These Deadly Games(64)

“Hey!” he screamed again. I raced toward my car, but even though he ran barefoot, he was faster—his fingers hooked the edge of my hood, and he yanked me back.

“Argh!” I whipped around to face him, breathing hard. My eyes watered from my throbbing palm and wrist.

“What the ever-loving fuck are you doing here?”

“I … I…” My phone buzzed. Probably An0nym0us1. Surely they’d punish me now—and the worst way to hurt me was to hurt my sister.

“What, were you gonna break in?” Jeremy asked. “Hack into my MD account?”

“No! I—”

“Lemme see what’s in your pockets. You got a USB? Were you gonna install something?”

I cringed as a spasm of pain radiated up my arm. “No—”

“Turn out your pockets!”

Wow. I mean sure, it probably seemed sketchy as hell to be spying on him, but talk about paranoid. “I wasn’t going to hack anything.” I turned out my pockets with my good hand, taking out my cell and mini-charger I’d grabbed from my desk in case my phone ran out of batteries today.

“Aha!” He pointed at the charger. “I knew it!”

“It’s a—”

“What were you gonna install, huh? A keystroke recorder? Ransomware? Were you gonna fucking blackmail me?”

“No—”

“Oh, man. That’s why you invited me to the park yesterday. You followed me home, didn’t you? That’s how you found out where I live.”

“I didn’t—”

“You know, I could get you banned from MortalDusk for life for this. I could call the cops—”

“Will you slow down a minute and let me talk?” I shrieked.

He finally shut up, hands on his hips. “So? Talk.”

“This”—I brandished the charger—“is a cell phone charger.” I pulled out the inner lining of my jacket pockets. “I have no USB or anything with any viruses on them. I wasn’t going to install anything on your computer, or even touch your computer.”

“You could have done it remotely.” He pointed at my phone. “You could have—”

“Jeremy,” I said, exasperated, “I don’t even know how to do something like that.” Zoey, maybe. But me? Not a chance. I stuck the charger back in my pocket and brushed dirt off my injured palm. The pain was slowly subsiding. Or maybe it was just going numb.

He crossed his arms. “So what the hell are you doing here?”

I racked my brain for an excuse. How the hell was I going to explain this? My phone buzzed again, and I glanced at the screen.

Leave NOW, or she dies.



The ground seemed to wobble under my feet. “I’m sorry, I have to go—”

But Jeremy stepped between me and my car, raising his arms like a barrier. “No way. I need some answers here. Why the hell were you spying on me?”

I bit my lip. Just because he wasn’t sending An0nym0us1’s messages didn’t mean he was innocent. What if he was working with someone else?

But Jeremy seemed genuinely baffled by my presence.

I remembered Dylan’s theory at the hospital that it could be one of Jeremy’s teammates or fanboys or something. Maybe he’d have some idea who it was. This was completely, utterly reckless. But I was desperate. Clutching my phone to my jacket to mute the mic, I spoke softly. “After we ran into each other at the park”—he scoffed, but let me go on—“my friend Matty…” His cheeks had gone purple, his honey-brown eyes wide with terror, and—no. I shoved the memory from my skull. I couldn’t think of that now, because if I thought of it, I’d feel it, and if I felt it my legs would give out beneath me, and the earth would swallow me whole. And right now, I had to keep my shit together. I had to focus on finding Caelyn. “He died.”

Jeremy’s expression softened. “Oh, shit, yeah.”

Suspicion flared in my mind. “Wait, you knew? How?”

“Er … you know he was livestreaming when his coughing fit started, right? The video’s still up on your channel. And once people heard what happened—well, people are morbid shits.” Oh, God. Randall must’ve forgotten all about it in the chaos of everything else. No wonder so many people sent me messages. “I, uh … I’m real sorry about that. But that doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

I hesitated a moment. “Well, the thing is, we’re not sure it was just an allergic reaction. It might’ve been … intentional.”

Jeremy looked stunned. “What, like someone poisoned him?”

“More like tampered with his food to add nuts—but yeah, essentially. And it’s not just that. My other friend Randall got swatted last night.”

“You’re kidding.” Jeremy gaped at me, eyes wide. I guessed that hadn’t made the news. Maybe Chief Sanchez managed to keep it hush-hush as he investigated. “Is he okay?”

“Yeah. Actually, he was at my house when it happened—there was a last-minute change in plans—but his dad had a heart attack when the SWAT team busted in.”

“Holy…” Jeremy clasped his hands behind his head.

My phone buzzed against my chest, sending a current of fear through me. “Anyway, the cops are trying to find whoever called in the fake tip. And I thought maybe—”