Page 57 of Boys Who Taint (Spine Ridge University #5)

Aspen

“It’s you, tell me it’s you,” I beg Grey. “Please. Tell me it was you.”

“It’s not him,” Levi finally says, his voice as low as I remember from back in the auditorium and the goose bumps scatter on my skin.

I shake my head.

It can’t be him.

It can’t be because that means all those filthy fingers, all that kinky fuckery, all those orgasms and all those kisses … were his.

Oh God.

I drop the knife in my hand. “No.”

“Fine, you don’t believe me? Then watch what he did to your half sister,” Grey growls, pulling out his phone.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” Levi hisses, but Apollo keeps him locked in place.

“Let’s see what he’s got then,” Apollo says.

Grey opens a file and plays a video, and I stare in abject horror at the footage taken on the night of Mavis’s death. Right there during the scene of the crime, when Levi and Mavis were near the rim where we used to jump.

But the video is shot from the woods where I could’ve sworn I saw those two eyes flashing that night.

“You were there,” I murmur as I glance at Grey.

“Keep watching,” he replies. “Look at what he did.”

“Turn. That. Off,” Levi says through gritted teeth.

“Or what?” Grey taunts. “You’ve already made her hate us all. I warned you what would happen. Might as well give her the full fucking truth of what transpired.”

But all I can focus on is the video on his screen, replaying that night from an angle I’d never seen during a moment I was still fast asleep.

Levi grabs Mavis’s hand and dashes toward the rim with her. She beats him to the ledge, but when the moment comes when they jump, he abruptly stops, releasing her hand in the midst of her jump, and it causes her to lose her footing.

I slam my hand in front of my mouth, seeing my own half sister fall to her death from a distance.

A deafening silence follows the thud, while Levi hovers over the ledge like a ghost, haunted by the memory of a jump he never made.

He didn’t push her.

She fell because he let go.

And when I look up and look into the eyes of the boy who’s been haunting my soul instead, something in his eyes breaks.

Ghost

I was never supposed to exist.

All those years of pining for a girl who barely acknowledged my existence chipped away at my sanity. I never understood why she pulled away. Why our friendship eroded to merely small talk. The older we grew, the more withdrawn she became, as if something intangible drove a wedge between us.

But when Mavis Rivera died … a piece of me died with her, and along with it my will to exist. Mavis was Aspen’s heart, and I destroyed it.

Guilt ate me up alive.

There was nothing left except the widening chasm between us. A chasm I’d created by accident.

It was all an accident.

“I never wanted her to die,” I mutter.

I’ve lost.

I’ve lost it all.

This was my legacy. My only chance to do all the things I wanted to do before it all fell apart. Every demented, fucked-up fantasy I’d kept buried deep inside, every inch of my depravity, my unending lust for her, I let it all out through this mask.

I lied and lied until even I didn’t know who I was anymore. I left my own heart somewhere down there in the deep end and destroyed her existence inside me.

All that was left was the hungry monster … and I wanted her addicted. Addicted to the pain, the sick obsession of a phantom, a ghost of her past, of a life we could never have.

She was never supposed to find out.

Never.

But she played the game so well, and I couldn’t be prouder of my little firefly.

I jerk free of Apollo’s and Grey’s grip and pull away, even though her burning gaze is still upon me, still tearing me apart from limb to limb.

But it won’t matter anymore.

It’s done now.

It’s over.

This is the end.

Apollo

“Levi!” I shout as he rushes away. “Goddammit. Finally, he comes clean, and now he’s gone.”

“Let him go,” Grey growls. “He’s done enough damage.”

Two thuds make me turn away from my cousin running out of the cemetery. Aspen’s knees are on the muddy ground, her eyes glossy and unfocused, like she’s no longer here.

Grey goes to his knees in front of her and grabs her, slowly pulling her into his embrace. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for everything.”

“I don’t understand,” she mutters, completely out of it.

In the distance, a motorcycle races off.

But then she suddenly locks eyes with me. “Wait … you knew?”

“It wasn’t hard to put two and two together when he’s part of my society, Freckles,” I say.

“You should’ve told me,” she says.

I raise a brow. “Do you think you would’ve believed me?”

She frowns, but doesn’t deny it. We both know that the truth is far harder to accept than a few lies, and when the lies become so deep that they leave scars when revealed, there is no way out, no way to stop them from spiraling out of control.

She buries her face into Grey’s chest while he’s still muttering sorrys, but I don’t think she’s even listening anymore, and I don’t blame her.

Discovering that the stalker you’ve been obsessing over is actually your most despised and hated bully isn’t something I’d deal with well. I’m surprised she didn’t immediately go for the throat.

But I guess some things are too shocking to get over that quickly.

“You … you both knew,” she murmurs. “Didn’t you?”

She leans away from Grey, who tries to console her by brushing away her tears. “No, I didn’t.”

“But you had those cameras everywhere.” She leans away. “You saw me with him.”

“I did, but I didn’t know who he was. I just knew that I had a sick, twisted fantasy about seeing you with another man, and I couldn’t help myself. I needed to see more.”

She gets up from the ground and looks at me.

“And you? You pretended to be my stalker for the fun of it?”

I scratch the back of my neck. “I thought you invited me to have a fun chase. It didn’t mean anything.”

“You knew what it meant to me.” She shoves me out of the way and waltzes off.

“Oh, c’mon now, Freckles,” I say, trying to reason with her. “You know I’m a lusty motherfucker when it comes to you.”

“Where did Levi go?” She looks around. “I don’t see him anywhere.”

“I heard his motorcycle. He’s probably trying to get far away from here.”

“After the bomb he just dropped on her?” Grey mutters.

“Can you blame him?” I scoff. “The girl he’s been in love with for over half a decade wants him dead.”

Aspen locks eyes with me, and the shock riddling her expression doesn’t go unnoticed.

“Oh, did I say something I wasn’t supposed to say?” I shrug. “Oops.”

“That’s not,” she mutters, struggling to stand on two feet. “I need to talk to him.”

“I don’t think that’s going to happen,” I say.

“What do you mean?” Before I can answer, she slaps her hand in front of her mouth.

“What’s happening?” Grey asks.

“Her stalker made her a deal. They fuck … he kills Levi,” I explain.

“So he lied all this time,” Grey says.

“No,” Aspen mutters, her eyes growing bigger. Suddenly, she grabs her bag and snatches the knives away from us. “Stay here. Don’t fucking follow me.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Because I need time to think. On my own,” she responds. “And I can’t deal with you two right now.”

“Aspen!” Grey yells as she runs off.

I grab a cigarette and try several times to light it up while the rain keeps trying to put it out. Damn. This is the second cig I’ve had in years. This girl is turning me into a chain-smoker, but fuck it, she’s worth it.

“Let her go,” I say.

“Why in God’s name would that be a good idea?” Grey retorts.

“Because she needs time,” I reply. “Remember?”

“But she hates me,” he says, his fingers in his hair.

“She hates all of us right now. It’ll be fine.” I take another drag.

“Why would you even say that?” he growls, stepping closer. “How can you be so relaxed?”

I offer him my cigarette. “You should try it. Takes the edge off things.”

He snatches it from my hand and takes a drag, then coughs like hell, and I laugh. “Atta boy.”

“Fuck. This is relaxing to you?”

“Well, I know other ways to relax.” I wink. “Wanna make out?”

Levi

I throw off my helmet and listen to the thud in the grass before I step closer to the ledge.

This is the place where I lost everything … because I couldn’t let go.

I lost.

I lost, and I knew it was going to happen. I just didn’t know when … didn’t know how it would feel until it came to this.

The rain pours down on my face, and I welcome the cold, hoping it’ll numb the pain. The earth beneath my feet crumbles as I step closer and closer, listening to the sloshing of the waves below. Closer to my demise, just like she wanted.

I peer over to the rocks where Mavis’s body lay splayed out in a puddle of her own blood because of me.

Her half sister is dead because of me, and I can’t ever change that fact, no matter how many times I wish it had been different.

If I hadn’t brought them all here, if I hadn’t talked with her, if I hadn’t held her hand and…

Too late for regrets.

One step closer.

“Levi!”

Her voice instantly makes me turn my head and answer her call, just like I always have.

Because she once looked at me the way I will always look at her.

Her face is marred by the emotional weight of my decisions and every choice that led to this moment.

I’m on the edge of no return, the same place we both lost our souls that night. And I can’t help but wonder if it was never meant to be.

“Tell me why. At least give me a reason,” she begs, dropping her bag on the ground.

“It was an accident,” I mutter, raindrops rolling down my cheeks. “I didn’t mean to kill her. It wasn’t supposed to happen, but …” I pause to take a breath. “That night, Mavis and I made a pact.”

She frowns, shivering in the rain, as her baggy pants and blue butterfly shirt slowly become soaked, and I can’t help but smile at the irony. “What pact?”

This is why I didn’t want Grey to show her the footage.

Why I didn’t want her to find out what truly happened to Mavis.

It’s going to break her.

“We were going to jump together …” I swallow. “And give up.”