Dead of Summer

When I open my cabin door and see the frame filled by a surprised, blinking Kayde with one hand up like he’s reaching for the doorknob, I just stand there and stare at him.

Which is exactly his reaction to me as well.

A small smile curls up over my lips, and I tilt my head to the side as I look at him. “I’m psychic,” I tell him, before he can say anything. “Your superpower is being a sociopath; mine’s being psychic. That’s totally hot of me, right?”

He gives the most dramatic eye roll I swear I’ve ever seen, and I watch the small changes that flit across his expression as he clearly tries to think about what he wants to say. “Was I interrupting you? Were you going to run away?” he finally asks, one brow jerking upward. “Please tell me you’re going to run away and break our deal so I can do something terrible tonight.”

My smile slips from my lips, and I break first. Stepping back, I gesture him into the cabin theatrically, sweeping him a graceless curtsy as he strides inside like he belongs in my cabin more than me. “I was going to go shower,” I admit, rubbing my arms as I shove my hip into the door to close it. “Which feels like it’s more to your benefit than mine. I’m sweaty.”

“You’re hot,” Kayde sighs, sitting down on my bed and kicking off his shoes. As I watch, he makes himself comfortable, looking like nothing in the world is wrong.

Only, this isn’t quite how this normally goes. Ever. At all.

It feels suspicious. This is never how Kayde approaches me or starts out our nightly game. Gooseflesh prickles along my arms, and I rub my palms over my skin before walking up to him and kicking off my flip-flops beside his sneakers. “What are you doing?” I ask finally, trying to look anything other than anxious.

Not that I’m succeeding.

“Well, I believe”—he reaches into my nightstand and pulls out the old horror book that he flips through curiously, being careful of the yellowed pages—“that we have one more night to play.” He doesn’t say anything else, just leaves me standing there, feeling incredibly awkward about the whole thing.

“Unless you don’t want to,” he adds after a good thirty seconds of me just staring at him like a weirdo. “Say the word, sweetheart. Literally, I’ve never liked hearing Darcy’s name, but if you say it tonight, I might get the shivers. Isn’t there something climactic about making it to the final night only to?—”

I don’t know why I do it. Something sparks in me, just like that first night, and I fall onto the bed, straddling him a little awkwardly. The action cuts off his surprise as I sit back on his thighs, my own legs folded under me. “I never said that,” I breathe, catching and holding his gaze with mine. “I just wanted to know what you were doing.”

“Reading.” He gestures to the book he’s holding, then lays it on the nightstand. “Better question though, Summer.” He tips his chin upward, in a challenge, and his eyes darken until they’re deep blue pools that glint with mischief. “What are you doing?”

I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m half-terrified of him tonight, and my skin seems to tingle at this terrible plan that rivals the one from my first night. But I still meet his smile with a crooked grin of my own, take a breath, and lean forward to fist my fingers in his shirt, then yank him to me to crush my mouth against Kayde’s.

Somehow, it surprises him. I hadn’t expected it to. I always think he knows what I’m going to do before I do it. But I feel him stiffen under me. I feel the way his hands flutter for a few moments, before one rests on my hip and the other comes up to wrap softly around the base of my throat.

“Sweetheart…” he murmurs, pulling away and holding me in place with his hand on my shirt. “Baby girl, what in the world are you doing?”

Shit. Shit, okay, I hadn’t thought he wouldn’t like it. I thought his surprise would melt into something else. I thought…a lot of things that aren’t true, apparently.

A questioning noise makes itself known from between my parted lips, and I can feel the confusion on my face as I search his for any sign of what I should’ve done instead. Only…he doesn’t look mad, exactly. Not how I would expect him to, at least. My fingers unclench and I pull as far away as he’ll allow, suddenly feeling self conscious about making the first move to surprise Kayde.

“I’m…kissing you? Is that not what we normally do?” I ask, trying to retain some of my bravado.

“I don’t think we have a normal.” Kayde chuckles, eyes still glinting. “Oh, I see…I see. You think I stopped you because I’m upset with you. Don’t you?”

I’m flustered and humiliated. I can feel embarrassment staining my cheeks, and I cast my eyes to the side instead of answering. It’s not like he can’t see the answer all over my skin, anyway.

“No, don’t do that,” Kayde coos sweetly. “Don’t get all shy with me. I’ve had you tied up naked in the boathouse, baby girl. I’ve had a knife on your skin. Don’t turn shy on me now, Summer. Come back here.” He uses his hand on my hip to drag me forward until I’m flush against him and his other hand can more easily wrap around to tangle in my hair. “I stopped you because you seem a little…desperate tonight. Are you thinking of how much you’ll miss me when I’m gone?”

My not-so-nice smile comes back instantly, and I will the heat to go somewhere other than my face. “I’m thinking of the party I’ll throw tomorrow night when you’re no longer here. I was just thinking that I need to pick up some hot dogs and probably some more edibles.”

“Oh, yeah?” He doesn’t sound put out by it, and I wish I knew why he was looking at me as if I’m missing out on some kind of joke. Unless the joke is that he’s going to kill me tonight, then kill the campers, then, for good measure, kill Mr. Fink.

Though I suppose the real joke would be if Darcy were to be the one to survive all of this shit.

“You’re not invited,” I’m bold enough to tell him, and his soft scoff is confusing, at best. But he doesn’t reply, exactly. Not for a few seconds, as he watches me sit on his lap like one of us is about to make a move.

“We’re feeling bold tonight, aren’t we?” he asks at last, stroking one hand up and down my bare thigh and pushing my shorts up a little more every time he does so. “Is it because this is the last time you’ll see me?”

“Probably,” I tell him readily, bringing my hands back to his shirt more carefully. “Doesn’t it seem like it?” I swear I’m asking him that and it’s not the part of me that doesn’t want him to leave. But even if I was willing to acknowledge that part of me, it wouldn’t really matter. Kayde has to go. I can’t beg him to stay, when all that would mean is I’ll end up with a bunch of dead kids.

I can’t let him kill anyone.

That’s the whole reason for this arrangement, after all.