When You Were Young - Page 142/259

She's almost asleep by the time they reach the tent. He sets her down inside and tucks her in like a child, brushing hair from her face to kiss her on the forehead. "I'll be back in a minute," he says. "Don't go anywhere."

"I won't," she says, her voice heavy with sleep.

She wakes up to find a heavy weight on top of her. Andre lays there, his eyes glossy and skin pale. Blood drips from his slit throat into her eyes. She screams and rolls him off, his skin ice-cold. "Andre? Oh my God," she says. Blood stains his shirt as well from a gash over his heart. "Oh my God."

She's yanked out of the tent by the hair and thrown onto the ground next to the cool embers of the fire. A woman with dark skin and wild hair squats over Jackie. "You thought you could escape me, didn't you?" she says and then punches Jackie before she can say anything. "You thought I'd never find you and your little man."

"Veronica?"

"I'm surprised you still remember." She punches Jackie again, this time in the right eye. "Did you think you could get away with it? Did you?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Jackie says. "We have to get Andre to a hospital. Please-"

"He's not going anywhere. And neither are you." Veronica holds up a bloodstained knife. As the knife dangles over her, Jackie thrashes beneath Veronica, but she can't get free. "We were supposed to be together forever." She dangles a half-heart necklace in Jackie's face. "Best Friends Forever, remember? That doesn't mean anything to someone like you."

"Veronica, please-"

"I only wanted us to be happy, but you couldn't settle for just me. You had to have him." Veronica gestures back to the tent. "So I gave him to you. I laid him right into your lap."

"You?"

"Why else do you think Stacey broke up with him? Why else do you think he knew you liked him? I did it all and how did you repay me? You and Prince Charming there plot to fly off into the sunset without me. 'Thanks for everything, Veronica, but we won't be needing you anymore.'" She unleashes a savage round of blows to Jackie's face. Blood fills Jackie's mouth. Her eyes are swelling shut so that she can see only the knife in Veronica's hands.

"Please, don't do this," Jackie says between sobs. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I didn't."

"You're pathetic. A pathetic, weakling like your precious fiancée and your loony aunt."

Jackie's entire body turns cold. "You started the fire? You killed Aunt Beth? Why?"