All Eyes on Us, page 27
Because in the end, it was all Carter.
The fog is almost cleared away. I’m on the edge of understanding everything, but when I think about Private and I think about the boy I used to love, who I thought loved me, the two images hold stubborn at the edges of my sight. Even now, I can’t quite make them merge.
A Mercedes passes in front of the high school and pauses at the light. Carter’s here. I spin around and run back inside.
“I need to talk to him. Alone,” I say. Rosalie’s sitting on the metal folding chair in the middle of the floor, waiting for me. “Give me the gun.”
“What?” She hugs her messenger bag protectively to her chest.
“He’s about to pull into the lot; he’ll be inside in a sec. I’m only going to talk to him, promise. But give me the gun, just in case.”
For a moment, Rosalie studies my face. Then she reaches into her bag and pulls it out.
“Just give it to me,” I insist.
“You don’t need to do this tonight,” she says. “Why not wait until tomorrow. Broad daylight, public place? Right now, you don’t know how he’ll be.”
“He’ll be angry,” I say. “And that’s what I need. Tomorrow, Carter’s going to find a way to explain this all away. Right now is my only shot at the truth.” I cringe at the word shot on my tongue, but Rosalie doesn’t seem to notice. A few yards to our left, a car door slams.
“Fine.” She places the gun in my hand, still looking wary. “But I am not leaving you alone with him. I’ll be right outside. Leave the door propped open.”
“Obviously,” I agree.
“If you need backup, say something about Culver Ridge.”
“And then what?” I ask.
“And then I’m calling nine-one-one.”
Rosalie switches off her headlamp and tosses it to me, then she slips out the door and into the darkness. I wrap the headlamp’s band around my wrist. The skin is still sore where the plastic dug into it, but I am not putting that thing on my head. I walk over to the open doorway and stand next to it, out of sight. My back presses into the wall, and for just a second, I’m strangely calm. I wait for the sound of my heartbeat to fill my ears, but there’s nothing. Then two shoes crunch across the gravel outside, and he’s here.
“Hello?” Carter steps through the door, into the gym. I still have the lamp switched off, so except for the light spilling in from outside, it’s dark in here. I let him walk a few feet inside, then I move into the open doorway, blocking it, allowing the light to black me out in silhouette. He spins around.
“Amanda?” he asks. “Where’s David and Ben?”
I ignore him. I switch on the headlamp, hold my wrist up so it’s shining right in his face.
Carter flinches. “Is that my gun?”
I’m not going to use it. I would never use it. But it’s his turn to feel scared.
“I don’t know,” I say. “I thought it was your dad’s.” My mind flashes to Mr. Shaw’s antique gun room. Carter had an entire gallery of deadly options at his disposal. I shudder.
“Give me the gun, Amanda. You’re going to hurt yourself.” He takes a step forward, and I raise it up, point it right at his chest.
“No.” A surge of adrenaline rushes through me. I’m in control. “Here’s how this is going to go. I’m going to ask the questions, and you’re going to answer. Got it?”
Carter looks like he wants to protest, but he crosses his arms across his chest instead. His uninjured arm cradles the one in a cast. “Fine.”
“Admit you sent those texts. The ones from the blocked number.”
“You’re being crazy, Amanda. I’d really feel better if that thing wasn’t pointed at me,” Carter says.
My hand wavers. If anyone has a right to throw around stigmatizing diagnoses in this scenario, I’m pretty sure it’s not Carter. But the gun is heavy and strange in my hand. Maybe I’m not being rational. I am pointing a gun at Carter.
“Fine.” I lower it to my side, but don’t release my grip. “But you still need to answer.”
For a moment, he’s silent. My hand twitches, and his eyes lock in on the gun. Suddenly it hits me. When he gave it to Ben, he knew it was loaded—but he told Ben it wasn’t. He actually hoped Ben would shoot me. The realization rockets through every muscle in my body, turning them to rubber bands, and it’s all I can do to keep from buckling over.
“I haven’t wanted to be Carter Shaw for a while now,” he says finally. I force myself to stand tall, meet his eyes. “It’s not personal, Amanda. This is so much bigger than you.” He laughs, but there’s no humor there. I shiver. “So yeah, I sent those texts.”
“You could have come to me, Carter. We could have talked about this.” My empty hand reaches up to my neck, dances across the skin where his heart used to be.
“Talk to you?” he spits. “You must be kidding. You have this whole plan for us. You have since we were kids.”
“It wasn’t just my plan,” I spit back. The fact that I don’t even want that anymore is beside the point. “It was everyone’s plan. Mine, yours, our parents.”
Carter shrugs. His face is blank, cold. “So you see? I couldn’t just break up with you, or tell Winston I didn’t want to work for him anymore. Gracefully bowing out of my future wasn’t exactly an option.”
I think about my mother’s expectations, and for a second, I feel a stab of sympathy for Carter. In a way, I understand better than anyone. But then I remember everything he did to me, the loaded gun he gave Ben, how he hoped Ben would use it, and my hand tightens around the handle. “So you made up a stalker to scare me into dumping you in front of everyone? I’d look like the bad guy, and you’d be the victim. And who would blame you for not going back to me after that.” All my synapses are firing now. There’s no fog, not anymore. This all makes perfect, sick sense. “And then what? You knew I was never going to keep quiet about what you did to me tonight. So you gave Ben those documents, whatever you have on our parents, and you told him to blackmail me into shutting up. You were just going to throw our families under the bus if I talked. Light a fire, get out, watch everyone around you burn.”
He shrugs. “You have to admit, it was a pretty good plan.”
“You harassed me!” I practically shout. “You had me kidnapped!”
Carter’s eyes narrow. “It’s your fault it went this far, Amanda. I tipped you off about Rosalie back on New Year’s. But then you had to resist, didn’t you? You pushed me. I gave you so many chances. You brought tonight on yourself.”
His words land like a slap. I want to scream, you’re wrong, and I’m not the one to blame here, but I should have known better than to leave the Shaws’ house tonight. To fall for his kidnapping scheme after I fell for the drugged champagne last night. I’ll give him that, but that’s the last thing I’ll ever give him. As I stare at Carter, the figure of Private and the figure of my boyfriend blur before my eyes. The image leaves me cold.
“Let’s just go home, okay?” he says, voice softening. “We’ll clean your prints off the gun, pretend this never happened.” He’s almost cooing. He walks toward me, slowly, his hand reaching out. “No one ever has to know about any of this. You do understand how bad it would look for me, if people found out? How bad this would look for you? Just give me the gun, and we’ll leave.”
He’s three feet away from me now. One more step, and he could make a swipe for the gun. His voice is gentle, but there’s something not right about his face—it’s hard, like stone. I step back.
“You sure you want to go home?” I ask. My heart starts pounding in my chest. “I thought you’d want to drive out to Culver Ridge. You know, make things right with Rosalie. In Culver Ridge.” I repeat our signal, louder this time, but I can’t hear anything outside, where Rosalie should be.
“Give me the gun, Amanda.” Carter steps forward, reaches for it. I yank it back, away from him, but he grabs my other arm above the elbow and squeezes tight.
“You’re hurting me.” I stare right into his eyes, but there’s no softness there. Only cold. Where ambition and desire—for me, for our future—used to shine, now there’s only hate. Something inside him has snapped. My skin breaks into gooseflesh. As he stares back at me, a fresh realization dawns across his face. There’s no way out of this for him now. No easy departure from me or his future. There’s just Carter, me, and a gun.
He twists my arm behind my back, and I curl over at the waist. Even with one arm in a cast, Carter is bigger and stronger than me. He used to make me feel safe. Now the only thing I feel is sickening, twisting fear. The jolt of pain shoots all the way from my wrist to my shoulder. I cry out; my arm feels like it’s going to snap.
“Carter, stop!” I scream, but he doesn’t. He throws me to the floor, and my hands reach out automatically to cushion the fall. The gun clatters to the ground, and Carter dives down after it. When I hit the floor, something sharp jabs my thigh. Glass or a piece of broken brick. I bite back the pain and grope around for the gun, but it’s lost somewhere in the rubble. My hands are torn up, blood sliding down my leg. I shake my wrist, but Rosalie’s headlamp is broken.
Above me, something moves. I look up, tears stinging my eyes. Carter’s standing over me, the gun pointed straight at my head.
“Wait.” I rub my coat sleeve across my face, but I can’t stop the tears. I’m not going to die crying. “I won’t tell. I want good things for you. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. I’m not going to ruin that now, promise. We’ll go home, just like you said. We’ll get cleaned up, and tomorrow’s a new day. For both of us.”
For a second, I think he’s going to take the bait. His face softens, and his arm drops a bit. I force myself to smile up at him. Sweet. Sincere.
“But you will tell,” he says. “I know you, Amanda.” He lifts his arm and pushes back the hammer. His finger twitches against the trigger, and I scream.
38
ROSALIE
TUESDAY, JANUARY 23
I tell Amanda I’ll call 911 when I hear our signal, but it’s a lie. As soon as Carter walks into the building and Amanda steps in front of the doorway, blocking the exit, my gut says this confrontation scene was a terrible idea. I force myself to stay and listen for a couple minutes, to be sure I’m not overreacting. I’m not. I can feel it crackling in the air all around me; something seriously bad is about to happen. Carter admits he’s Private, and I’m done. I am not sticking around for the rest of this. I creep silently around the side of the building until I’m back in the parking lot, out of earshot. Then I dig out Ben’s phone and dial.
I try to be as clear as possible with the 911 operator. I tell her our location, and that it’s Carter—not the boys in the truck—putting Amanda in danger.
“We didn’t have a call-back number for you,” she says, as if this is going to help anything now.
“I’m on a borrowed phone. A different one. Is someone coming?”
“We have two uniformed officers en route. A marked car will be arriving in a few minutes; I’d like to keep you on the line until they get there, okay, Rosalie?”
“Okay.” I stamp my feet against the pavement in a mix of cold and impatience.
“Are you sure you’re safe where you are?” she asks.
“I’m fine,” I repeat. “Please tell them to hurry.”
Carter’s and Amanda’s voices pitch up from the gym. He’s yelling. She’s yelling. I’m too far away to make out what they’re saying, but my pulse spikes.
“How much longer?” The operator doesn’t give me a straightforward answer.
Their voices rise again. Any amount of time is too long—even if I did unload the gun. While Amanda was outside, my headlamp and I found the latch for the chamber, and it popped right out. Five little bullets slid into my hand. The sixth one’s buried somewhere in the rubble where I shot it. The thing about handguns is, they’re really not so complicated.
But gun or no gun, Carter Shaw is dangerous.
And this is taking too long.
I scan the parking lot. The Gallaghers’ truck might have had something useful inside, but it’s long gone. The shovel I found earlier is still in the gym. I imagine myself smashing Carter’s head in with a brick, and bile floods my mouth. I spit onto the pavement. When I look up, my eyes land on my bike, still propped against a planter. While the operator tries to keep me talking, I squat down next to it and run my fingers along the chain, searching for the quick link.
“Hold on,” I tell the operator. I put her on speaker and slip the phone into my coat pocket.
With both hands free, I toss my gloves to the ground and place my fingers on either side of the link. I squeeze. It takes several tries, but finally the links compress and the chain pops open. I run it through the chain guides and around the ring, guiding it off my bike. Laid out long, it’s four and three quarters feet, nearly as long as I am tall. When it’s free, I dig Ben’s phone back out.
“I’m losing the signal,” I lie to the operator. Then I end the call.
I look up and down Foster one more time. Two cars pass, but there are no sirens, no sign of help coming. Inside the gym, Amanda screams.
I run.
• • •
Moonlight slices one piece of the gym floor into a pale triangle. The rest is darkness. I step silently through the doorway, and at first I only see the white glimmer of Carter’s back, hunched over something on the floor. The gun is discarded to his right, glinting and useless in the moonlight. Then I see a flash of green—Amanda is pinned beneath him. His uninjured hand clamps down on her mouth, and his cast cuts a dark line across her neck. He’s facing away from me.
I stretch my arms apart, extending three feet of chain in the air between them. The remaining links are wrapped tight around my gloved hands. I squeeze the metal tight and say a quick prayer. Jesus, if you’re listening. Give me strength.
Then I lunge toward Carter, reach the chain over his head and down across his arms and chest, and yank him toward me. We go flying back and land on the gym floor, hard. He stinks of sweat and rage. I struggle up to a sitting position, bringing him with me, then pull back on the chain, pinning his arms to his sides and his back to my chest. There’s a crack as the metal snaps against his cast, and he howls. Through my gloves, the chain bites into my hands. I clench down harder.
“Amanda!” I yell. She’s still sprawled on the floor in front of us. In the moonlight, her dark hair spills around her face like a halo. She’s not moving.
“Rosalie?” Carter tries to twist around to face me, but I pull the chain tighter. My arms burn and his body heat sears through my coat. It makes my stomach turn.
“The cops are on their way—this is over,” I hiss in his ear.
He struggles hard, but the chain holds tight, leaves oily streaks across his white dress shirt. “What the fuck,” he spits.
I keep my eyes trained on the still body in front of me. Come on, Amanda. Move. Breathe.
Carter squirms again, and this time, he slips down, gaining some leverage. The chain slides up his chest and I redouble my grip. When I first pinned him, I had the element of surprise on my side. Now, I’m reminded of his strength. If he twists again, I’m not sure I’ll be able to hold him.
“We should be together,” he says through clenched teeth. “Why are you doing this?”
I answer his question with a question. “You knew about Paulina. Why didn’t you ask me to my face?”
He whimpers, a trapped animal sound. “You’re supposed to be with me,” he says, “not her,” and my suspicions about the deepness of Carter’s delusions are confirmed. Of course, he had no way of knowing what would have really happened if my father had seen those pictures. And that’s my fault, because I lied to him, big time. He probably envisioned a stern talking-to that would drive me deeper into his arms. I shudder.
In the distance, a siren wails. We both jerk our heads toward the door. Please, Jesus. Let that siren be for us.
Carter gives a massive wrench and my hold on him slips, chain sliding up higher and snagging on his shirt collar. His arms slide free and he grabs the metal to keep it from digging into his neck. I yank back, but the chain trembles in Carter’s grasp. Outside, the siren wails louder, closer.
“Don’t move.”
Amanda’s voice is a fragile scratch, a record skipping in the dark. I can hear the damage where his cast smashed down on her windpipe, but she’s speaking. She’s alive. And when she shoves herself up to a sitting position, she’s holding the shovel. Amanda lurches to her knees and crawls, shovel clenched in one hand, closing the distance between us. She leans forward and presses the metal tip into the soft skin at the base of Carter’s throat. “Don’t fucking move,” she hisses.
The sirens pitch up to a high wail, and the sound of car tires screeching into the lot fills the gym. Two doors slam.
“Logansville Police!” a voice shouts. Four feet pound the pavement outside. “Carter Shaw, come out with your hands in the air.”
Amanda lowers the shovel, I relax my grip on the chain, and Carter struggles to his feet.
39
AMANDA
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 24
“Amanda? Are you awake, honey?”
My mother’s voice floats through the thick, hot air. My limbs feel heavy, like I took too many sleeping pills. I take a deep breath, and my throat leaps into flames. I gasp, then explode into a series of spluttering coughs. My eyes fly open.
“Here, go slow.” For the second time in as many days, I’m in a hospital room. My mother is pressing a plastic cup with water and ice chips to my lips. I feel a lot worse than I did after having my stomach pumped, and that was god-awful. Slowly, everything starts to come into focus. I prop myself up on my elbows and take a grateful sip.
“How long have I been sleeping?” My voice comes out in a raspy croak, my neck bruised and raw where Carter tried to choke me after the gun wouldn’t fire. “Where’s Carter?”
