Page 15

fourteen

Amnesia

August

Scarlett

A nother day, I wake up unable to move a single muscle in my body. As I attempt to sit up to silence my alarm, my skin and bones feel pierced by a million knives, and I wince in pain. My head hammers, feeling like my skull is cracking, and grabbing it doesn't help. My ears are hurting too. They experience a loud ringing that makes them feel like they’re bleeding. My body feels heavy and sluggish, and I can’t seem to get myself to move. What the fuck happened last night?

I lay here, clueless and a little frustrated that I can’t recall anything, trying to search my mind for the last thing I do recall, but I can't even think at the moment. When I look down, my eyes are sore and throbbing, and I notice marks on my hands and arms, which I quickly pull the blanket over to conceal. A groan escapes my scratchy throat, and I manage to turn on my side. I close my eyes again, ignoring the pain and hoping for a few more minutes of sleep before I have to get up to get ready for work. But that doesn't happen.

Melanie's scream penetrates the silence around me, causing my eyes to flutter open. My door slams open, and she rushes into my room, jumping on my bed in terror.

"Scarlett, you need to wake up!" She shakes me, thinking I'm sleeping.

"I'm awake, Mel," I groan again, my gaze fixed on the window, watching the rain fall.

"What happened last night? I can't remember shit," she asks, trying to get me up.

"I can't remember either. Did we go out?"

"No idea. Why can't we remember? Were we drugged or something?" She asks, her voice panicked, as she scrolls through Instagram on her phone.

"Who would have drugged us, though?" I finally turn to face her, rising slowly.

I reach for my phone and unlock it, oblivious to the radiating pain. When I launch the app, my heart sinks and bile rises in my throat. "Uh, Mel… Have you seen what's trending?" With tears already welling up in my eyes, I turn my phone so she can see what’s at the top of my feed.

She draws a breath, drops her phone, and grabs mine from my hands. "No fucking way! Is that River ?!"

I sit here with my eyes cast down, picking at my nails frantically as she screams while reading the article. I nod, but nothing comes out of my mouth. She puts the phone down and picks up her own while desperately looking for additional news reports about what happened. Picking up my phone again, I read the article slowly, feeling a lump in my throat that won’t go away when I swallow. My body trembles, my hands sweat, and nausea threatens to knock me to the ground.

His body was reportedly found at the lake early this morning, according to reports. When they recovered his body from the water, they discovered that he had been stabbed more than 70 times. His head and hands had been severed. I sputter, puking all over, not having time to make it to the bathroom. Melanie sits motionless on my bed, unable to speak as she stares at me, mouth agape and eyes wild. What the fuck happened last night, and who did this to River?

" Does it say who did it?" I ask, sounding hopeful .

As tears roll down her cheeks, she shakes her head. “No, it says they don’t currently have any suspects, and anyone with information is urged to contact Salem Police.”

I grab a towel and clean myself off while ignoring the marks all over my body and speculating as to who—if anyone—might be responsible. Who am I kidding? Of course, they're behind this. They killed Shawn; they must have killed River too.

When I regain my composure, the first thing I do is call my workplace and explain the gravity of the situation. Shock consumes me, not only because I didn’t get to say goodbye to him, but also because I can’t remember what happened last night. If I could, I might be able to figure out how River was murdered.

The buzzer for our apartment goes off, scaring the shit out of us and making us both jump frantically. Melanie follows me out of bed, clinging to my wrist for dear life. I press the button on the speaker box in the living room, my voice shaking as I speak.

"Yes?"

"This is Detective Holbrook from the Salem Police Department; do you have a moment to speak about River Wilson?"

"Yes, come on up." I buzz him up and stand at the door, fear coursing through my bones as I unlock it and wait for him.

Blade

"I still don't like the fact that we left a fucking body for the cops to find," I blurt out, taking a sip of my coffee, as we sit on the balcony, staring into Sinner's apartment.

"We've never left them a body before, and one wrong move could cost us everything."

"Relax, Blade. We covered all of our bases. Besides, it's fun watching everyone squirm," Nixon chuckles as he puffs on his first cigarette of the day.

Saint sits beside me, as quiet as can be, his gaze never leaving sinner's balcony. "When we're done in this town, I want to head to New Hampshire next," he says haphazardly, still obsessively watching her and drooling slightly.

As soon as the detectives leave their apartment, she and Melanie step out and sit down, their phones pressed to their ears, probably asking them about their whereabouts and connections to River. Last night was insane, and Scarlett killing River was the icing on the cake. Saint had the fucking brilliant idea to record everything so she could watch it when we have her with us, knowing she wouldn’t remember a thing this morning.

Only two months remain, and they can’t come soon enough. My thoughts are completely consumed by how much I’m going to fucking break her already-broken body when my eyes first land on it.

"We're not the ones who killed him anyway, so why are you so fucking worried, Blade?" Riley asks, a smug expression on his face as he steps onto the balcony.

I jerk my head in his direction and glare at him, my teeth clenching and my fists balling in rage. "Shut the fuck up, Riley. I'm not in the mood for your ass this morning."

As he backs up into the apartment, his hands are raised in mock surrender, and the door slides shut behind him. Saint gets up and walks inside without saying anything, his gaze only leaving Scarlett's apartment when the door slams shut behind him.

"Well, someone is in a bad mood this morning," I laugh, turning my gaze to Nixon, who’s sitting beside me and passing me the morning blunt.

As I lean back in my chair, his hand squeezes the area above my knee, and he smirks. "So wound up this morning, huh?" he asks, his lips curling into a smirk.

"Just a little."

"And why is that? Didn't you get your dick wet last night?" When I recall the games we played with Sinner, I’m unable to control my grin or the boner that appears between my legs.

"Yeah, but it wasn't enough," I admit, making him raise his brow intriguingly.

He licks his lips and lowers his gaze to my cock. "You want a little help?"

I recline in my chair as a shiver runs down my spine and tingles along my tailbone as he moves his hand toward the bulge in my pants, biting into his bottom lip.

"Sure, put your mouth to good use, Nix." I puff on the blunt and lower my eyes to my cock as a subliminal hint to him.

He licks his lips again and eagerly began to undo my pants. He pulls out my cock and starts slowly pumping it up and down. I can feel it pulse in his hand, and my breathing becomes labored as he quickens his pace.

"Fuck, Nix," I growl, letting my head fall back against the glass door.

He grins and takes my throbbing cock between his lips, slowly rolling his tongue around the base. My legs tense as he relaxes his mouth and shoves me deep between his lips. The head of my cock hits the back of his throat, and like a pro, he doesn't gag. Nixon tightens his lips around my shaft and continues sucking, working his tongue and lips up and down my cock. I fist his hair, shoving him down and forcing my shaft deeper into his throat.

“Fuck,” I bite, pleasure swirling inside me.

He sucks faster, more eagerly, almost desperately. Every time I spill a drop of precum he licks the tip of my cock hungrily, and I struggle hard not to come down his throat. With the tip of his tongue, he tickles my balls, pushing me over the edge. I grip his head and fire my load down his throat, watching strings of cum drip from the corners of his mouth as he swallows. He grins, wiping the shiny substance from his lips and winks at me as he let my cock fall from his lips.

"Feel better?" he asks with sarcasm laced in his tone.

"Much. Now, let's go see what trouble we can get into with sinner, shall we?" I take my Birsa Thunder 9 from my waistband and cock it, satisfyingly listening to the hammer click. "Glocked, cocked, and ready to go. I'm in the mood to fucking torture her some more."

Two days later, River's funeral

Scarlett

I smooth out the black outfit I bought for today in the mirror, trying to look my best for River's funeral. The wake was held last night, and because he was missing his head, it was obviously a closed casket. It was difficult to be there, but as his girlfriend of almost five years, I felt obligated to pay my respects to his family, who were the closest thing to a family I had ever had. Going back to the cemetery where Carli is buried no longer bothers me. I’m so overcome with grief and trauma that my body is numb to everything right now.

For the past two days, I haven’t been able to eat, sleep, or do much else. Melanie and I have been sitting around the apartment like pitiful shells of ourselves. We are at a loss for what to do. The night before he was killed is still a mystery to us, and I don’t think we will ever be able to piece it together.

"Hey, are you almost ready?" Melanie comes up behind me, scaring me half to death.

"Yeah, I'm as ready as I'll ever be." I force a smile, and she reciprocates, reaching for each other's hands as we walk out of the apartment.

When the priest delivers his sermon and speaks about River and how he touched so many in the congregation, there’s not a dry eye in the church. His parents wanted me to sit in the front row with them, and I couldn’t look them in the eyes and say no, not when they had just lost their son. And in such a heinous manner. My gaze remained fixed on the casket the entire time, knowing River's headless body lay just feet away.

I remained curious about what had happened to him and who his murderer was the entire time. Was it someone who came to his funeral? Is it someone we know? The more I thought about it, the more it irritated me, and I gradually drove myself insane. I kept looking around, wondering if I knew who had taken River away from us all.

I fought nausea with tears and held Mrs. Wilson's hand as she cried for her son. My heart was breaking for everyone. River's death made me sad, as did the fact that Carli and Shawn had still not been found. That they weren’t properly buried like River. But at least some of us were aware of Carli's whereabouts. And now it was just Melanie and me. Only two of the five of us remained. And I spent the rest of the funeral wondering who would be the next to die between Melanie and me.

I didn’t want to officially lay him to rest in the ground, but I overcame my fears and went to the cemetery with the family to say my final goodbye to River, my first love. Normally, on days like this, the sun shines brightly, as seen in movies and TV shows, and everyone smiles through their tears, saying, "This is what he would have wanted."

The sun, however, is obscured by heavy, black clouds strewn across the sky, which is fitting for River and who he was. They cast a dark gloom over Salem, showering us with thick pellets of rain as we huddled over River's dug grave, looking down at his customized casket with dozens of rose petals and guitar picks scattered on top of it.

Thunder rumbles in the distance, amusingly to the beat of 'Iris' by the Goo Goo Dolls playing. My face lights up as I hear the melody, and my hips sway back and forth to the beat. The lyrics bring tears to my eyes, and I turn my gaze to his coffin, allowing them to fall freely.

Lightning strikes, flashing brightly in the sky, giving me the impression that I’m in front of a giant camera. I blink and collapse to my knees, allowing the pain and loss to consume me.

"Are you ready to go?" Though I hear Melanie's voice, I don’t turn to face her.

I’m stuck in a trance and unable to turn my gaze elsewhere. But I'm not even looking at anything. I’m simply stuck.

"I'm gonna stay for a while." Melanie can clearly hear that my voice is monotone and flat, which is not like me.

"Alright, what's going on?" She crouches down, rubbing my back to comfort me, despite the fact that we both need it.

"I just don't want to leave River yet." I can’t take my eyes off his casket, which they’ve lowered a little further into the ground.

"You're soaked, girl. Your clothes look painted on. You're gonna get sick."

"I'll be fine," I assure her, even though I have no idea what the night holds. And right now, I couldn't care less.