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Perhaps it had been the simple joy of the evening, but for the first time in ages, my guard was down.
Which was probably why, as I unlocked my door, I was too late to react to the sound of a scuffle behind me.
One minute I had a foot inside, the next pain flared across the back of my head and darkness swarmed my vision.
49. Cameron
The throbbing of my head drew me out of unconsciousness. I winced, still not fully awake as I reached to touch the source of the pain. My eyes fluttered open. A swollen bump under my hair made me hiss.
It was then I realized I didn’t recognize where I was.
A tiny, dark room. Moonlight shone through cracks in blinds covering one small window and I could make out wooden paneling on the wall. No, not paneling. The entire room was made of wood, like a garden hut.
My heart lurched as I searched the dimly lit room and saw a foot.
I pushed up on my elbows, nausea from the pain in my head making the room spin.
She came back into focus in horrifying surrealism.
A blond sprawled on the floor, a bloody wound at her temple, eyes closed, face pale.
Caoimhe.
“She got in the way.”
I cried out at the male voice that sounded from my right and sucked in a gasp when I spotted him sitting at the foot of the cot I lay on. Scrambling away from him, I pressed against the wall. The wood was cold, almost damp at my back.
Confusion and fear suffused me.
“Kenan?”
The janitor stood abruptly, and my gaze shot around the room for a weapon. There was nothing but the cot and the three of us. But there was a door out. Kenan stepped over Caoimhe like she was an object in his way and stood in front of our only exit. The streak of moonlight that snuck past the blinds glinted off something in his hands.
A hunting knife.
Realization tightened my chest as I really looked at him.
His slight build, his mannerisms. The way he walked.
“It was you. That night in my house. It was you.”
“Ten points for the cheerleader,” he scoffed.
My eyes flew to Caoimhe, my lips trembling. “Is she …?”
“Dead? Not yet, but I think she’s dying. Honestly, I thought you weren’t going to wake up either, that I’d hit you too hard.” He nudged Caoimhe with his foot. “This one caught me spying on you and Forde weeks ago. I thought I’d convinced her I wasn’t up to anything, but she followed me from my place tonight. I’ve been waiting for days for you to show up at your house alone.”
Kenan hadn’t been working this evening.
He’d lain in wait for me.
Why?
“She followed us out here thinking I didn’t know she was behind us. When she tried to rescue you, I smacked her in the temple with a rock. Maybe a bit too hard.” Kenan chuckled darkly. “Not that it matters. She was dead, anyway.”
Caoimhe had tried to rescue me?
Despite everything.
