White Rabbit(89)
“Peyton, listen to yourself,” Sebastian implores, his voice rising again as he tries to cope with what she’s saying. He thrusts a hand into the damp air, fingers splayed, his body tense as a coiled spring. “This is … it’s insane! It’s fucking insane. Two people are dead already—isn’t that bad enough? You don’t have to kill anyone else!”
“I don’t want to, all right?” she snaps back fiercely, eyes blazing. “This actually isn’t a whole lot of fun for me, Bash. That wasn’t all acting, when I was crying earlier? When I was pretending I burned down the Whitneys’ house? Killing Fox … it was awful. It happened, like—it was—even when I was doing it, I couldn’t believe I was doing it, and, and it was … awful. I barely kept from puking.” Her throat flexes at the memory, and her chin jerks forward. For a moment, I think she’s going to puke right in front of us, but then she swallows and grits her teeth. “But Fox Whitney was a human colostomy bag. He was a misogynist dickhole, he blackmailed me for sex, he wiped his ass with his friends, he sold drugs to kids … Just tell me he didn’t deserve it.”
“I—” I want to argue with her, to turn this conversation around … but what can I say? Fox Whitney really was a terrible person. Murder is wrong—I mean, obviously—but I’m not going to miss the guy. I can’t offer anything more than empty platitudes about right and wrong anyway, and I’m not sure those will make much of a difference to her at this point. But I have to say something. I have to try.
Peyton isn’t acting anxious or desperate; on the contrary, she’s controlled and steady, seeming not the least bit worried we might get away from her—and that makes me cold with dread. The unbeatable team of nerves and my smart mouth conjure up some words at last.
“Peyton, I’ve hated Fox a hell of a lot longer than you, but somehow I managed to not kill him. Maybe you could’ve given not killing people a try?”
She rolls her eyes, annoyed. “You are such a sanctimonious shit, Rufus, you know that? I mean, keep it up, really—you’re making what comes next a whole lot easier.”
Sebastian grabs my elbow and pulls me closer, protectively, his eyebrows drawing together. “You don’t have to do anything, Peyton. And you can’t kill all three of us. Lia’s expecting us to tell her what went down tonight—in person—and if we don’t do it soon, she’s gonna call the police!”
“And by the time they get here, I’ll be long gone, and all their loose ends will be wrapped up for them,” Peyton finishes complacently. “Race’s dad will be getting back from Washington in, like, half an hour, and when the cops show up to ask where his son is, he’ll be finding a convenient suicide note on Race’s computer that confesses to everything.” She gives us a little frown, more disappointed than regretful. “I really … I almost thought it was a good thing that you guys showed up here instead of Lia. You already seemed pretty sure Race did it, and I could tell you bought my story. I thought maybe I could let you go to the police and back me up—tell them I burned down Fox’s house, and let you support my alibi. But Race needs to die here. It’s what I wrote in his suicide note, and it’s too late to go back and change it without getting caught. Maybe if you guys had kept walking. Maybe if you hadn’t looked in the trunk. But…”
Her face goes blank again, her eyes as cold and empty as Pluto, and I hold my breath instinctively. Sebastian’s fingers tighten on my arm, and I can tell he senses it, too—something is about to happen; we’re all out of time. Whatever move we’re going to make, we have to make it now.
And then Peyton lifts her right arm, and I see what she’s been keeping just out of sight. All the pressure levels in my body change; my stomach drops, my lungs rise, and my heart suddenly feels as if it’s beating in the center of my brain.
In her hand is Arlo’s rifle.
28
In the east, the sun is finally starting to make its presence felt, daylight asserting itself in shades of white and silver that displace the mist’s dreamy blues and purples; but Fernwood Park remains an endless swamp of turbid air and wet grass nonetheless, trees looming like shrouded sentries as we struggle past them with our cumbersome burden. Race’s legs feel surprisingly skinny in my arms, but his upper body keeps slipping from Sebastian’s hold, and—to Peyton’s escalating aggravation—he and I have to stop frequently to rest and switch places.
The stakes changed pretty drastically upon the reintroduction of Arlo’s rifle. If we could somehow get away from Peyton, escape and lose ourselves in the fog before she could take proper aim, we’d have a chance at hiding from her—perhaps; but she seems well aware of this fact, and trails just far enough back to be out of arm’s reach while still keeping well within sighting distance. She handles the firearm like she knows what she’s doing, and it makes me think twice about saying fuck it and trying to run anyway. Besides, I can’t make a move unless I know Sebastian will also be safe, and there’s no way to confer, to plot. We have to bide our time—we have to hope there’s enough time to bide—and wait for a clearer opportunity to present itself.
The first thing she did, once the barrel of the weapon was out in the open and we all knew exactly where we stood, was instruct us to put our cell phones on the ground and stomp on them until they shattered. Then we were ordered to pull Race out of the Camaro’s trunk and, supporting his weight between us, march him off into the pale abyss of Fernwood Park in order to meet our collective doom.