In My Dreams I Hold a Knife(88)

Mint pointed the glass dagger at me. “Where were you that night?” He spun to Coop. “With the professor, or him?”

My heart was pounding so fast it was going to break through my chest.

Courtney grunted, an unladylike sound, and her eyes rolled back in her head. Caro shrieked, but before she could do anything to stop it, Courtney wobbled, knees bending in unnatural directions, then collapsed on the floor. Caro dropped to her knees and pressed her fingers to Courtney’s throat. “Her heart’s beating. Oh my god.”

“She just fainted, Caro. I’ve seen it on the field. It’s going to be okay.” Slowly, Frankie turned from Caro to Mint, his hands spread wide in supplication. “Mint, why don’t you put the glass down. This isn’t you. Put it down and we’ll talk it out.” He took a hopeful step forward.

“Stay back!” Mint hissed. His golden hair was disheveled, flipped over his forehead so you could only see one of his eyes, making him look a little mad. Perfect Mint, campus big shot, heir to a real estate empire, king of the East House Seven. A killer.

Eric ignored Mint’s warning, stalking toward him. “You planted the scissors in Jack’s room.” It wasn’t a question but a puzzle piece fitting into place. “You framed one of your best friends, threw him to the wolves. Sat back and watched his life go down in flames because of what you did. All our lives. And then what, you kept dating the girl you tried to kill, just to keep up appearances?”

That’s right. Oh god. Mint had come to me after Heather died, drowning in an ocean of emotion he could barely keep contained—guilt and fear and anger. I’d assumed it was survivor’s guilt, nothing more than an intense reaction to what had happened to our friend. I could remember now. He hadn’t let me touch him for hours, nearly a whole night, even as he’d insisted we recommit to our relationship. And I—awash in my own misery and guilt—had been grateful for the lifeline, the chance to make my life normal again. I was desperate to feel the way Mint used to make me feel—like I was valuable, a somebody.

I grimaced as I remembered the night he’d broken up with me in New York, the way he’d looked at me with revulsion when I’d begged him not to. That had been a glimpse of the true Mint, what he really felt. Everything else had been a lie, carefully calculated by a man who’d actually tried to kill me. My first real boyfriend, who for a few triumphant seconds in the dark thought he really had done it.

My legs went weak. I dropped, unable to hold myself up.

Mint’s steel eyes turned to me as I knelt, taking measure of me in that way he had. But this time, instead of wanting to straighten my spine and stand taller, I wanted to cower. To be anywhere other than where he could find me.

“Jack was going to report me to the cops for hurting Trevor,” Mint said, his voice cold and detached, almost thoughtful. “I never felt bad about what I did to him. But you—I did feel bad about you. Really. I tried to forgive you for Garvey, to move on in New York. I figured if I could just get rid of my anger, that goddamn fire in my chest, I could wipe the slate clean. But I couldn’t. And it turns out I shouldn’t have even tried to forgive you, because it wasn’t just Garvey. It was him, too.” He pointed the tip of the glass at Coop, whose gaze was already locked on Mint, eyes narrowed, shoulders tensed.

“For that, I’m going to finish what I started,” Mint said. For a second, I thought he was talking to Coop—he was still looking at him. But then he turned to me, his eyes strangely vacant, and I knew the truth. Of course. It was me he hated. Me who’d turned him into his father.

His voice was so measured. “I’m going to do it right this time. You did everything you could to humiliate me, and now you have to pay, for balance. I—”

Eric rushed him in a burst of speed, but Mint reacted quickly, meeting Eric with his foot, kicking him square in the chest. Eric hit the floor hard, hands catching the glass shards. They turned bright with blood.

Coop lunged, trying to take advantage of Mint’s distraction, but Mint twisted away and slashed Coop with his jagged glass, making a vicious line across Coop’s chest. Caro screamed as Coop staggered, clutching the long gash, his T-shirt gaping open.

I fell backwards to the floor. It was one thing to hear Mint’s confession, another to see him strike his friend and draw blood. The surprise must have caught Frankie, too, because he paused his forward momentum, giving Mint the precious seconds he needed to thrust his hand inside Coop’s pocket and wrestle out the lighter he’d known Coop would be carrying. He flicked up a flame, as fluid as Coop had taught him to be.

“Don’t—” Caro started to get up from where she crouched near Courtney, but Mint leapt past her to the stack of old newspapers and touched the flame to the paper. For one glorious instant it seemed nothing happened, but then the fire spilled from the lighter, racing over the newspaper, and suddenly it was ablaze. The fire caught the arm of a nearby couch, licking across the cushions, until it covered the couch like a blanket.

Mint was setting the room on fire. We’d discovered his secret, and now he was going to kill us.

Eric had rolled to his knees, still struggling to breathe from Mint’s kick, and now he and Frankie grabbed Coop’s shoulders—ignoring his moan, the hand pressed to his chest—and pulled him back, away from the flames. Caro was trying with every ounce of her strength to pull the deadweight of Courtney’s body toward the doorway.