Skinny • Book 1 In The Reality Series

Katy

It was like a muscle cramp. The kind when you're running and then all of a sudden your paralyzed, the pain in the back of your calf so painful all you can think about is how if you had a saw, or a hatchet or a soup can lid, you'd just cut the thing off, relieving yourself of the crippling and mind numbing agony.

I couldn't breathe, the pain was too much and the gasping screams leaving my mouth too many.

I had seconds for my mind to wrap around the fact that I was about to be shot to death. I knew fighting would be futile. I know he wouldn't miss again; I knew soon it would be over.

Clutching my arm, my blood dribbling hot and thick between my fingertips I closed my eyes, praying for it to be quick, praying for Sam, praying because it seemed like the right thing to do.

But death never came.

Instead there was a loud bang, a metallic ding as the gun fell to the floor, a heart shattering sound and then a thud.

Confused, I opened my eyes and immediately wished I hadn't, because the picture before me was not one I wanted to see.

The gun had backfired.

The wall, once white, was splattered red, painting a macabre Pollock inspired mural on the otherwise blank canvas. Folded on the ground beneath the crimson stain, Ashton sat motionless, his limbs bent in angles no living human's ever had before.

His eyes were open. One looking at me, the other locked on something behind and above me. His mouth was slackened and agape, a trickle of blood ran down his chin, another leaked from his nose, and a stream of it poured from the small, seemingly endless whole just above his Adams apple.

Tears falling from my eyes in rapid succession, I let out a sob as I tentatively let my fingertips ghost the place where his jaw met his neck. I realized, as I felt the steady beat fluttering against the pads of my index and middle finger that him breathing was not a relief, but a horror.

It wasn't that I wanted him dead, I wanted him freed from the nightmare whatever part of his mind remained, if there was any left, was trapped in.

He'd messed up, horrifically. Unforgivably, unforgettably and undoubtedly, but no one, no matter what their crime deserved to die that way.

My heart broke as his right eye wandered downward, locking on me. His lip twitched as he tried to speak, before his fingertips twitched.

Ignoring the pain and blood coming from my arm and head I crawled towards him, and stopping between his splayed out legs, brushed a sweat soaked curl from his forehead.

"Shh." I said gently, as ghostlike sounds left his mouth, "It's okay. I forgive you."

His eyelids dropped, struggling to stay open.

"Go to sleep Ashton." I whispered softly, my vision blurring with tears as I took one of his blood splattered hands in my own and ran my thumb over his knuckles, "You'll feel better when you wake up, I promise."

I noticed the foam filling his throat and spilling from his mouth before I saw the dark stain spreading over his pants.

Realizing that he was gone. Dead, seemingly shot, the smoking gun pointing to me as the shooter, I rose to my feet and left the room.

I don't know how long it took me to get down to the car and Sam, my mind kept spacing out, gaps of mystery fogging the clarity around me.

I remember leaving the hotel, passing the screaming ambulance and its entourage of police cars as we left.

I remember turning off the deserted road and onto the dark and lonely highway.

I remember wondering how the turn signal lights worked, and struggling to make any progress with one foot on the gas pedal and the other hovering above the break. I remember jerking the wheel to much to avoid an orange barrel.

I remember the truck catching the front corner of Ashton's car, and I remember slamming into something, the glass surrounding me shattering.

And then I was in the dark.

And the last thing I remember is hoping to God, that when I woke up, I would be far, far away from Ashton.

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