Kidnap My Heart

Chapter Fourteen: Emma and Will

Because you’re always with Taylor, you plague.

“I don’t know. I just know she’s here. Who knows what she’s planning in her twisted little head? I don’t even want to know.”

I tuned them out after that, lost in my own thoughts. I suppose it did look a bit strange. But maybe it was best if I waited. They were waiting for me to attempt an escape, which meant they would be prepared to stop me. I didn’t want that. I wanted our escape to be foolproof; I wanted to know I wasn’t making things worse for both Taylor and me by attempting an escape.

The shutting of the door snapped me out of my thoughts, and the next time someone spoke, it was Eric. I guess only Will had left. “Is Will out there?”

At first, there was no answer, leading me to think he was the crazy one and was talking to himself, but eventually Taylor answered his question. I could almost feel my heart constricting in my chest. God, I needed human interaction. I needed my best friend. “No, he went upstairs.”

I raised an eyebrow. No stuttering. A giant pause, sure, but no stuttering.

“Good. Did you get a whiff of the message on the wall?”

Another pause. “What?”

“The message. Did you smell it?”

“Um… why would I smell it?”

“Because it wasn’t blood. It looked scarily similar, but it wasn’t blood. It was some weird mix of gel and Pomegranate.”

Honestly, I was less worried about the fact that Eric had seen right through my ruse and more worried about the fact that his first instinct had been to smell the wall to test the blood’s legitimacy. Obviously genetics had given the Knight brothers good looks and not much else.

“But why would you sniff it?”

“That’s not the point here.” I could almost imagine him rolling her eyes at her comment. “Ghosts weren’t behind Will’s haunting last night. Emma was.”

“I knew it,” Taylor said, a joyous tone overtaking her voice. “I knew there was something fishy about this!”

There was a moment of silence, and then Eric spoke. “I told you she wouldn’t leave you. Not after what you did for her. You’re only stuck here because you tried to save her.”

“Yeah, and look where that got me,” she muttered, her tone lowering in a matter of seconds. “I’m an idiot.”

“You’re loyal. There’s a difference.”

“Are you two finished yet? I don’t want to take too long. Rage might pull another prank,” Will yelled from some other room in the house.

Oh, you bet I will, Squilliam. I snorted at the nickname.

“Did you hear that?” Eric asked.

Taylor’s reply was immediate. “I have to pee.”

“Er—okay.” His footsteps retreated, and I heard the door shut behind him.

I didn’t hear anything at first. A good thirty seconds passed in utter silence, and then the toilet was flushed. I heard Taylor’s voice soon after, and it sounded like she was right next to me. “Emma?” she whispered.

I debated whether or not I should risk detection and decided to hell with it. Taylor needed to know I was here and perfectly okay. “Yeah?” I whispered back.

She burst into incredulous laughter. “Oh, my God.”

“Shh… they’ll hear you,” I hissed.