Page 156 of Dark Little Game

“She said she would be back when she foundyou. Her brother is here, too,” Weston says.

My brother is shaking, and his face is covered in tears, more afraid than I’ve ever seen him.

I head out into the hallway first, checking that no one is out there.

“Her brother,” I say. “That was him.Fuck. So they both went back over to Onyx House to find me? Is there anyone else at Onyx House right now?”

“Ollie and Noah,” Rayne says. “They’re the only ones.”

“Goddamnit.”

“No,” Weston says as we take the stairs down fast. “They left. Right before Briar’s brother found me in the backyard, Ollie and Noah decided to walk to get food before they played that video game.”

Hope floods me again.

“Then they’re safe. I saw Briar’s brother on a balcony at Onyx House a minute ago. He saw me. Shot at me. We need to leaveright now. Out the back door.”

By the time we make it through to the back of Luros House, I can already hear their front door swinging open across the house.

I run with Rayne and Weston into the backyard, and we head through the grassy yard.

“We have to hop the fence. Rayne, it’s going to hurt your hand, but you have to jump.”

“Forget about my hand. I can do it.”

My heartbeat is steady like a drum as I watch both of them get over the iron fence and land on the short leafy hedge on the other side of the fence.

All three of us make it onto the back lawn of Onyx House.

All three of us safe, and alive.

“To the other side of the yard. Let’s go,” I tell them. “We go to the side, make it up further onto Red Row, and run toward campus as fast as we can.”

Weston and Rayne round the opposite corner of Onyx House before I do.

And I see the Glock pointed at all three of us a moment later.

My heart skips a beat.

It’s her.

Briar is holding the gun, her hand steady as she points it at us.

The first true friend I ever thought I made.

A person Iput my trust in.

“It was soeasy,” she says. She does have a British accent, and I place it immediately.

It’s the same type of British accent that the Thornwick crime family have.

“You don’t want to do this, Briar,” I tell her.

She looks me up and down, shaking her head. “Well, itcouldhave been easy, I suppose. You had to muck it all up for us, didn’t you?”

I hear a branch snap behind me and I glance and see her brother, Kai, coming up behind us with his own gun held out, too.

“We didn’t want to kill you,” Briar continues. “Just wanted to use you. For revenge. But now it’s all gone a bit messy, hasn’t it?”