Don't Be Scared

“Plea—”I cut the word off hard, nearly biting off the tip of my tongue as well. I’m probably going to die and it’sdefinitelygoing to hurt. But I’m not about to beg him to spare my life. I don’t want to go out like that. I want to leave with something, even if it’s just the small, very tiny, moral victory of knowing I didn’t beg.

Whatever that’s worth in the afterlife.

“No!”I scream instead, arching up to shriek the word in his face. He hisses a sneer back at me, and finally, unfortunately, manages to straddle my hips, weight pinning me down just as he gets ahold of both of my wrists, transfers them to one hand, and slams them to the ground above my head.

Leaving his other hand free for the knife I can see at his belt.

Tears prickle at my eyes, though I squeeze my lids together hard to lock that down. Crying goes along with begging, and I refuse to do either. My hands ball into fists as I try to push him off of me, but both of us know that it’s a futile effort going nowhere.

A touch on my stomach, my skin bared by my shirt and hoodie riding up during our struggle, is enough to unlock my teeth for a soft whimper to pass between them, but it’s not a knife.

It’s only his gloved fingers. They trail up my skin, dragging my hoodie with them a few inches until moving over it instead. The man repositions, leaning down closer to me until I can feel the smooth coolness of the unblemished white plastic mask slide against my cheek, and his fingers wrap almost lovingly around my throat to tighten ever so slightly.

He’s going to strangle me, and in a moment of cold calmness, I can’t decide if this is worse or better than getting stabbed.

“Stop fighting me,” the man purrs in a cold voice that’s slightly muffled by the mask. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Yeah, that’s so believable,” I spit, wishing I could bite him. “God, I’m so reassured already.”

“All I want is to ask you a question.”

“If the question is ‘stabbing or strangling?’ I haven’t decided yet, thank you—” But he interrupts me with his fingers squeezing my throat, and shifts until he’s looking at me straight on from behind the bright white mask.

“Who should be the next to die, Bailey?”

Chapter17

“…What?”I breathe, staring up at the blackness of the sky above me that I can see over his mask. I know branches obscure parts of it, but in the darkness and the clouds, I can’t tell where the trees end and the sky begins. The only thing I can see that isn’t darkness is the killer’s mask, only inches from my face. “What did you say to me?”

The hand on my throat moves slowly, and the backs of gloved fingers trail against my skin, the leather smooth on my face. It gives me a minute to think, and when I look at his mask again, something clicks.

I’ve seen this mask before. Fuck, I’ve all butlickedthis mask before, and the thought curls in my stomach. “Do I know you?” I ask, trying to move my hands and failing. Instead, I settle for turning away from his fingers, but he only chuffs out a small laugh and follows my face with his hand. If anything, I’m pretty sure it’s to make the point that I can’t get away from him, more than him wanting to touch me.

“Do I look familiar?” he goads in a soft, low voice. “Does thisfeelfamiliar?” He strokes my face again, then moves his hand to grip my chin to force me to look at him. “Or is it something else you findfamiliar?” He rolls his hips against mine, and I can’t help the hitch in my breath when he does.

There’s no way he was one of the guys from the party that night. I know for a fact that at least one shop in town sells the masks, so they aren’t exactly unique.

“No,” I dismiss, wishing he would get off of me. “I don’t know you.”

He doesn’t laugh like I’d expected, or tease me about it. Instead, the man is quiet, though I can’t stop looking at the hilt of the knife he still hasn’t drawn, or the bright white of the mask that, for some reason, is throwing me off.

Iknowthere’s something wrong with the picture I’m looking at, but I can’t for the life of me figure out what.

“If you’re sure,” he only replies, and I swear there’s a hint of disappointment in his voice. Does he want more fear from me? Moreterrorat my impending death. “But you still haven’t answered my question.”

What was the question? God, my brain and heart are working so quickly and at such a terrified level that my thoughts are too scattered for me to do more than just blink at him. “What?” I mumble at last, feeling like an idiot.

“Oh, Bailey,” the man sighs, adjusting his grip and leaning back to sit up as much as he can while still holding my arms. “Bailey,what am I going to do with you? You have to pay attention. Especially this year. Especiallynow. There are so many mistakes I’ve made with you tonight, and you haven’t even seen any of them, have you?”

Mistakes? I have no idea what he means bymistakes.The only mistake he made was not finding me the first time. Or maybe not stabbing me in the barn when he was killing Evan. Still, the word has my brain turning, and it’s hard to fully focus on him when it feels like he’s given me a puzzle I’m somehow supposed to solve.

My thoughts go out the window when he leans in again, however, faceinchesfrom mine. I take a deep breath, trying not to cry out or jerk away, and get a nose full of his scent. For a killer, he wears great cologne. It’s mellow enough, with hints of vanilla under the sharp spice, and I wonder how much of that is justhim.

Fuck, I cannot be sniffing a murderer in the middle of the woods while on my back, about to get either stabbed or strangled or both. Inappropriate doesn’t even begin to cover it.

“Pay attention, Bailey,” he purrs in a voice too-sweet and much too velvety to belong to a murderer. “Because you’re going to choose.”

“No,” I whisper, shaking my head. “I’m not.”