The Killer Secret

9.

I shot up from my sleep, gasping for air. Ever since I saw Axel, dead in his home, he had now taken over from Tammy to haunt my dreams. The weird thing about this particular nightmare, though, was the reoccurring images of the bloody shoeprints, leading away from Axel's body.

I turned around and froze.

Travis was sound asleep, next to me, in the back of his truck and I was still wearing my dress from the funeral yesterday.

My phone started to ring, alerting Travis and I of an incoming call and I hurriedly answered.

"Hello?"

"Did you enjoy spending the night together?"

"Excuse me?" I stated, taking a quick glimpse at the caller ID.

It was unknown.

"You will know how it feels soon enough to have someone you love being ripped from your life prematurely."

The person on the other end of the call used some sort of device to distort their voice, which made it impossible for me to recognize them.

Travis shifted next to me, sitting up right against the back window of his truck. "Who is it?" He asked, but I was too much in shock to reply to him.

Instead, I got angry. "Listen to me, you son of bitch, you wanna play games? Then lets play! Quit hiding in the shadows and show your goddamn face to me, you coward."

At this point, I was yelling and I didn't care that Travis was right there. I was done with all the mind games.

"All in due time, little cricket."

And then they hung up.

Little cricket? Why does that sound so familiar?

"Kayla, is everything okay? Who was that on the phone?"

I kept playing the name over and over and over in my head until the wheels clicked.

"I have to go."

Stepping down off of the truck, I grabbed my phone and keys, and headed towards my car.

"What's going on?"

I kept walking with Travis at my toe, not bothering to face him.

"Kayla, talk to me." He grabbed my arm and spun me around. "Who was that?"

I couldn't stop the tears from falling any longer and hid my face between my hair. "Just let me go, Trav."

"Why do you always do this? We are finally getting back to a good place. Why are you pulling back now?"

I dried my eyes and sniffed away my snot, looking up at him. "Travis, I just can't do this right now. I have to go."

He didn't understand. I could see it all over his face, but he let go of my arm anyway, and I got into my car and drove off. Something I seemed to be doing a lot of lately.

- - - - - - - -

Summer of 2017.

Tammy and I were already on the outs, but not in front of our families. My family and I, along with a few others from our friendship circle, attended the annual garden party fundraiser held at the Oscar's home.