Stake You (Stake You #1) Page 18

Chapter Thirteen

  “Wanna talk about anything?” Base asked hesitantly after a few minutes of silence.

  “No, thanks,” I said, turning up the volume of the car radio. The song was annoying, but it was better than talking.

  He switched to a CD, and a familiar song assaulted my ears. It felt angry, and that was exactly what I needed.

  “Didn’t take you for a Metallica fan,” I said a few minutes later.

  “You get a lot of things wrong,” he said, and then he laughed. “But please, don’t kill me. Safety first.”

  I glanced at him. “Do you always have to be a smartarse?”

  “Trust me when I say that you can’t handle anything else,” he said softly. “So. You seem tense. What was going on back there?”

  “Remember I told you how I liked privacy,” I warned.

  “Hey, you caught a glimpse of my family life,” he said, grinning. “Fair’s fair.”

  “Fine,” I said, realising I wanted to talk about it. “That idiot is my mother’s ex. The most recent one anyway. He’s married, and every time the guilt gets too much, he ditches my mam. She gets all depressed and goes through this big ritual of crap that you’ve witnessed a little of. Then she gets better. I mean, eventually she gets better.”

  I clenched my fingers into fists. “Or she would if it wasn’t for him. He keeps popping back up as soon as she starts getting her act together. He leads her down this path, and it takes her ages to find her way back once he ditches her. But he shows up just to drive her away again, and she falls for it every time.”

  He grunted. “Sounds familiar. Frankie’s dad isn’t exactly the right person to be a parent, you know? But he calls, and my mam goes running to make sure he’s okay. But maybe it’s hard having kids. Maybe he makes her happy.”

  “Does my mother look happy to you?”

  “About as happy as you,” he said, deftly avoiding my half-hearted slap.

  “Do you know what the sick part is? He’s one of the better ones. That is the best she can do. How sad is that?”

  “Seriously?” He raised his eyebrows. “What were the other ones like?”

  I cleared my throat, staring out of the window. “When we moved here, there was one who was actually nice. Normal. I thought he might be the one to change everything. Get Mam back to her old self. Before… before she became this way. But he couldn’t hack her anymore, so he left. Of course, I give him a hard time at every opportunity.”

  I tried to smile at Base, but it must not have looked believable because he had pity in his eyes. “The rest aren’t worth talking about. She’s entertained a long line of extreme losers, starting with the one who got her pregnant with me when she was still in school.” I didn’t want to talk anymore.

  Base turned off the radio. “I need to talk to you about what you said at school earlier. About… about you and me. I didn’t mean to—”

  “Let’s not,” I said, feeling myself blush again. “I don’t want to talk about anything like that.”

  “What do you want to talk about?”

  “Sully,” I said, gritting my teeth. “He wasn’t at school today. At least, not after… earlier. Aoife, too. What do you think they’re doing?”

  “Just mitching, hopefully,” he said, but his eyes were worried.

  “You really think…”

  He glanced at me, his mouth tight. “I really think,” he said. “You should have seen your face this morning, Dev. That wasn’t… He can’t get away with stuff like that, and stuff like that isn’t normal.”

  “Maybe I was seeing things,” I said, thinking hard. “Like, some kind of mass hysteria deal, except with just us. If nobody else is seeing something that you are, then the problem is with you, right? I might just be losing my mind. It would be easier for people to believe.”

  “If we keep following him around, then we’re going to see, one way or another,” he said. “And I think we need to figure this out sooner. This has gotten bad too quick. Aoife’s just… I need to get her away from him. One way or another.”

  “We can’t kidnap her, and her dad won’t help. Hell, we’re the only people who seem to have noticed that anything’s going on,” I said. “I think we’ll have to do something about him to stop this. I just don’t know what that will be.”

  Base pulled up at the top of Sully’s road. “The car’s outside his house,” he said. “How can he afford a place like that anyway?”

  “Maybe he’s just some obnoxious rich kid,” I offered.

  “Then why’s he coming all the way to our school? It’s a massive kip. And look at those kids in the poncy uniforms. There’s a school around the corner; I checked. He should be going there.”

  “Maybe we could take a look at his house,” I said slowly. “When he’s not at home. If he has a parent there, then we know he’s just an ordinary creep.”

  “He’s not ordinary,” Base practically shouted. “Why do you keep trying to convince yourself otherwise?”

  “Because it’s less scary,” I said simply. “I don’t believe in anything, Base. It’s too much for me. So until we have evidence that says otherwise, he’s just your average scummer, okay?”

  “Fine,” he said, surprising me. “We’ll have proof soon enough. I’m going to park around the corner, so make sure you keep an eye out for his car.”

  “Shouldn’t be hard to miss,” I said. “Even in spot the Beemer neighbourhood. God, people are so pretentious.”

  “You’re not happy unless you’re hating someone, are you?” Base teased.

  “I don’t hate everyone. I quite like Maisy, for example.”

  “Name five people you don’t hate. Apart from your mam,” he said.

  “Shut up.” I sat furiously thinking for a few minutes before pointing at him with an “ah-ha!”

  “What?” he said, startled.

  “Maisy, your little brothers, and Tom and Mark at my work. Five people I don’t hate. So there.”

  He burst out laughing as he parked the car again. “Can’t believe you’ve been sitting there thinking about it for so long. Does that mean I’m still hated?”

  I glanced at him, trying not to smile, and he shook his head. “What do I have to do?” he muttered.

  We both fell silent as we stared out of the window, waiting for Sully to move. I kept glancing at Base, unable to help myself. I had basically turned into my once fourteen-year-old self again, and it bugged the crap out of me.

  “We can’t sit here all day,” I said. “And what if Aoife’s with him?”

  “You ring Aoife’s house and check,” he suggested.

  I typed the number he gave me into my mobile and made the call. Aoife’s dad sounded sleepy when he answered the phone.

  “Is Aoife there?” I asked. “She missed school today, so I wondered if she would want to know the homework we were assigned.”

  “She won’t need it,” he said. “She’s ill in bed.”

  “Is she okay? I mean, can I get her anything?”

  “No. She just needs rest. A lot of rest.”

  He sounded odd, and he hung up without saying goodbye.

  “He said she’s there, but she’s resting up because she’s sick. Think that’s the truth?”

  Base shrugged. “Maybe. If Sully makes a move, we’ll watch and see if she’s in the car with him. Then we’ll check his house in case she’s there.”

  “And if she is?”

  He cleared his throat. “Then I’m taking her with me.”

  I stared at him and realised how determined he was. “She’s lucky she has you to take care of her,” I said at last.

  “She’s my friend,” he said, looking confused. “That’s what friends do.”

  His expression remained resolute, and I wished things were different. I had to turn back to staring out of the window before I said something I regretted.

  “He’s on the move,” I whispered, slinking down in my seat as I watched the car turn out on to the main road in the wing mirror. “He’s co
ming this way. What if he sees us?”

  “Crap,” Base whispered. “Please, don’t freak out, Dev.” He leaned over me, grabbing me as if he were about to kiss me, but he just waited, hovering over me with his fingers wrapped in my hair. He was so close I could stick out my tongue and lick him. His eyes locked onto mine, and I felt his palm against the small of my back, pulling me closer to him. I realised I was grabbing my seat, so I slipped my hands around Base’s shoulders as an obnoxiously loud car engine roared by us.

  “How is this helping?” I whispered, afraid to look away, afraid to look too closely at his eyes when his scent was messing with my head at such close proximity.

  “I panicked,” he admitted. “But I doubt he would recognise my car, so maybe he didn’t get a good enough glimpse of us.”

  “I thought the windows were tinted, so he… he can’t see in, right?”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said breathily. “I forgot.”

  He glanced at my lips, and a million butterflies in my stomach threatened to escape.

  “I think… I think he’s gone.”

  “Yeah.” He hesitated for a couple of heart-stopping seconds, but then he pulled away, letting me go, playful Base back once more. “That was close,” he said, grinning. “Wanna check out his house?”

  “We gonna break in?” I asked, rubbing my arms. It seemed as though every inch of my skin was covered in goose bumps.

  He watched me carefully and cleared his throat. “Need a jacket?”

  I shook my head dumbly, still trying to make sense of how I was feeling around Base. Nothing had happened, and yet I felt as though it had. Deco had never made me feel even a fraction of the same sensations.

  “So, breaking in?” I repeated, just to focus myself on something other than the lingering memory of the heat from Base’s hands.

  “Nah, we’ll just knock and see if anyone answers. After that, well, I’ll play it by ear.”

  “I have a terrible feeling you’re just going to keep getting me into trouble.”

  He grinned. “Never. Come on. Let’s run down and knock. See what happens next. Like you said, we can’t sit around waiting.”

  We hurried to Sully’s house, and I prayed he hadn’t just driven to the corner shop or somewhere ridiculously close. His curtains were closed at the front, but Base rang the doorbell a number of times. Not a sound came from the house.

  “I’m jumping over the back gate,” Base said, running around to the side of the house.

  I followed him like a puppy, cursing him. Sully’s home managed to look as creepy as him, all gothic and imposing, the windows like closed eyes, hiding all of his secrets.

  “It’s not a big deal,” Base said. “Keep watch, okay?”

  Swearing, I moved back to the front gate and watched down the road, hoping Base would come to his senses sooner rather than later. What were we even trying to do?

  Ten minutes later, and I was getting edgy. Base still hadn’t returned, so I headed back to the gate and called him. “Hurry up,” I said, pushing open the wooden gate he had unlocked after he climbed over it. Just in case, he had said. I inched my way into the back garden, dread crawling all over me.

  The garden was dead, the grass withered and brown. Not even a weed. Devoid of life. Somehow, it seemed fitting that nothing would grow in Sully’s garden.

  “Base,” I called out softly, hearing no answer. For a second, I panicked, thinking Sully had somehow gotten past me and taken Base, but I breathed deeply in an effort to calm down my frantic imagination. He hadn’t come back. He didn’t have Base. Everything would be okay.

  But Base wasn’t in the garden, and as I peered around looking for him, I noticed a window swinging wide open. Oh, no. You idiot, I felt like screaming. And then I heard a familiar rumble. Sully’s car. I mentally thanked the fact he had an unbearably loud engine, and I hoped it would drown out me calling Base’s name through the window.

  “He’s back,” I shouted as loud as I dared. “Get out now, Brian!”

  I heard the sound of something falling, and within seconds, Base was climbing out of the window, his face snow white.

  “We have to get out of here,” he hissed at me as he jumped to the ground.

  “He’s back,” I said, my breath catching in my panic.

  “I know.” He took my hand in his. “We’re going to wait until he’s inside, then we’re going to run out the front and straight to the car. Understand?”

  Silent with fear, I nodded, and he squeezed my hand. For some reason, that just made me feel even more afraid. What had he seen to make him look so freaked out?

  “Was Aoife there?” I dared to whisper.

  He shook his head, but his face was locked into a grim expression, and the fear threatened to overwhelm me. We moved closer to the wooden gate, listening to Sully locking his car and making his way into his house.

  “Wait here,” Base said. “And when I wave, run.”

  I tried to pull him back, but he was gone, back down to the end of the house before I could stop him. He waited there, and even at that distance, I could see how pale he was, but then he was waving, and I turned on my heel to run. I heard glass smashing as I opened the gate and ran through it, but I didn’t hear Base’s footsteps running behind me. Glancing around, I hesitated to make sure he was following, but then he was through the gate, almost dislocating my shoulder as he pulled my arm, urging me forward.

  “Out of here,” he cried, and we both ran, my heart racing in my chest. I ran so fast, I felt sure my lungs would explode.

  I could have sworn I heard footsteps behind us, but I kept pushing, nearly keeping up with Base’s long stride. He was in the car first, locking the doors automatically as soon as I jumped in, and he started the car abruptly.

  I glanced behind me, saw nothing, and took a deep breath of relief, but even though Base accelerated the car, it didn’t move. The wheels were turning, squealing against tarmac, but the car wasn’t moving forward. In fact, it began to slowly move backward.

  “Oh, fuck!” Base cried out. “It’s him. He’s holding the car.”

  I didn’t dare look in the mirror; I just closed my eyes shut as Base abruptly reversed, the car jumping as though he had bumped into something. He accelerated, somehow pulling free of whatever had been holding us there. I refused to let myself think it had been Sully. The car felt as though it lifted off the ground as it vaulted forward, and my stomach was practically thrown into my mouth at the force of it.

  I finally worked up the courage to look behind me, and I immediately caught Sully’s gaze. He was standing on the road, completely unharmed, his hands clenched into fists and a look of pure anger and hate on his face. I touched my throat absentmindedly, not realising tears were streaming down my cheeks until Base patted my arm as he whispered comforting things.

  “He’s gone,” he said. “He didn’t follow. Too many people around, probably.”

  I gulped hard. “Sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry. I just… Did you see that?”

  “It’s okay,” he said soothingly.

  “What… what did you see at his house?”

  He didn’t speak for a few minutes. “The place was empty. Like, very little furniture, no food in the fridge. And there was one room…” He shook his head as he remembered. “There were chains and what looked like blood on the floor and walls. It looked like a freaking torture chamber or something. I couldn’t move when I saw it. I kept seeing Aoife lying there. I mean… Fuck, Dev. What the hell is he doing in that house? I took a picture. If you want to see. But you might not…”

  “He knows,” I said in a stronger voice. “He knows it was us.”

  “I’m calling the police,” he said firmly. “If they go to his house, they’ll see. They’ll know what to do.”

  “What if they don’t?”

  “Don’t say that,” he replied in a harsh voice. He pulled out his phone and got on to the nearest Garda station. After a couple of minutes of waiting, he tried to explain, but he stopped mid-
sentence, listened, and hung up. He pressed the phone against his forehead and doubled over.

  “What’s going on?”

  He slammed the steering wheel. “Fuck! It was like they were waiting for me to call, Dev.”

  “What are you talking about? How could...”

  He glanced at me, and suddenly, I knew exactly how. I swallowed hard. “What did they say?”

  “Basically warned me about harassing people. Told me they had my information, and if I kept bothering him, then we’re all in trouble. The voice reminded me of Aoife, of her dad. You know what I mean?”

  “Yeah, I know. So we’re screwed then.”

  “He won’t get us,” he said. “We’ll stick together, and he won’t get us.”

  “You can’t go home,” I blurted in a panic. We had no help. There was nobody but us. “Your brothers… He’ll hurt them. Don’t go home, Base. He’ll follow you. Please, don’t go home.”

  He pulled up as soon as he could, loosening his seatbelt and pulling me into a hug.

  “You’re shaking again,” he whispered, and I felt his lips against my cheek. I longed to turn my cheek and meet his lips with mine. I wanted everything to go away.

  He rubbed my back. “It’s going to be okay, Dev. I promise.”

  “Don’t go home,” I said again.

  “I won’t,” he said, and I clung to him for reassurance, desperate to feel safe again. I knew I wouldn’t, though. Safe didn’t exist anymore.