Chapter Twenty-Five
SERENA'S POV
It's like feeling dizzy. Tingly and ticklish but pokey and proddy and a million sounds buzz past your ears like little baby mosquitoes, but everything else is dead dead silent, and all you can hear is echoing laughter in your head. Afterwards, you want to throw up. But when you're high? I'm telling you, there is no other feeling like it!
Unfortunately, I just lost about three day's worth of lunch at my stoner friend's house. I feel like I've swallowed chunky vinegar, and the taste of acid drowns my tongue. It's sick.
"Neeext teeeme, beeeebe," Stoner's friend, who I've decided to call Bedroom Friend, slurs as I pass him. That was my last client for today. My only client in a long time. But I'm getting bored with him, and I'll be moving on to another house soon. This town is so full of drugs it's practically high itself.
I walk down the streets silently, keeping to the shadows with my arms wrapped around me, my wide eyes scanning the streets. I know, I know, I'm just being paranoid. I mean, it's not like Cas takes random vacations to Stoner Street. But it never hurts to be careful.
A sound like a rocket exploding ricochets off of the bricks, interrupting my thoughts! A luminescent, glowing essence crackles from between two buildings like a spark of electricity. The smell of smoke and metal reaches my nose.
I round the corner quickly, my heart acting like a startled horse, when I see someone. A silhouette, cloaked by shadows, looking down at a too-still figure of a human body. The cadaver's head is at an awkward angle, with blood pooling out from underneath it. When the shaded person steps into the faint light of a flickering streetlamp, I can make out his features.
Strong. Tall. Clutching a flashing silver knife in sweaty hands. Flecked brown hair, like autumn leaves... and when he turns, eyes as blue as steel, burning cold.
"Zach?" my voice cuts through the air.
His face freezes in shock when he sees me. His muscles clench, and the hand that holds the knife twitches.
"Rena," he states simply. "What are you doing here?"
"What are you doing here? With the knife, and the dead body... you didn't..." the thought of being left alone with a killer shakes me to my soul.
His eyes widen in realization, and the knife immediately drops to the ground. It clinks against the ground like a cymbal.
"I didn't... I didn't kill another human," he says. As if it makes it better.
A sharp buzzing in my ears grows louder. I have to strain to hear my drained voice.
"What else would you be killing?"
I know exactly what else is out there. But does he?
"I just meant I didn't kill anyone," he says quickly.
He comes up to me and wraps his fingers around the top of my arms. I can feel a warm liquid staining my skin. With a grimace, every cell in my body tenses.
"Okay, baby?"
My voice is so quiet that I almost don't think I've spoken. "Okay."
He glides his hand down to mine, and pulls me away from the scene of the murder.
"I just found him like that... and I picked up the knife. I didn't kill him, okay, baby? I could never kill another human being," he explains. The amount of emphasis he puts on "human" makes my bones shiver.
I look back at the scene. I almost have to do a double take. Zach keeps walking, leaving me standing frozen, and gaping at the murder site.
"Rena, what's wrong?"
YOU ARE READING
Innocence (Burning Beliefs #1)
Fanfic*COMPLETED* Gracie Belle isn't normal -- she has visions. And when she discovers why she has these powers, she's pulled into a world of Angels, the paranormal, and deception. The charming half-demon Lucas takes her by storm, her sister Serena falls...
