The Trench

Chapter 52 - Needing Answers

At the bottom of the stairs she flips a light on and lowers the hood on her black jacket down before standing to look at her prisoner. Mae stood there like a mannequin, arms lip at her sides and her head cocked slightly to one side staring into my eyes. The gaze was intense and very unnerving and I found myself take a hesitant step backwards. I take a quick look up and down and I don't see a gun in her hands, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have one. Considering now she has hers and mine.

After what felt like eternity Mae finally lets out a sigh, as if she has the entire world on her shoulders they slump down a bit. Her gaze on me lessens from intense to almost soft and sympathetic and she gives me a small, lopsided smile.

"We could have been great friends, Riley." Her voice is small and smooth, like the Mae I knew a few months back. She sighs again and shakes her head as she takes a few steps towards me, as she does I take a few steps back and she frowns.

"Why am I here?" I'm taken by surprise as I hear how hoarse my voice comes out, I clear my throat lightly.

She looks at me, studies my face before answering. "You're my new Emily..."

I stand there a moment, hands on my hips as I squint my eyes at her suspiciously.

Did I just hear that correctly?

"I'm sorry, what?"

The corners of her mouth twitch up in a small smile as she gestures towards my face.

"You look just like her, albeit your personality is much more stubborn and ugly than hers.."

I frown and furrow my eyebrows at the insult.

"But I could help you, you know. Become her. I could have my best friend back." She clasps her hands in front of her sweetly and I scoff out loud at the gesture, she narrows her eyes at me.

"Listen, Mae, are you listening? Emily is not coming back, she's dead. I know that hurts and I know it's hard to move on but you have to. My brother died, and I moved on. Hallow died, and I moved on. Aimee..." A knot forms in my throat and I try to swallow past it, unable to finish my sentence.

"Aimee..." Mae says mocking my voice "Is dead, and you will move on from her too. Before you know it, everyone close to you is going to be gone and I'll be the only one here for you." She smiles again and I instantly feel nauseous, I can feel the blood draining from my face.

"What do you mean everyone will be gone?" I whisper, my voice coming out small not brave and inquisitive like I had intended as I glance at the staircase once again.

"Well...consider it this way; I took out Aimee, I think Taylor might pose a little more of a problem with her high spirited ways but I think I can manage if I take her by surprise." Mae states, rubbing her chin with her fingers as if she's deep in thought.

"I can't realistically get rid of Austin, since he's my brother." She lets out a laugh. "I thought the fire would be enough for you to dump his ass."

My body went ridged, froze in shock as I snap my eyes to her face. I can feel my heartbeat in my ears and all of the blood that had drained my face a second ago is quickly rising back up, I can feel my ears and my cheeks getting warm.

"You thought what about the fire?" I breathed dangerously, my eyes boring into hers and for a slight second I saw uncertainty flash over her face. She took one step backwards and held up a finger.

"Now just hang on a second. I had no idea your horse was going to run back inside. I hate animals in general but I would never kill one on purpose." Her face was serious and I almost laughed out loud at her sentence.

"You'd never kill an animal, yet you just SHOT A PERSON?" My voice began to rise as I step towards her again, anger boiling up inside me making my peripheral vision blur. Whether from adrenaline, blood pressure, or tears I'm not quite sure.

"I didn't think it would spread so fast, honest. Look, that same day I had texted Austin and he mentioned he was fixing your truck and then going to the barn with you." Her nose scrunched in a slight snarl. "Which meant neither of you had time for me, so I remembered the name of the barn you had told me about way back and I decided to ride my bike there since it wasn't that far and wait for you two. I didn't have a plan, but when I got there other people were there handling water buckets so I hid in the loft. As soon as they left I knew what I was going to do."

As much as I wanted to punch her, stab her, knock all of her teeth out I knew I needed to be still. If I attacked now I'd never get any answers, so I stood there clenching my hands as she watched me apprehensively while she told her story.

"I hid the fire extinguisher, then I heard someone coming up the stairs and I had to curl up in a ball behind a few bales of hay. Austin came up and was throwing some hay down and the plan just all fell into place. As soon as you two were gone I set the fire and crept down the stairs, I was halfway down the driveway when I heard you two shouting."

Tears threatened to spill onto her cheeks as she's telling this part of the story, however I refused to feel sympathy for a psychopath.

"My intentions were harmless, Riley, you have to know that. Austin has been my best friend my entire life, and you took him! If you thought he had started the fire whether on purpose or accident maybe you'd let him go and I could have you both again. That night, at the party, it was me who put drugs in the punch. I had aimed for Taylor or Aimee, but somehow it only got to you." She rolls her eyes disappointingly.

I stand there, hands on my hips staring at Mae trying to process the words spewing from her. Finally I sigh and bring my fingers up to pinch the bridge of my nose in disbelief with my left hand. The fingers on my right hand are tapping away furiously at each other and I grit my teeth at the annoying habit.

"You're telling me, that all of this was a ploy for you to have Emily back? You set someone's barn on fire with living creatures inside, in hopes of me accusing your brother and dumping him. And you shot my friend, and you tried to poison my other friend..."

I took the hand away from my face and glance up at Mae, who is staring over my shoulder and nodding.

"Okayyyy, I'm not sure what questions need to be asked first so I'm just gonna jump right in." My tone is more sarcastic than angry anymore, and I believe it has something to do with my mind unable to piece together everything.

"First off, how'd you even know Aimee and I were going to be at the shipping yard tonight?" At the memory my head throbs and I pat the dried up wound gently. "And where the fuck did you get drugs and a silencer?"

Mae regards me curiously, I can see her chewing her lip in thought for a moment before answering.

"I got them off some guy in an alley, naturally."

I throw my hands up and grimace snidely at her, of course she would think that was normal.

"I didn't actually know you two would be there, the opportunity just kind of presented itself. Come to think of it why were you there?"

She looked confused still, but growing more skeptical as she blinks waiting for me to answer.

What the hell, might as well tell her.

"We were following Kane."

"Why?"

"We think he has something to do with the murders around town, that's why we came to you at your house. I had mentioned we followed him for acting weird, after talking to you we pieced together that he's been out almost everytime a murder has happened. Did you know a murder happened at the docks that night? You had to of known, you followed him there."

I see Mae sigh again, with one hand she rubbed the back of her neck thoughtfully as she started at the floor in front of me.

"Kane followed me there, not the other way around."