Wilder

A fucking ladder.

You got this. Hand over hand, and one step at a time, I hurried up the deathtrap, keeping Paxton’s face in my mind as I climbed higher than I ever thought I’d be able to, finally coming out at the catwalk.

“Don’t look down,” I whispered to myself. Instead I locked my eyes on where Brooke fumbled on her stomach, her hands beneath the catwalk. She had hold of one of the giant light fixtures, but the way the catwalk wobbled when I stepped onto it told me she’d loosened that, too.

The motion also alerted her to my presence, and her head swiveled, a maddened look in her eyes I’d never seen before. “Stay back!” she yelled. “I don’t want you to get hurt, Leah.”

She had the light already loose, hanging by what looked like a single screw. Shit.

“Whatever you’re doing, Brooke, don’t. Please. Someone could die.”

She turned and stood, her hands locked around the railing like mine were. “He should! That stupid fucking trick took Nick! Someone should be punished! Instead they’re making a movie. A movie! While he’s confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life, so ruined that he won’t even let me see him, they’re here, doing what he loved. Paxton shouldn’t be the first to do this trick. It was never his, it was Nick’s, and they’ve all forgotten him!”

“I know it feels that way,” I said, taking another step on the swaying catwalk. “What was your plan? Drop the whole catwalk? Have you lost it? Your sister is down there!”

She hesitated, looking down briefly.

“I disabled Penna’s bike. She’s fixing it in the back. I’d rather die than hurt her. I don’t want to hurt you, either.”

“And that’s why you pushed me off a cliff in Morocco?” I glanced down and saw Paxton still riding the circuit, and I silently cursed Little John. I didn’t know how long I could keep her occupied before I was the one she threw off the catwalk.

“That was unfortunate,” she admitted. “But the cameraman walked away, and you were alone. I thought you’d jump, land in the water. I hoped you’d be scared enough that Pax would stop the movie, or you’d just leave, and he’d fail his classes. I never meant for you to get hurt.”

“I could have died!” My brain was misfiring, trying to reconcile the angry woman in front of me with the friend I’d made the first morning on board.

“You didn’t, but you might if you stay up here. Now, go!” She bounced slightly, and the metal creaked, then descended a couple inches.

“I can’t let you hurt Paxton or anyone else,” I said, clinging to the railing.

“They need to understand that what they’re doing ruins lives. It ruined Nick’s life, and it destroyed mine! And they don’t care! They just keep on going, keep pushing. It’s not fair! I only want them to stop!”

My hands tightened on the rails, my knuckles turning white. “Let’s get down, Brooke. We can talk about this on the ground.”

She shook her head. “I’ve come too far, especially now that you know. Then again, I could blame it all on you. Nothing bad started happening until you showed up that first day.”

Another bounce and the angle deepened. I looked down to see Paxton at the start of the center ramp. The one we were directly above. God, this was the moment she’d been waiting for. “Don’t do it,” I begged.

“For what it’s worth,” she said, looking down at Paxton before she glanced back up to me. “I think he loves you. Even if you were just a tool to get Rachel on board.”

My eyes widened.

“Of course I know. Don’t be stupid. I’ve known since Penna ran the background check on you when you both applied to the program. That’s why I grabbed that picture before we left L.A. The only one who doesn’t know is Landon. Which is kind of fitting, seeing as Paxton was the only one who didn’t catch on when Rachel and Landon were fucking around behind his back. It hurts to turn the tables, doesn’t it?”

“So you planted the picture so I’d find it?”

Keep her talking. He hasn’t started yet. Distract her.

In fact, he wasn’t there at all. I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Don’t get excited, he’s just backing up to get enough speed to hit the ramp. This will be the jump of a lifetime,” she said with a smile that didn’t even look like hers. She was losing it right in front of me, and if I couldn’t stop her, someone was going to get hurt…or die. “The one Nick would have made if he’d been here. But Paxton always has to have it all, doesn’t he? The tricks, the girls…even you. It was hard to watch you fall for him, knowing he was just using you. I really like you, and I thought you’d be smarter, that I wouldn’t have to involve you, but then I saw how badly he wanted you, needed you, and I knew you were the key to everything. If you were hurt, if you quit, the movie would fail. They’d go home and reassess. After Madagascar, I figured if you saw the picture, you’d leave him to rot in that jail cell. Movie over. Mission accomplished and no one gets hurt…other than Nick, not that they care. But no, you had to call Brandon. You had to fix everything for the guy who only wanted you for your best friend. Where is your self-worth?”

I heard the bike rev, then come flying out of the tunnel. As the bike hit the ramp, Brooke jumped as hard as she could, then ran, the catwalk falling as she raced toward me. When I tried to grab her, she pushed me back, and I fell along the catwalk as it turned into a giant slide. I saw the camera break loose at the last second before I gripped the support beam, catching my weight as the catwalk fell to a full ninety-degree angle.