Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 82534 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 413(@200wpm)___ 330(@250wpm)___ 275(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82534 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 413(@200wpm)___ 330(@250wpm)___ 275(@300wpm)
“Will your parents be worried?”
“My parents aren’t home. They’ve gone on a vacation, but they still want me to check in. Can’t you call them? Your friends. Tell them they’ve made a mistake?”
She was hopeful they’d listen to him.
Logan’s face lit up. He was sitting on the floor with his cell phone in his hand. He put the call onto speaker.
“Hello, the awesome Luke is here, how may I direct your call?”
She rolled her eyes. It was typical he was finding some way to joke about all of this. It wasn’t funny. Not even close.
Blowing out a breath, she started to pace but didn’t go very far in case of falling and hurting herself.
“Stop being a dick right now. You know who it is. Come and let us out.”
“No can do, my friend. You’re alone, and I suggest you make use of the time.”
“You do know you’ve kidnapped Ava, right?”
“Yep.”
The P came out with a resounding pop. She turned to look toward where Logan was, or at least where she thought he was.
“Like I said, my good friend, enjoy.”
Luke hung up, and Logan cursed, throwing his cell phone across the floor.
“Did you really need to do that? It’s probably broken now.”
“I’ll buy another one. They’re not hard to replace. You may as well stop pacing.”
Now that she’d been in there a while her eyes were growing accustomed to the dark. Sitting down on the floor, she winced. “Do you think there’re any rats?”
“There better not be.”
“Great. My parents are going to be pissed.”
“Why? They’re not home.”
“They’re expecting a call from me, and I’ve never left them hanging like this. I don’t know why your friends have picked me to play this stupid prank on, but it’s not fair. I don’t like it.” She breathed out a sigh. “I hate the dark.”
“There’s nothing here that will hurt you.”
“Not even you?”
“I won’t hurt you. Consider it a Halloween locked in treat.”
“Oh, goody.” She leaned her head back against the door or was it the wall now? She didn’t know. “How long have you been here?”
“About ten, maybe twenty minutes before you showed up.”
“I thought these guys were your friends.”
“They are.”
“Some friends you got who are willing to throw you in the school basement. They’re really good guys.” She couldn’t help but fill her voice with sarcasm.
He burst out laughing. “You’re cute when you’re worried.”
“I’m not trying to be cute.”
“I didn’t say you were trying anything, did I?” He winked at her. “Still cute.”
“I don’t want to talk about this right now.”
He laughed, humming to himself. She didn’t want to be down in the basement.
“Why would they throw you into the basement and no one else? Why not Anna?”
“I don’t know the mysterious ways my friends work, Ava.”
The time ticked by. It felt like hours but could have easily been only a few minutes. She had no way of telling the time and had left her cell phone back at home. Now she felt stupid.
She hoped her parents weren’t worried about her.
The temperature had started to drop, and she wondered if the school was empty, deserted. She couldn’t help but let out a shiver.
“Come here,” Logan said.
“I’m good.”
“Stop being a baby. You’re cold. We can warm each other up.”
“It’s fine. I’ll be fine. So long as your friends open the door.”
“They’re not opening it until the morning at least. Stop being difficult, come here, and hug me.”
She rolled her eyes, but seeing as she was extremely cold, she crawled across the space toward him. She touched his leg first and immediately recoiled.
“I’m not going to bite.”
“Sorry.”
She moved in close, and to her surprise, he wrapped an arm around her, pulling her in close.
“See, not a problem.”
He was much warmer than she was. The costume she wore was too revealing, leaving nothing to the imagination.
Logan stroked her arm, and she rested her head on his shoulder. Rather than being awkward, it was nice. A lot nicer than she wanted it to be.
“Not so hard, huh?”
“I don’t know. I’m putting a lot of faith in you that you aren’t going to hurt me.”
“Why would I hurt you?”
“You’re part of a crowd who likes to. Not just me either, a lot of people. Don’t you remember Dillon?”
“Oh, please, that was just funny.”
“It wasn’t funny. Neither is shoving people into lockers. Do you know how much that hurts?”
“Don’t know. Never been on the receiving end of being pushed into one.”
“Believe me, it hurts. Not to mention all the tripping. Name calling. Do I need to go on right now?” The last thing she wanted to do was to have to go into detail with part of the school bully gang what exactly it was he’d done.
“Why not? It seems to me you’ve got a lot of shit to get off your chest. Talk away. Fill the silence.”
“And have you throw it all back in my face? No, thank you. I rather like the silence.” She pressed her lips together.