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Leaning the back of my head against the wall, I closed my eyes, and it was like I was thrust back into that house, into the darkness. Thrown into the past, every detail vibrant and vivid in my head.
Neo was under me, his body pulled apart and opened up by yours truly. His handsome face was no more, now a gory, disgusting display of meaty flesh in the shadows. I held a knife in my hand, a small blade, but it was sharp enough to cut through just about anything—anything other than bone.
But why would someone want to cut through bone? Bones were the prettiest part.
It was like his corpse had become a canvas to me. A 3D canvas, interactive, something I could twist and make into whatever I wanted. So fresh he was still warm.
There were so many more things I could’ve done to him, if I hadn’t been interrupted. If I hadn’t been pulled back into reality and the mess I’d made. I should be grateful for Alistair, for being so calm and collected given the circumstance, but at the same time, if my mom had never married him and we’d never come to Eastcreek, I never would’ve known what it was like to have blood on my hands.
Literally and metaphorically.
A struggle as it was, I pulled myself back into reality, opening my eyes to view the extra bedroom that had become my art studio. Those memories were so vivid, it was like I was there, like I could go back in time and relive it. The truly messed up part was, I didn’t think I was half as out of my mind during that time as Alistair and the others thought.
I think the thing that scared me the most was that I’d been sane and in control the whole time, that I’d done all that on purpose. That I’dwantedto dissect him like some kind of lab experiment in biology, minus the formaldehyde stench.
It was dinner time. I should eat something, since I hadn’t eaten lunch, but the mere thought of going downstairs and making myself something sounded like way too much work. It was like I’d been mentally drained. The only thing I could do was sit there and watch the time go by.
School tomorrow was going to be the opposite of fun. With the announcement official, the halls would be flooded with gossip about Neo and what he was doing at his grandfather’s house all by himself… with Erin’s car in the garage.
Rumors were going to fly. I could only imagine what Kaity and the others would say.
Heavy footsteps in the hall alerted me to someone approaching, and it was as I was getting to my feet that Gareth busted into the room. He had his phone near his ear, a grim look on his face, and instantly, my stomach sank.
“What?” I asked, breathless, but not in a good way. Had something happened to Alistair and my mom on the way to the airport? Did they get into an accident? Did… did Brett come for them and kill them both?
Oh, God, what would I do if—
Gareth said nothing, but he gestured for me to follow him, so that’s exactly what I did. He turned and walked out of my studio, and I hurried after him, following him to his bedroom, where he’d turned on the television. The flat-screen TV hanging on the wall was on a local news station.
A banner that saidBreaking Newsscrolled along the bottom as a woman spoke to the camera. The headline ran:Body Found. Gareth hung up the phone and stood beside me, watching the TV, his mouth pulled into a thin line.
“This comes mere hours after the sheriff in Eastcreek announced the identity of the body found in another house. Over the weekend, a house fire raged on Leif Road, and a body was found in the charred wreckage. I’m told dental records were a match, and that the body was that of local senior Neo Banks,” the newswoman spoke solemnly at the camera.
“I don’t—” I stopped when the image on the TV changed. The newswoman was now doing a voiceover as the camera showed a familiar house with yellow tape all around it, a bunch of emergency vehicles parked around it, their lights flashing.
That house… was Erin’s house.
As the newswoman went on, Gareth tore his eyes off the screen and looked at me. “I guess Brett wasn’t lying when he said things are going to happen fast.” He didn’t sound too happy about it. “I wish I knew where he was. I’d go straight to him and fucking kill him so we can all move past this shit.”
I partially listened to him, but I also listened to the woman on the TV. It was live, which meant it had to be happening right now. That had to mean right after Brett left, he dropped a body, but whose?
Rick appeared on the TV in a prerecorded statement, saying, “No positive ID yet. All I can say is when I came to investigate the car we found at the scene of another possible crime, I found the house’s front door open. Male, late forties.”
“Do you believe it to be the owner of this house?” the newswoman had asked him.
“It’s possible” was all Rick said, and then the screen went back to the newswoman, back to the live broadcast.
“It has to be Erin’s dad,” I whispered, a sinking feeling in my gut.
Gareth nodded. “Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking. Alistair is on his way back from the airport now. Rick was the one who called him and told him about this.”
“I don’t understand. Wouldn’t the body start to smell if it had been there the whole time?” I was pretty sure Rick had gone to the house to investigate for me, back when I’d agreed to try to find whatever dirt Alistair had on him in exchange. Man, how quickly things had changed.
“Yeah. Just like they only found one in the house,” he said. “That means Erin’s body is somewhere else, same with her mother’s. I’m betting Neo and Brett had the bodies stashed somewhere else, maybe in a freezer so they wouldn’t rot. They’ve been gone a while. The bodies would’ve started to decompose already if they weren’t.”
It was just like the day I’d found out Erin was missing, a redo of that moment, deja vu in its entirety. All of the air had whooshed out of my lungs, and my thoughts raced.
We had to find where Brett was hiding. If we didn’t… this was only the beginning.
