𝐓𝐀𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄- 𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐑 𝐑𝐄𝐈𝐃

𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐘-𝐓𝐖𝐎

𝐑𝐇𝐈𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐎𝐍 𝐆𝐑𝐎𝐀𝐍𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐒 𝐀𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐀 𝐃𝐑𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐊𝐍𝐄𝐄 𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐎 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐆𝐔𝐓. Rhiannon fell to the floor with a grunt, and swept her leg to try and make Alana lose her balance, but she'd seen the move coming and quickly stepped out of the way. Alana reached to grab Rhiannon, who quickly rolled out of the way to avoid her blow. Rhiannon scrambled to her feet, but she wasn't up for long until Alana had her pinned to the ground once more, her fingers wrapped around her throat. 

"Yield," Alana demanded, tightening her grip in a warning. 

"Screw you," Rhiannon grumbled, still trying to fight her way out of this, but Alana was stronger and more capable than she was. Alana narrowed her eyes and squeezed her throat tighter, still not enough to cut off air flow. "Fine!" She groaned. "I yield. Now get off of me, you crazy bitch." Alana grinned as she stood up and held out her hand for Rhiannon to take, helping her off the mat. "Have I ever told you that I'm insanely terrified of you?"

"I would be a little concerned if you weren't," Alana replied, wiping a bead of sweat off her brow. She and Rhiannon tried to spar as much as they could to keep her in shape so she wouldn't get rusty. She'd needed to learn how to use her size to her advantage so she could have an easier time overpowering these men. Besides, rage happened to be good fuel to the fire as well. 

Since they spent most of the time at Rhiannon's place, Alana's actual house got turned into a gym of sorts whenever they practiced with each other. She carefully wrapped her hands and began to work out with the punching bag until her arms felt weak, and once she was done with that, she practiced throwing knives at the dart board, pretending it was Corey's face as she hit the bullseye every single time. 

"Mallory went to go see Evangeline's father," Rhiannon informed her with raised eyebrows. Alana paused and glanced over her shoulder, "What? Are you tracking her?"

"Well, obviously," Rhiannon admitted. "I've been keeping tabs on her, but that's not how I found out. He just texted me." 

"It's nice that you still keep in touch with him," Alana admitted. If she was still technically alive, she'd be going to visit him, too. She would have given anything to comfort Mr. Scott, to let him know that in Evangeline's last moments, she wasn't alone, nor afraid. Alana wanted to tell him that she'd been right beside her, holding her hand as she passed. She wanted him to know that Corey and his friends did not have her, even in death. She was never theirs to have in the first place. 

"Why would Mallory Hale pay him a visit?" Rhiannon mumbled. 

"I mean, her and Eva were pretty close," Alana shrugged. She was hesitant about Mallory before, but now it felt like they were sort of friends, or something like that. Occasionally, she'd send her texts about how Spencer glances longingly at his cell phone when he doesn't hear from her, and how he has a smile on his face whenever she does. Mallory insisted that it was fucking disgusting, but Alana liked knowing that he was thinking about her when he was away. "They lived next door to each other for years."

"I thought that she wasn't on speaking terms with her parents?" Rhiannon questioned, typing away at her cell phone. She'd been tense ever since Mallory started hanging around more, mainly because she was the cautious one, and she was terrified that Mallory would ruin their plans before they got a chance to finish. 

"Dude, why are you asking me? I don't know shit about family drama." Alana said, rolling her eyes. Her parents had passed away when she was twelve years old, and she was in and out of foster care for two years until she was fourteen and ended up on the Mitchell's doorstep. Once you reach a certain age in foster care, you start to understand that you're never getting adopted, since most of these families wanted shiny new babies. Sometimes she tried to remember certain things about her parents, but she felt her memory growing worse with age. "Why do you care so much anyway?"