The Rules (25 page)

Drew’s face was contorted with rage. His nose was running.

“Kyle!”
she shouted a third time, but she didn’t dare look for him. All she was doing was putting Drew on alert. Reminding him that it was three against one.

Make that two. Beth wasn’t going to be any help at all.

She stole one quick look around and was startled to see that the smoke had grown thicker. It wafted like a blanket on a wash line in front of the lights. Then she was staring back at Drew.

He still hadn’t shot the gun.

“Do it,” Drew cried. His eyes were glittering, spinning.

She pushed the rifle barrel toward the ceiling and dove at him, aiming for his knees, catching him square in the crotch. He shouted in agony and slammed violently onto his back. She heard a crack—his head—and the rifle went flying.

She leaped on top of him. He struggled and groaned, arms windmilling, legs flopping against the concrete as she straddled him. His head rolled from side to side. She hit him over and over again with her open hands and then she made fists. She couldn’t hear anything but the sound of skin slapping skin.

I hate you I hate you I hate you,
she thought as she pummeled him. She started to rise on her knees but then she realized he might buck her off. She crouched and remembered Praveen going after August; she closed her hands around Drew’s neck and threw her weight against them.

Her momentum was stopped when his fist came out of nowhere and clocked her on the temple. Her ears rang; everything went black. She sucked in smoke and coughed but somehow she fought back, striking with all her strength. She unleashed every ounce of the rage and terror that had built up inside her, and even as he went limp, she kept it up.

I want to kill him.

His face was mottled. His nose bloody. His lips were slack. He looked almost like Cage, like he was wearing Hiro’s surreal mask. He looked like death.

Because he was.

The killer. The one who had tormented and butchered them. Who had faked his own death so he could hunt them in safety.

“Die,” she said in a low, dangerous voice, sounding not at all like herself, and she spat on him.

He didn’t move.

She stared down at the glob of her own spit on his cheek. At the damage she had done.

I saved us.

Horrified, exhilarated, she scrambled off him. Her hand caught on something that was hanging out of his pocket. It was a ripped green handkerchief.

A perfect match to the fabric she had found near Jackson’s car.

Quivering, she remained on all fours, hovering vigilantly over him. She studied his face, his arms, daring him to move. Almost but not quite hoping that he would. She leaned forward, wheezing, and yanked the handkerchief out of his pocket.
Evidence,
she remembered, and wiped her face on her sleeve instead. Inky hopped around her, batting at her. Robin panted, making primal, guttural noises like an animal.

I won.

It was not a game, but it was over. The long, horrible ordeal was done. When the sun rose, she would see it. She and Beth and Kyle.

Then she straightened and looked around for Kyle, confused and worried because he hadn’t helped her. Maybe the rifle had gone off when she had attacked Drew. Maybe he was hurt.

That was as far as her mind would go.

“Kyle,” she said.

“Here, Robin,” he replied from behind her. Up on the stage.

She turned.

Surely she was dreaming; he was standing beside Beth with one arm around her shoulders and the other down at his side. Beth was sobbing, and he was rubbing her shoulder as if to comfort her.

“Robin,”
Beth ground out.

“What are you doing?” Robin asked. She took another look at Drew, then crawled to the edge of the stage and used it to push herself to her feet. Beth and Kyle just kept standing there, Beth in tears and Kyle so strange, so quiet, and so…She didn’t even know how to describe it.

Her legs were shaking so badly she had to stop.

The floor felt as if it were rocking like a hammock. She reached out a hand to Kyle and Beth and said, “You’re safe.”

“Not quite yet,” Kyle replied. “But I’m getting warmer.”

She saw a flash of metal at his side.

The knife.

“Robin!” Beth shrieked. “Robin!”

Then Kyle raised his hand and it flashed again in the light.

The world stopped completely. Robin heard the crackle of fire, the pounding of her heart. She heard the ocean waves.

Then time caught up. It was groaning steel and flurrying embers and tears streaming down Beth’s face as her mouth moved but no sound came out.

Robin shouted, “No!”

While Kyle plunged his knife into the center of Beth’s chest.

Beth’s eyes bulged.

Blood blossoming in the middle of her sweater now poured down her front as Kyle yanked the knife back out with a flourish.

“And another cheater pays the price,” he said.

Robin’s breath fluttered as she strained not to lose control. But she couldn’t help it. She threw back her head and shrieked. He waited patiently. Then she held her arms out to Beth, who had fallen on her side. Her eyes were wide as she stared straight at Robin, begging for help. Her lips moved.

“Let me go to her,” Robin begged. “She’s going to bleed to death.”

“I can tell you’re upset. You’re not really making sense. I obviously know that, Robin.” He hopped off the stage and landed in a crouch. His fingers raked her hair and he yanked her head back savagely, exposing her neck. “After all, I’m the one who harpooned that little fish.”

“K-Kyle,” she managed. Her throat ached so badly that she couldn’t draw a breath. He put the knife against it. She jerked. It was as hot as a fireplace poker.

“Robin,” he said softly. “You threw me. I didn’t plan on you. Plan for you. I wanted to let you go.”

Her legs began to twitch as her sight grew dim. She snaked back her hand and grabbed his wrist. It was corded with muscle. He was so strong, and she was completely flattened.

“That was so amazing, the way you took him on,” Kyle said. “He was such a waste of space. A frickin’ druggie, totally out of control. His bandmates had no idea just how addicted he was. He would do
anything
for drugs.”

She was going to black out. Her eyes were rolling back in her head.

Then Kyle’s mouth came down on hers, and his grip on her hair loosened. She exhaled against his mouth and sucked air in through her nose. She breathed in the scent of him beneath the blood and smoke and thought about biting him to make him let go of her but that could backfire so badly. He ended the kiss with a sad sigh.

“So you gave him drugs.” Her voice was hoarse. Her scalp burning.

“Mostly I just listened. Addicts, they get so paranoid. He was so mad at the band. He was right; they were planning to dump him.”

Her eyes darted, trying to figure her escape. The bat was on the table, so far away. The knife was still at her throat. The smoke was thickening as a wave of embers filtered down from the ceiling. It was closely followed by a second.

She peered up at him through her lashes. He thought she was looking at him, but she was checking the ceiling. Brilliant flames flickered through the crossbeams. He didn’t seem to notice.

“It was easy to get ready,” he said. “Everyone trusted me. They didn’t hide things when I was around. I had all August’s spreadsheets. It was like I told you, a magic trick. There are clues and objects salted all over this cannery. Mostly in the tunnel. With the bodies. Morgan surprised us. Drew didn’t hit her hard enough, I guess.”

“Hiro saw Drew die,” Robin said.

“One of August’s mannequins. Drew threw it off the cliff. He yelled, I shouted out his name—everyone sees what you tell them to see. Just like everything else in this world,” he added bitterly.

“Why?” she whispered. “Kyle, what…what happened to you?” Something had done this to him. Some disaster, some tragedy, something unpardonable.

“You don’t know what pressure’s like,” he said. “And for
nothing.
You make one mistake. One really stupid mistake. You break the rules. And then you’re done.”

She stayed quiet. As long as she kept him talking, he wouldn’t kill her.

“It was when I lived in San Francisco. I used to hang out with this older kid. Eddie Clausen. Eddie was a hood, but nothing like Jackson White. He was rich. His parents had more money than some small countries.” He went silent for a moment. “I was sorry about Jackson.”

Her stomach churned. Of all the people to be sorry about, Jackson would not have been her pick.

“Eddie,” he said. “He was a dealer. He took me with him one night. I didn’t know what was going on. There were lots of drugs and tattooed guys with guns. And police.”

Kyle?
She couldn’t see him that way.

“The police took us into custody. We rode in the back of a squad car, and when we got to the station parking lot, one of them walked Eddie away. I was still in the back. My hands were cuffed. Two cops came over and dragged me out and they…they started
beating
me. They punched me in the face, the head, everywhere. I couldn’t defend myself. Pretty soon I couldn’t even
see.
And they threw me in a cell with adult offenders and what happened to me…
what happened to me,
Robin!”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, but she said it so softly that she knew he couldn’t hear her. That was probably good. He was going someplace in his past that didn’t include her. Maybe he would realize she wasn’t part of his twisted world. He would take pity. But how could he let her go? He had confessed to murder right in front of her.

“I still have the scars. And the nightmares,” he said. “And Eddie? You might wonder what happened to him.” He gripped her hair again and she thought he might pull her scalp right off her skull.

She tried to swallow. And breathe.

“
Nothing.
His rich parents bailed him out that night. They blamed the whole thing on me.” His voice shook with barely suppressed fury. “Eddie had been dealing drugs for
years
before I met him. Stole money out of their wallets. Broke into their storage, took all kinds of stuff, sold it. He drank all the fancy wines and whiskey, but no one ever said one word. The maids covered for him. His parents just pretended not to know. But they knew. They had to know….”

His voice trailed off. He didn’t sound like himself. This was a guy she had never met before. A wounded, angry, damaged boy. She would have no hold over a guy like that.

“I told the judge. I told all of them. Everybody could see how beat up I was. Resisting arrest, they said. And Eddie…he lied. They asked him to tell his version. He said I’d gotten into a fight before the cops came and that I was out of my mind when the cops took us. And they
had
to hit me a couple times to make me settle down. He didn’t look at me
once.
Maybe he was scared. I don’t know. And he got away with
that,
too.”

His eyes were shimmering with tears, and there was spittle on his chin. And then all his features went hard and angry, like he was turning into someone else.

“Just like these kids, getting away with everything.”

Robin could only breathe in little gasps and she was getting woozy. She knew she had to do something to save herself. She was so tired, so scared. She kept thinking this was some dream she was having, some insane prank.

The dry wood overhead crackled. Red and orange flames skittered along the rafters in tidal waves. Surely he must notice.

“My parents still hate me. I heard them
talking.
” He choked back a sob. “They wanted to put me away. I have done
everything
and it’s never good enough. It’s not enough. And never will be. And all these people at the party tonight, they’re Eddies. I hated them. I hated all of them. They were just like him. Breaking the rules. Getting away with it. Lording it over everyone else, the people who do it right and get screwed over anyway. I’m glad I killed them.”

“I’m not like them,” she gritted out. Her eyes were watering. The fire overhead was gaining on the wood. Soon chunks would begin falling.

“I know you’re not, and that posed a real dilemma until I realized the simple, terrible truth.”

“And what was that?”

He shook his head. “You’re a rule breaker, too, Robin. After all, you crashed a party you weren’t invited to.”

He was so crazy. She sobbed, low and hard, but she had to think. “No, I’m like you. Beth was my Eddie. She dragged me here. I didn’t know I wasn’t invited. I didn’t know it was wrong.”

He shook his head. “August was snooping around. He was going to find out.”

She tried to clear her throat. He wasn’t making any sense. Her heart was clanging.
“Find out…”

“The stupid gate.” He huffed. “They think they know everything. They’re so
cool.
August blows through enough money in a
week
to support my family for a year. I started working part-time at the country club, but I didn’t tell anyone because I was so humiliated. I was a
dishwasher.
But I quit as soon as Alexa died. So they stole my job from me, too.”

“The gate?” she said hoarsely. “You locked it?”

He was staring off into space. “They were always sneaking in. Doing whatever they wanted. And I had spent hours cleaning grease traps and throwing out garbage and I could hear them laughing and splashing around. And Alexa made some sleazy comment about only illegal aliens working there. So when Jacob left, I took her clothes and I…I was so
angry.
”

She nodded, tried to show him that she understood. Her head was buzzing; she was so afraid of him. She had to help him out of his darkness. “I can see why you were worried that August would find out you locked the gate, because terrible things have happened to you, but L-Larson was right. She was high. You didn’t kill her, Kyle.”

His face went completely blank. He looked like the mannequin they had found in the cave. The world roared around her.

He
did
kill her,
she realized.
He really did it.
She couldn’t catch her breath. Kyle Thomas was a cold-blooded killer. He was
insane.

He almost seemed to hesitate. A sad look passed over his face and he cupped her cheek. “I can’t let you go, Robin. You know everything.”

“They’ll figure it out, Kyle,” she said quietly, hopefully. “Evidence—”

“Drew. His fingerprints are everywhere. And then there’s the fire.”

As soon as he spoke the word, a large chunk of wood swung away from the ceiling and dangled overhead. She traced the path of its descent and realized it would probably fall about a foot to Kyle’s left. She kept her eyes glued to it, watching, mustering her courage.

The fire kept burning through the piece of wood. Her breath stopped. She pursed her lips and watched. Her eyes blurred and teared with the smoke.

The wood began to fall and she flung herself backward with all her strength. He grunted and jerked forward just far enough so that the brick-sized chunk smacked him on the head. Fire flared from the wood and ignited his hair.

Bellowing, he released her. She moved sluggishly, awkwardly, as she stumbled to the baseball bat. She grabbed it, Kyle rolling into a fetal position. The fire was out. She raised the bat over her head and staggered back toward him.

She arced the bat in the air and brought it down on his head, but she hit his hand and the bat bounced off. She tried again, smacking his shoulder this time. He brought down his hands and she saw bleeding welts on the crown of his head and forehead. With one quick jerk, he wrestled it out of her grasp.

There was pure murder in his eyes.

She backed up, then wheeled around to cross the warehouse floor. She could hear him shouting. The door looked so far away.

The flames on the ceiling leaped to the walls and began to slide down them. Tongues of fire lapped at old paint. The remaining coffins and their robot corpses combusted. The sign for
PENALTY BABES
evaporated.

He was coming after her. He was swinging the bat back and forth in front of himself, raging. Smoke poured down but he kept coming. Sections of the ceiling thudded, one, two, three, four, five, like missiles. He dodged them.

She reached for the doorknob.

Turned it.

The bat cracked against her left side, and she crumpled to the floor. He stood over her; a moment flashed before her eyes—their first kiss—and then she rolled to the right, the bat narrowly missing her.

The far section of the room burst into flames, engulfing the stage. And Beth.

Robin raised a hand.

The bat came down and hit the concrete. Then, with a ferocious roar, Inky lunged forward out of the smoke and bit Kyle’s ankle. It stunned him and he swayed, just long enough for Robin to wrap her hands around the bat and yank it away from him.