Page 147 of Only With Me

Brothers?

“What’d ya think, Kenny? We can still have fun with just the two of us, right?”

“Mm-hmm. I think he’ll appreciate the dedication. We’ve waited years for this moment,” he responds.

That’s when it hits me.

Emery must’ve recognized my face and name on the CowboyMatch app and then tried to lure me in by acting interested and wanting to get to know me in person. No wonder he was so persistent and asked a million questions about me.

Fucking psychopath.

It’s no coincidence he messaged me after Henry’s parole was denied.

Emery probably didn’t anticipate me rejecting a second date and that’s when he resorted to stalking me. Who knows what he would’ve done to me if I’d willingly dated him and he’d gotten me alone?

The thought sends a shiver of nerves down my spine.

And Kenny?All these years he was right under my nose, and I had no idea he was one of the three. There’s no way Jake knew…he couldn’t have.

A truck engine roars outside, grabbing their attention. Kenny picks up some kind of large weapon and holds it up when noises come from the otherside of the door.

God, please let it be the sheriff or someone with a loaded gun.

I try to shift my body so I can look over my shoulder but the pain is too much.

“Go check out who’s here,” Emery tells Kenny.

When he walks around me, I try pulling myself up.

“And where do you think you’re going?” Emery stomps on my ankle, and I hiss at the pain.

“Let me go,” I sneer.

Commotion outside grabs Emery’s attention and then I hear popping sounds.

“Stay here,” he demands.

When he goes to step over me, I lift my leg as high as I can and make him trip. His knees bend before they collide with the ground and when he tries to catch himself, he loses his grip on the bat.

It bounces and rolls, landing a foot away from me. With as much strength as I can produce, I roll over and reach for it. Before I can grab it, Kenny stands over me and stomps on my wrist.

“And whaddya think you’re gonna do with that, you little bitch?”

I think about the countless book plots Natalie’s told me over the years. The girls who get murdered in those stories always do something stupid before their throats get ripped out. If I become one of them, Natalie will summon me from the dead just to kill me again for being so stupid.

When more popping noises echo outside, Emery’s attention goes to the door. Without hesitation, I reach over with my other hand and grab the bat. Before he can stop me, I swing the bat between his legs.

I hear his high-pitched shriek before his knees buckle and then he collapses on his side with his back to me. Part of him lands on my arm, but I fight through the pain to slide out from under him.

When I attempt to stand, the dizziness and throbbing almost knock me down again, but I refuse to give up when I’m this close.

Crawling toward the bat that dropped between his legs, I hiss through the pain that’s radiating through my body until I wrap my hand around it. Even as I struggle to breathe, a surge of adrenaline fuels just enough strength to lift the bat over my head.

“You can tell Henry I’m not thirteen anymore!” Then I slam it down against his rib cage—once, twice, three times—until I hear them crack.

Drained of energy, the weight of my injuries are too much to hold myself up, and I fall to the ground next to him.

The last sounds I hear are the metal bat rolling away and someone screaming my name.