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20

VICTOR

By the time we arrive in Clifwell, I’ve got that hot, itchy feeling under my skin again. It gets worse and worse the lower we go down the mountain, and when we pass the big wooden sign with Welcome to Clifwell: A Place to Live Well! painted across the front, I’m grateful I killed those two people last night. I can’t imagine how bad the need would be if I hadn’t expelled some of the energy.

Even if it made Penelope angry with me.

I can feel her anger on the whole trip down the mountain, simmering and quiet and just beneath the surface. Maybe anger is too strong a word—but she’s certainly put out by what I did. What I told her back at the motel is true, though. I’m not going to have it circle around and affect her. That would be unfair of me.

“God, look at this place,” Penelope mutters as I pull off the main road, following the pretty, filigreed signs toward downtown. At first, I’m not sure what she means, as there isn’t much that looks different: just the same alpine forest pressing in around us. But then I notice the glimpses of houses through the green. Well, not even houses, really. Mansions. We can only catch glimpses of them, but it’s clear what they are.

I always knew there was money down here. But I hadn’t fully understood what that meant.

“So where am I taking you exactly?” The question feels ashy, and there’s a part of me that thinks I could just turn around, go back to the highway, and keep driving until we hit California, leaving a trail of murders in our wake. Every night, another roadside motel, another death, another round of wild, frantic fucking.

My cock likes the idea, jolting against my thigh. My heart doesn’t. I’m here for a reason, too. Even if⁠—

Even if I’m keeping it from the woman in my passenger seat. The woman who’s alive.

Penelope looks down at her phone. “A hotel in the town center,” she says, tapping on the screen. “Clifwell Inn. You want me to pull up the GPS?”

No, I don’t. I want to keep driving and terrorize the highways like I did back in the ‘70s. Except this time, I’ll have Penelope with me.

“Yeah,” I say, squeezing the steering wheel a little too tightly. Another mansion flashes by, almost nothing but big glass windows that catch the golden autumn sunlight. More road signs, too. One points to a ski resort, another to a hiking trail.

Penelope’s phone chirps suddenly, an automated voice telling me to keep going straight for three miles. She slides it in the cupholder and settles back in her seat.

We don’t speak. I follow the GPS. It takes ten minutes to pull into Clifwell proper, which looks like a simulacrum of the other mountain towns around here. It has the same simple wooden buildings and tidy storefronts, but everything is freshly painted in pretty, pastel colors. Gleaming BMWs are parked in front of the meters. Elaborate Halloween decorations are strung from the lampposts. The downtown area is lined with maples and cottonwoods, and although their branches are mostly bare, the air still swirls with red and orange and yellow confetti. It’s perfect. It’s beautiful, just like the Wolrath Sanatorium was.

And I’m going to destroy it the way Hunters always do.

“Your destination is on the right,” announces the phone, and Penelope shifts forward in her seat, looking out the window. The filtered sunlight catches in her hair, makes it gleam copper, and I’m going to destroy her, too.

That makes me sad, though. Not excited.

“There it is,” she says, nodding at a frothy, Victorian-style inn nestled back from the road. Clifwell Inn is emblazoned across the wooden sign hanging over the sidewalk, swinging back and forth a little in the wind.

I let the car roll to a stop. Penelope looks over at me, and I drink in the sight of her, because I know there’s a very good chance this is the last chance I’ll get to do it. Certainly the last chance when she’s not furious with me.

“Thanks for the ride,” she says. “You can, uh, you can do whatever you want with my car.”

Something snaps violently inside me. This is it. She’s leaving. The last few days were a dream or a gift or both, but they’re over now.

I need to focus on my own mission.

Wait until after Halloween, I think suddenly, studying her in the pretty, hazy sunlight. Let her ruin Wolrath’s party before you take his life.

The idea sparks in my thoughts. I like it. It’s an excuse to hang around here, to watch over her, to keep her from trouble. And then I can still get my revenge, like I planned. Once I know she’s safe.

“I’ll hold it for you,” I finally say. “Your car. Just in case you change your mind.”

Penelope’s eyes glitter strangely, and for a moment, I feel something from her: a sudden swell of sadness. My throat gets dry and scratchy, and I almost say something. I almost tell her to wait.

But I don’t, and she pushes the car door open and lets in a rush of cold, smoke-scented air that stirs her hair around, making her look wild.

“If you want,” she says. “It’s not worth much anyway.”

She doesn’t get out, just sits there with her hand on the handle, the door still hanging open. Leaves skitter across the sidewalk outside. I breathe out.