ROSALIE
TUESDAY, JANUARY 23
I lunge for the gun, which is reeling across the floor toward Amanda, and snatch it up. Then I spin and point it straight at the black silhouette of the driver in the doorway. “Get over next to him, and keep the door open.”
He does as I say. My headlamp shines on Ben’s slumped figure on the floor. I didn’t even hit him that hard. There’s a fine line between knocked out and dead, and I was not trying to cross it. Ben’s breathing, but he’s definitely unconscious. I drop the shovel and kick it toward Amanda.
The gun feels warm in my hand, and really heavy. It’s some old wild west model, a revolver I think? Whatever it is, this thing is an antique. Amanda leans down to grab the shovel, and I can see her wrists are tied with some sort of plastic binding. I have a pocketknife on my keys, but I can’t hold the gun and slice her ties at the same time.
“Listen, the gun isn’t loaded,” the driver says. “This all got really out of control.”
“You didn’t even know Ben had a gun,” Amanda spits. “How do you know it’s not loaded?”
“I know my brother, okay? He’s not like that.”
So they’re brothers. My brain flashes back to our suspect list. I should have been more open with Amanda about my Paulina doubts. And she should have told me that her number one suspect had a brother.
“Just to clarify,” I say, the gun in my hand making me brave, “your brother’s not the type to kidnap a girl and tie her up? Or he’s not the type to shoot her now that he’s got her here? Or was this all your idea . . . sorry, didn’t catch your name.”
“David,” he and Amanda say at the same time. Ben’s still breathing deeply at his brother’s feet. David holds his hands in the air and crouches down to check on him.
“Fine, David, let’s test that not-loaded theory.” I turn away from everyone and aim the gun at the ground about five feet to my right. Shouldn’t there be a safety? Or maybe not. They probably weren’t too concerned with gun safety in the Wild Wild West. I shine my headlamp on the handle, but all I can see are the trigger and a little lever up top. I pull it back with my thumb and it makes a small click. That seemed to do something. Then I point firmly into the ground and pull the trigger as hard as I can.
A loud bang. The gun jerks back in my hands, and the floor erupts into an explosion of dirt and grit. Definitely loaded.
“Fuck.” For once, David, Amanda, and I are on exactly the same page.
“Please hand it over,” David says from the ground where he’s crouched down with his brother. Ben’s starting to stir. Guess the sound of a firearm going off in a building with bad acoustics would be enough to wake up your average head injury case. “I know how to unload it, okay?” David says. “I promise that’s all I’m going to do.”
“Don’t listen to him,” Amanda hisses.
“Hell, no.” I swing the gun back to face the guys. The person with the gun has the power, and a rush of it surges through me. One of these guys was the creep in the woods, and at my house. One of them threatened to out me to my dad. There’s no way I’m handing over this gun. “I know what I’m doing now. Lever thing, aim, fire. You two put Amanda and me through hell and back over the last three weeks, and now you’re going to talk.”
“You’ve got this all—” David starts to say at the same time Ben says, “It wasn’t supposed to be loaded.” He’s sitting up now, rubbing slow circles against the back of his head. “Rosalie?” he asks, recognition dawning. “How did you get here?”
I glare at him, ignoring his question, and turn to David. “So you’re Private? Or you two are some kind of stalker tag team?”
“Who?” David asks.
“The private number,” Amanda cuts in. “Anonymous texts? Time to talk, David. Or have you forgotten there’s a gun aimed at you?”
“Chill, okay? I promise I will tell you everything you want to know, but I didn’t send any anonymous texts. Ben?”
Ben shakes his head. “Not me.”
Amanda and I glance at each other. What the actual fuck?
“The gun is Carter’s,” Ben says slowly. “Well, his dad’s, from his antique collection? It’s so old, I didn’t even think it worked. Swear to god.”
“Ben Gallagher.” Amanda sounds calm. Dangerous. “Are you telling me you took this gun from the Shaws to kidnap me? Carter’s going to have your head when he finds out.”
“Amanda, he knows.” It’s David this time. He stands up slowly, one hand still in the air, the other gripped under Ben’s arm, helping him to his feet. “This is all because of Carter.”
“Yeah, I get that this is about Carter,” Amanda snaps. “What do you mean he knows?”
“I mean he hired us,” David says.
I turn to Ben for an explanation. “Carter offered to pay me to keep an eye on Amanda,” he says. “At first, that was it. Then things kind of . . . escalated. David didn’t know anything until today, I swear. I asked him for help a few hours ago.”
David looks at Amanda. “The plan was to drive you around for a while, scare you, and then you’d give in and make the call. You were supposed break up with him on speaker in front of everyone at the party, and then we’d all get out of here. No harm, no foul. WVU isn’t going to pay for itself. And there wasn’t supposed to be a gun.” He glares at Ben.
My hands are steady, but my mind is reeling. In the gym’s dim light, I can see the same realization start to burn in Amanda’s eyes. These guys aren’t Private. They’re just Carter’s puppets, doing what they’re told, because it’s been Carter behind every threat, every anonymous text. Carter desperate to get what he wants—a brand-new future without Amanda or Shaw Realty or rigid family expectations; a future he thought he’d found with me. Guilt wrings my gut like a limp rag. To say I’d underestimated Carter doesn’t even begin to capture it. It’s been days since he first said those three little words, but for the first time, I really understand. I love you, Rosalie. I’d been so sure Carter saw me as a temporary outlet, because it’s how I wanted him to see me. But he saw me as a way out.
I close my eyes, and I’m jolted back to that day in the clearing. The deep winter chill. The soft crunch of pine needles and limp, dead leaves beneath my feet. Then, a flash of black and white through the trees. This time, I understand what I’m seeing. Not Trina or someone from the Fellowship or even the Gallaghers—but Carter, all dressed up in a suit and tie, spying on Pau and me before heading off to yet another ubiquitous Logansville social function. I’m sure, now, that it was Carter at my house. The yawn of his shadow made willowy in the dark. Carter other times I didn’t even know I was being watched. Carter who sent the pictures to Amanda, knowing how deeply she despised me, banking on the fact that she’d send them on to my dad, do his dirty work for him. Then Carter demanding I confess when Amanda wouldn’t comply. Carter desperate to know the truth about Pau and me, but too spineless to ask me to my face.
My mind reels ahead to the two of us at Eat’n Park, how he tried to convince me it was Amanda who had trashed her own locker.
To the day in his car, right before I broke things off. The concerned look on his face when I said someone had been following me.
To his conviction that the car accident was a sign from God, that we should be together. Was that even real? Or was he using my religion to play me?
I try to puzzle it out, get inside his head. He must have thought Pau was some fling, an “experiment” that my deeply religious parents would nip in the bud, pushing Carter and me closer together. That as soon as Paulina was out of the way, we would be Carter and Rosalie, happily ever after. And me none the wiser that it had been Carter who’d come between us. My gut twists harder, but it’s anger this time, not guilt, doing all the wringing.
“David, get over here.” I dig my keys out of my pocket with one hand, still holding the gun toward him with the other. “There’s a pocketknife on my key chain. You’re going to cut Amanda’s wrist ties.”
He walks over to me and accepts the keys. These guys aren’t dangerous; I get that now. But just to be safe, I say, “Don’t even think about trying anything. Gun, remember?”
He nods. In a minute, the ties are severed and he’s handing my keys back. Amanda’s just standing there, rubbing her wrists, looking kind of dazed. For a moment our eyes meet, then we turn to David and Ben, who are both staring at the ground, hands shoved in their pockets. They don’t bear much family resemblance, but they’re both washed in the same shame.
Amanda’s eyes flicker to the gun. Slowly, I lower it so it’s pointing at the floor. “I think you should get out of here,” I say to the guys.
“There is nothing I would love more,” Ben says, “but we kind of can’t. I have to call Carter. Phone’s on silent, but he’s been calling nonstop.”