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Valerie’s brows furrow. “I know. I can’t believe I let her trick me into doing her dirty work for her.”
“She fooled me too, and I was the one who got him first.” I wait for the twinge of remorse to make an appearance, but I feel nothing, and I know why. In my head, killing Mark Warner was justified. I believed he had a role in hurting Valerie. The fact he wasn’t, in fact, guilty bears no weight on my conscience. Carol was the one who killed him—I was just the tool.
“Do you want to see what I did to Bobby and Doug?”
I smile. “Do I? Of course. Let’s go.”
sixteen
Valerie
It doesn’t take long for us to set up the crime scene so the police believe Carol is Killer Santa. Eric cleans the Killer Santa mask with bleach to get rid of as much of his DNA as possible, puts her head inside his mask, then takes it off again, so if they find his DNA, it can be attributed to transfer. He also makes sure the murder weapon—his bowie knife—is clear of our fingerprints and covered in hers. The bow and arrow we turn into splinters of wood in the workshop and spread the small pieces throughout the school, keeping the arrow tip.
Our cover story is close to the truth, as Eric suggested. I came upon Killer Santa stabbing Mark Warner and went after him. Eric happened to be cycling nearby and came to help. While Killer Santa was distracted killing the nosy neighbor, we rode away on his bike, but Carol followed us to the high school, and the rest is pretty much what truly happened.
“What about your shirt? It has Mark Warner’s blood on it.”
“I know. We need to burn it.”
“Hmm, we could burn it in the school’s kitchen, but what are you going to wear?”
He pulls a black shirt from his backpack. “I’m always prepared.”
I can’t help staring while Eric changes. He’s on the leaner side, but his muscles are defined and begging to be explored by my fingers and tongue.
He catches me ogling him and smiles cheekily. “If I’d known you liked the sight of me shirtless, I’d have walked around the house without a shirt more often.”
“Yeah, what a missed opportunity.” I return his smile.
He walks over and pulls me into his arms, his expression growing serious. “I wish you’d told me about the convo with my mother when it happened.”
“I didn’t know you liked me that way. I thought you were just doing me a favor when I attacked you.”
His brows shoot up, then he cups my cheek. “Val, how could you have believed that? I was crazy about you. Iamcrazy about you.”
“But when did you start to feel that way about me? You barely looked at me when you moved to Stanmore.”
His lips curl into a wicked grin. “I did look at you. So often, it made me sick of how you were turning me into a man living in hope and dying in despair.”
My twisted heart beats faster. Only Eric can make me feel like I’m a sunshine-and-unicorns girl instead of the psycho I truly am. “I never noticed. I thought you hated me.”
“No.” He shakes his head. “But pushing your buttons and earning your ire were the highlights of my day. I did believe you couldn’t stand me though.”
“An act.” I shrug. “I didn’t hate you. I hated that I had such a crush on you from the start and you were oblivious.”
His brows arch and his eyes twinkle with satisfaction. “From the start, huh? Was it my heartthrob face that made you melt?”
I slap his arm. “Man, you’re conceited.”
He laughs. “What? I have a mirror.”
“Your looks didn’t hurt, but that wasn’t it. Do you remember when we were watching a documentary about the ugliest bugs and animals in the world?”
“Yeah. How could I forget? It was the first time we spent time together without our folks.”
“You started talking over the narrator and coming up with the most ludicrous and bizarre backstories for those creatures. That’s when I knew you weren’t like anyone I’ve ever met.”
Eric smiles. “So I have creepy creatures to thank for your affection.” He leans down to kiss me, but then I tense, remembering something crucial.
