“Nice, very girl next door,” sniggered her attacker as he pressed the knife to her cleavage.
Overcome with exhaustion, Minnie’s limbs refused to struggle anymore. Inside her skull, her fury continued to rage and sizzle, burning and crackling into intense frustration as it dawned on her that she had never been so powerless. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t protect herself, and she couldn’t even spit a defiant insult at those sick motherfuckers because she couldn’t stop sobbing.
Closing her eyes, she tried to disconnect from the cruel universe.
She had accepted her fate.
She was about to be raped.
Maybe even murdered.
Just another tragic news story splashed across the tabloids; another poor, defenceless teenager humiliated, battered, then discarded in a shrub or a filthy river bed.
She waited to feel pain. She waited for the satisfied grunt of the animal that pinned her down to the woodland floor.
Instead, she felt a hard jolt and a loud WHACK followed by a cry of pain. Her eyes flew open, and a smile of relief immediately flooded her face.
The attacker with the knife had collapsed down onto his side, a spidery wound on his forehead, thick trickles of blood dripping down his face as his eyes bulged. Shards of glass stuck out at startling angles, jammed too far into his pathetic flesh to fall to the floor.
Standing above him was Ronnie. One of his eyes was black and bruised, already swollen to the point where his face appeared deformed. In his hand, he gripped one of the wine bottles, now smashed at the handle.
Instinctively, Minnie found herself taking the other attacker’s momentary surprise to her advantage. She squirmed out of his grasp and lunged for the knife, then turned back to face him.
Suddenly, he didn’t seem so scary anymore.
The piece of shit fell backwards, his face ghostly white. He scrambled through the mud, mumbling incoherently, his hands and feet not working quick enough to get away.
Minnie, on the other hand, found herself so full of energy that she practically jumped to her feet and was on him within seconds.
“You sick cunt,” she hissed, driving the blade straight into his face. There was something exhilarating about saying that word, the most terrible of swears that up until then she had never once even uttered under her breath. The point of the weapon slashed through his cheek, narrowly missing his eye.
But she didn’t just stop there.
Although she saw blood, and although she could practically feel the fear draining out of his pores, it was as though her arms had been replaced by the mechanical hands of a murderous robot. She stabbed him repeatedly.
Again, and again, and again, and again…
Crimson splatters of his flesh covered her face, and she savoured the rusty taste on her tongue as each puncture came easier and easier. She ripped through flesh, pierced tissue, and chipped bone in a mad, chaotic frenzy.
And with every movement, she only became more alive.
Chapter Twelve
2019
“I’ve got a confession to make.”
Jared shivered and pulled his thick coat tighter around him. He grimaced at the repulsive patch of mud belching and congealing around his boots as he illuminated the ground with his torch. He was only half-heartedly listening to Samantha, who had been filling the air with mundane chatter ever since they left the RV. His teeth chattered. He was cold, wet, and thoroughly miserable. All he wanted to do was find the fucking teddy and go back to sleep. But they had been searching for what felt like hours and had wondered so far that the RV was now just a small rectangle in the distance, illuminated by a small square of light.
“Hey, did you hear me?”
Jared startled as her voice suddenly presented behind him, her words tickling the back of his neck. He spun around and found himself almost nose-to-nose with the teenager. It was dark, but he could just about make out her classically beautiful features in the moonlight.
“What?” he mumbled grumpily.
“I said, I’ve got a confession to make,” said Samantha, her voice slowing in a way that Jared might’ve mistaken for seductive. She smiled at him and appeared to move closer, even as she remained totally still. Her presence somehow engulfed him; her scent, her warmth, and her smile creeping under his skin where they were not wanted.
“What’s that then?” he asked, averting his eyes, pretending to scan the ground with his flashlight again.
“I’m a fan.”
“Sorry?” he turned back to her.
“I’m a fan of your YouTube channel,” Samantha said with a shy smile. “I watch you every day…” she put a hand on his arm. His skin sizzled beneath her touch. “That’s why I came here.”
Jared’s face contorted into a disbelieving frown. “What? You got your family to come down here just because Sienna and I were?”
Samantha nodded excitedly. She touched his other arm and pressed her body up against his. “Do you believe in love at first sight?” she whispered into his ear so that all of the hairs on the back of his neck stood up to attention.
Swallowing, Jared paused.
What the fuck?
He shrugged Samantha off, suddenly repulsed by her.
“What? Are you kidding me? Are you hitting on me? When your parents are lost out here somewhere?!” he gestured out across the pitch-black marshes.
The girl pouted and crossed her arms. “No, that would be crazy…”
Jared scratched the back of his neck and took more steps backwards, his mind racing and his chest tight with unease. “What the hell is this, Samantha? Are we looking for a teddy bear or not?”
Samantha giggled and shook her head but didn’t say a word.
He felt his stomach lurch as that awful churning of dread came back and hit him all at once. His senses seemed to combust as he felt another presence as if the two of them were somehow being watched.
“I’m going,” he said, his voice wobbling although he tried so desperately to sound brave. He turned on his heel, a thick knot blocking the top of his throat.
Suddenly, a loud, almighty squelch
