Total pages in book: 160
Estimated words: 160041 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 800(@200wpm)___ 640(@250wpm)___ 533(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160041 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 800(@200wpm)___ 640(@250wpm)___ 533(@300wpm)
I don’t think I’m getting out of this one alive.
And maybe that’s a good thing.
CHAPTER 7
Sunny
What was he writing, and why was he looking at me while doing it?
Could he be the guy who left me that note?
I lean over and bark, “What were you doing?”
“Nothing,” he replies, trying to tuck the notebook away too.
I fold my arms. “Were you writing about me?”
The panicked look on his face doesn’t help his case. “No, no, I—”
I pull the note that was left for me from my pocket and hold it right in front of his face. “You wrote this, didn’t you? Go on, admit it.”
He reads over the words. “Taken care of the body …” He frowns. “No.”
“Bullshit,” I hiss, and I immediately snatch the notebook from his fingers. “Give me that.”
“Wait, don’t—”
I ignore his pleas and open the small book, wondering what else he’s written in here. If he’s the one who wrote me that note, I’ll know soon enough just by his handwriting.
However, the words on the page catch me off guard.
A mountain of suffering before you
Climb higher and higher
Surrender to none
Black sky filters through your lungs
Like soot raining down upon your soul
Bear your fangs
Only fire will quench the rain
Higher and higher to the tallest hill
Do not let it be in vain
Dredging pain like sludge
Console you
Tears of ruin cascade down
Feet entwined
Hands bound
But none will stand before you
So heavy is the crown
You bear
A void so perfect
It swallows even the air
Breathe
Breathe
Breathe
One final breath
To oblivion
My friends snort and laugh behind me, and a flush slowly wriggles its way onto his cheeks. But all I can focus on are the words he wrote, and how they resonate so deeply that I’m momentarily stunned.
Why does this feel familiar?
“You wrote this?” I ask after a while.
He nods, rubbing his lips together. “Just a scribble. Nothing important.”
The handwriting isn’t anything like that note I got … but maybe he deliberately changed his way of writing to throw me off.
I hand him back the notebook. “Impressive.”
His eyes light up like I just gave a dog a bone. “Really?”
“Yeah. I like it.”
“What?” Vivian mutters, confused.
“It’s good,” I tell her.
“Okay. I guess,” she says, making a face.
I ignore her and push the notebook back into his hands, and he visibly gulps. “In fact, I think you should write more of these…” I curl a few of strands of his blond hair around my finger and coil them up. “Fill up your notebook, then show them to me.” I add a smile for good measure as I wrap him around my finger, and his eyes follow my every move, desperate for more. “Won’t you do that for me?”
He nods a few times, swallowing, before I release him from my grasp and march off with my girls. Whether he is or isn’t the one who wrote me that note doesn’t matter … as long as he’ll do anything and everything I tell him to. Because these killing sprees of mine are not going to be free of consequences, and it will definitely come in handy to have someone on my side.
Atreus
The next day
The lights above my desk shine so harshly that I have to squint.
One of these days, I am going to rip them out and sit in the darkness.
“Another crime scene. No corpse this time, though. But they did leave evidence on the walls of the shop beside it.” Trent throws a set of pictures on my desk. “Thought you might be interested in these.”
I pick them up and stare at them. No body, but the splotches of blood on the walls clearly indicates a violent murder took place here. I raise them to the lamp and inspect them up close. Someone tried to clean up but didn’t do a proper job.
“You think the Bones Brotherhood is on a spree again?”
I run my fingers through my dark brown hair. “No. They kill in silence and only when necessary to keep their men in line or to get rid of enemies swiftly, mostly with bullets. This is something else entirely.”
But what? What possesses someone to exhibit such rage?
“Do you have any leads on the victim?” I ask.
“I spoke to the shop owners, and they said they hadn’t seen him in a few days. Thought he was sick but forgot to call in.”
I snort. “Meanwhile, his remains were behind their dumpster all this time without their knowledge.”
“Do you want me to bring them in for questioning?”
I nod. “I want all the details. Job function, timelines, their clients, locations, and every place he’s visited in the past couple of weeks. All of it.” I lower the photos. “Any others?”
“That’s it so far, but I’m sure there’ll be more,” he replies.
“Thanks,” I say, as he walks off and closes the door again.
I turn around in my seat and hold up the photos to the board behind my desk, pinning them onto the map. Each new body is another piece of evidence pointing in the right direction, but all the lines I’ve drawn so far between the victims, the locations, and several suspects end up circling back to a single goddamn place.