience, so I won’t have you do anything to expose our arrangement in front of the other counselors or the kids. I don’t need them to see or know what you’ve agreed to with me.”

“How long?” I find myself snapping through my teeth. “How long do you?—”

“For the rest of camp, obviously,” he’s quick to explain. “One anything isn’t enough to stop me, Summer. I’ll get bored. You’re mine for the rest of this camp session. I get to play with you for eight more nights, and then you’ll never see me again. I’ll get in my car after Fink pays me for a job very well done, and you’ll never see me again.”

That seems…simpler than it ever should be. But my stomach continues to curl and twist, my hands still trembling in his coat.

“And you can tell me to stop whenever you want,” Kayde adds quickly, his smile turning benevolent. “I’m not cruel, you know?” he most definitely is, but I’m not going to say it. “If you don’t like something. If you don’t want to do something, you can just tell me to stop, and I’ll stop. I’ll walk away, and I won’t ask you for anything else. Of course…”

Hope rises in my chest, though when he adds on the of course, I feel it snuffed out like a newborn flame.

“If you won’t play with me, if what I want is too much for you, then we’ll be right back here. Only without any promises or deals to keep them safe. Tell me no at any time between now and then, and it ends there. I’ll kill everyone in this fucking place, and I’ll make you watch.” He sneers the last words as he leans in toward me, his lips brushing my forehead.