Page 110 of Mistaken Prejudice

“What do you want?” I asked, trying to remind myself that getting angry wouldn’t get me anywhere. “Just tell me what the hell you want!”

“Why don’t you come here yourself, and I’ll tell you in person?” He chuckled.

I glanced at Levi before I spoke again. He nodded in confirmation, telling me to go on.

“Fine. Where are you?”

“Your old school. Come and find me, pretty boy. But hurry up, will ya? I’m running out of patience,” he said before he hung up, and we were left stunned.

“Are you sure he’s telling the truth? That Jess is with him?” Levi asked and before I could answer, I received a text with an attached photo.

The picture showed Jess on his knees with a black eye and busted lips. His platinum hair was stained with blood that dripped over his face.

They are going to pay for this.

“Let’s call the police.” Levi grabbed my phone from my hand and eyed the picture. “Fuck, Andrei.”

“You know we can’t,” I said.

We couldn’t get the police involved. Those jerks? They had the power. They’d find a way to spin this mess and put the blame on us. “But what we can do is hurry the fuck up.” And we did.

With Levi behind the wheel, we jumped in the truck and put it into gear, and then started the longest twenty minutes of my fucking life.

***

Pacific Green used to be a dumpster while we still went to school there. Now? Now the place was even more of a shithole. I remembered how they promised to renew the school while renovating it from the fire’s damage, but from the looks of it, they didn’t.

Yellow caution tape was still blocking the entrance to the place, telling you to stay away. Levi and I ignored the warning and walked right into the danger zone. And make no mistake, the ruins of a burned building collapsing on our heads and burying us alive were hardly the danger at sake. The owners of the SUVs parked outside? Yeah. They were the definition of danger.

The school was still huge, and there was a lot of ground to cover and only two of us. Splitting up was obviously a bad decision, so we decided to skip that. I’d made enough bad decisions lately, and we were not in some horror movie where we tried to get ourselves killed.

I pulled out my phone and looked at Jess’s photo again. Maybe something in the background would give away their location, and it did. I recognized the green rubber floor with the clue of white stripes. It may have melted and burned in the fire, but the radioactive green color of our old gym remained the same.

“They’re at the gym,” I said, shoving my phone back into my pocket, and started to walk down the hall that led there.

“Wait.” Levi grabbed my arm and stopped me. “Let’s use the old entrance. If we have any luck, it would be unlocked, and we won’t walk right into their trap.”

“That’s a good idea.”

We hurried, letting the darkness engulf us as we crept into the gym. Just as Levi predicted, the old entrance was unlocked. With me peeking over his head, we looked inside and tried to scan the room.

It was dark except for the lights that came from the assholes’ phones and the moonlight that broke through the cracks of the burned ceiling. From what I could see, they were the same guys from the bathroom: the twins, Ty, and Kamper. Shay-Lee was the only one missing, but I knew he was there, waiting, lurking in the dark like the monster he was.

“There he is,” Levi said and moved to get up when I stopped him.

I also noticed Jess. He was squeezed between the twins, his face a mess, but other than that, they didn’t seem to have hurt him anywhere else. I understood Levi’s distress, but we had to act smart. We were outnumbered. Me with a broken arm, and Levi, well, he was never much of a fighter to begin with.

There was one solution, and it was clear. From the beginning, it was my mess they were dragged into, and so, it would be me who’d end it.

“Here’s what we’re going to do. I’ll go in there while you stay here.”

“What? No!” Levi protested. Ignoring him, I continued.

“Once Jess is free, I’ll tell him to run, and you run with him. Is that clear?”

“You’re out of your goddamn mind.” He clenched his jaw. “Seriously, Andrei, they’ll kill you.”

That was a high possibility, but at least he and Jess would be safe.