by Alana Terry
“Who?” I asked reluctantly.
“The DNA matches a woman named Emily Cross.”
I didn’t remember her, but her name unleashed a torrent of conflicting emotions inside me: love, hatred, safety, terror . . . longing. My voice came out hoarse with emotion. “Who was she?”
“I don’t know.” He sighed as he watched my face. “I don’t have many details yet. Apparently, the locals prefer hard copy files to an electronic database. I reached out to the local police department, but they weren’t involved with the case. They referred me to the sheriff’s department, and I’m waitin’ to hear back.”
I closed my eyes and squeezed the bottle in my hands. I’d known deep down that the body I tripped over had belonged to a woman or a girl. Now I knew her name, and I knew that she’d meant something to me.
Chapter 27
“ADD ONE CUP OF CHOCOLATE chips,” Jace said in a monotone voice as she squinted to read a nearly illegible recipe. All I saw was “one c-smudge of smudge-ate chips.” Someone apparently hated this recipe, because they’d cried all over it, making the ink bleed.
Jace handed me a measuring cup. “Be precise,” she instructed.
I looked at the measuring cup in my hand and then at the bag of chocolate chips. Pfft. I ripped open the bag and emptied every last chocolate chip into the bowl.
“Holly, that’s too much!” she shouted.
“You said be precise. I poured the entire bag in with expert precision. Didn’t drop a single one.”
She groaned and plopped her face into her hands. “These are gonna be disgusting.”
“At least I can differentiate between a tablespoon and a teaspoon.” She clearly couldn’t, evidenced by the heaping mountain of baking soda she’d added to the mix.
She scowled at me.
I mixed the cookie dough batter with a wooden spoon until it was thick enough to make my arm ache. I was pretty sure it had transformed into leather somewhere along the way. I grabbed a spoon and popped a glob of batter into my mouth.
“Don’t eat it! It has raw eggs in it!”
I gave her a befuddled look as I finished chewing the tasty leather, and then licked the spoon clean. There was a psycho trying to kill me . . . like I was worried about salmonella. “Raw eggs. Really?”
She rolled her eyes and opened her mouth to scold me when her phone rang. She tugged it out of her pocket, glanced at the display, and groaned loudly. “My mom. I need to go pretend I’m listening for twenty minutes.” She wheeled out of the kitchen, and I heard her shout, “Don’t eat the cookie dough, Holly!”
I ate another glob of cookie dough. Sugary sweetness—with a hint of salty bitterness from too much baking soda—melted over my tongue.
I plopped some golf ball–sized cookies onto a baking sheet with a fresh spoon and glanced at the recipe card: “Bake at 350 degrees for smudge-minutes.” Right . . . so, thirty minutes?
I popped them into the oven and set the timer.
Being alone in the kitchen as I watched the timer gave me too much time to think. I was trying to avoid that. I had too many questions and too few answers.
My mind kept drifting back to the woman whose body I’d tripped over all those years ago. Emily Cross. I couldn’t remember her face or why her name filled me with so much longing.
I couldn’t help but wonder if she’d been my mother. Had I ever stood in the kitchen and baked cookies with the woman I couldn’t remember? Would she have let me eat the raw cookie batter or lick the bowl clean?
Then there had been the man who called me “baby” and urged me to safety. I didn’t want them to be my family; the thought was too disheartening. I wanted them to be strangers I had just happened to find myself in a bad situation with.
I sighed and crouched down in front of the oven. Wondering would get me nowhere; Marx would have answers for me soon enough. I peered through the glass panel of the oven door at the cookies bubbling on the sheet. I really wanted them to be done so I could eat one. I tapped the glass with my fingernail impatiently.
“They’re not lizards in an aquarium, Holly,” Marx commented from across the room. “You can’t make them go faster by tappin’ the glass.”
I grinned and dropped my hand back to my lap. If only. I sat cross-legged on the floor against the wall to watch them bake. I could hear Jace’s muffled voice through the wall. She was arguing with her mother again.
I glanced over at the two men leaning against the wall by the door when I heard Sam say quietly, “What if I insist on staying inside? It would be safer for her that way.”
“I think she’ll slam the door in your face,” Marx replied in an equally hushed tone.
I was pretty sure they were talking about me, because I would definitely do that. I had considered doing it to Marx the first time he came to my apartment.
“She doesn’t trust me enough to let me inside,” Sam said, managing to sound a little hurt. “What do I need to do in order for her to trust me?”
“Get rid of that permanently angry fixture on your face.”
“I’m not angry. That’s just my face.”
I opened the oven and was bombarded by the sweet smell of chocolate chip cookies. The timer hadn’t gone off, but they looked done-ish. I scooped three of the hot cookies onto a plate and carried them over to the officers, who promptly fell silent. Sam tried very hard to arrange his expression into something that didn’t look angry, but he was right: it was just his face.
Marx offered me a warm smile. “Never figured you for a baker.”
I shrugged. “I usually avoid the kitchen, but there are few problems a tasty cookie can’t solve.” I held out the plate of cookies to Sam. “Have some cookies.”
He took the plate cautiously and muttered, “Thanks.” He glanced at Marx, who gave him a look that clearly communicated, Eat at your own risk.
I tucked my fingers into the back pockets of my jeans and waited for Sam to try one. He gazed at me with uncertainty before he realized why I was still standing there.
“Oh, you meant right now.” He eyed the cookies like they were made of dirt rather than chocolate chips and flour. “You didn’t scoop these with the same spoon you were licking, did you?”
I scrunched my nose indignantly.
“Right,” he muttered. He picked up a cookie carefully and blew on it before taking a small bite. “It’s actually not bad. A little salty, but not bad.” He ate a second one and offered the remaining cookie to Marx.
“I’m fine, thank you,” he refused politely. I was a little offended; he was assuming that just because I had a part in making them, they must be awful. “Don’t give me that face, Holly.”
I wasn’t aware I’d been giving him a face.
He sighed. “Give me the cookie.”
Sam smiled faintly as he held out the plate.
Marx eyed the misshapen blob suspiciously. “What’s in it?”
“Everything,” I said.
“That’s helpful, thank you.” He took a tentative bite and chewed slowly. He seemed to have a bit of difficulty swallowing it. “That was far more edible than I thought it would be.”
I rolled my eyes and took the plate back. If nobody else liked the cookies, I would eat them all myself. I loved cookies.
“I think you offended her,” Sam whispered.
Marx whispered back, “That was the worst cookie I’ve ever tasted.” And then in a voice I was meant to hear, he said, “Holly I’m gonna head home. Try not to burn the apartment buildin’ down.”
“No promises!” I waved good night with the cookie spoon before he left the apartment. I worked my way through the bowl of batter, alternating spoonfuls into my mouth and spoonfuls onto the baking sheets.
I jumped and nearly dropped the tray of cookies I was sliding into the oven when a door banged open. Jace rolled out of her bedroom in a cloud of fury. Her face was still splotchy from the stress of the conversation with her mother. “My mother’s coming,” she gritted out.
“What
? When?”
She folded her arms and huffed. “Now. She’s in the neighborhood.”
“Um . . . your mother’s allergic to this neighborhood. Was she dragged here by wild dogs?”
“I guess we’ll find out.”
If her mother was coming, that was my cue to leave. She wasn’t fond of me.
“I’m gonna go.” I walked to the couch to fetch my jacket. “Don’t forget about the cookies in the oven.”
Sam walked me home in his usual state of silence. After hearing his hushed conversation with Marx across the room, I felt guilty for leaving him standing on the patio when I opened my front door. To his credit, he didn’t ask to come in or even make a move toward the opening.
I paused in the doorway. “Sam . . .”
“Holly . . .”
I wanted to be able to invite him to stand guard inside—for his safety and mine—but I just couldn’t do it. I held up a finger before walking to the refrigerator and grabbing one of the fruit punches. I brought it back and held it out to him. “Peace offering?”
He took it hesitantly. “I didn’t realize we were at war.”
“You want inside; I want you outside.”
He sighed. “You overheard our conversation.”
“Like I said before, the two of you whisper like you’re trying to be heard over the roar of a jet engine.” I shrugged a little uncomfortably. “I’m sorry I can’t invite you in.”
He rested his shoulder against the brick siding of the building. His eyes met mine. “You don’t have to apologize. I know you care, so there must be a good reason you won’t let any of us inside. Marx knows you better than I do, and I trust the line he’s drawn.”
I bounced a little awkwardly on my toes as I said, “Thanks.”
Sam held up the punch and said, “Thanks for this. It’s my favorite.”
“Oh,” I said, remembering I needed his help with something. I pulled my phone from my pocket and shoved it at him. “Would you mind fixing this?”
He took it and turned it over in his hands, looking for visible damage. “What’s wrong with it other than the fact that it’s ancient?”
“It screams at me.”
“The ringtone?” he asked. At my nod, he opened the phone, and I watched as he pressed a series of buttons. I couldn’t follow it. The phone made a cute little water drop sound, and he snapped it shut before handing it back. “Done.”
“Thanks,” I said with a small smile. “Good night.”
“Night.”
I closed the door and locked it, leaving him out in the cold. Before heading for the shower, I grabbed my own fruit punch from the refrigerator. It opened easily, thank goodness, and I set it on the bathroom sink before I climbed in. I dressed for bed in the bathroom after my shower; it had become a habit after finding the film strip of pictures across my rear windows.
I took a few sips of my punch as I combed my fingers through my hair, and then slid my bare feet into my green slippers before opening the door. A wave of dizziness washed over me as I walked out of the bathroom, and I put a hand against the wall to brace myself. The room tilted dangerously around me.
That was unnerving.
I blinked at the swirl of colors and lights outside my front window, trying to solidify the image. It snapped into focus for just an instant, and I saw a warped face lit from within: uneven eyes, slashes for a nose, and a cavernous mouth with a row of crooked, disproportionate teeth. It was a jack-o’-lantern. Recognition stirred through me as I stared into the face pressed flush against the outside of my window.
“How does mine look, Daddy?” I asked as I grinned up at him from the front steps of the house.
My arm was stained to the elbow with pumpkin guts, and I held a small sharp knife in my right hand as I sawed through the last bit of skin that held the pumpkin’s eye in place. I poked it out and leaned back to stare at my masterpiece. His eyes were crooked, as if they were melting down his face, and his teeth were reminiscent of a beaver in need of braces.
I knew without a doubt that the jack-o-lantern in the front window was mine, but there was no way it had survived for so many years. The memory faded, and the pumpkin on the window sill blurred into disorganized shapes and colors.
I’d only ever felt like this once before, and it had been after I swallowed a bottle of pills in the bathroom at the Wells’ family home. After every other attempt to free myself from that house had failed, that bottle of pills had been my last hope.
Pills. I looked down at the bottle of fruit punch in my hand and dread flooded through me. It was the only thing I’d consumed that could’ve been tainted . . . but he would’ve had to get inside to drug it.
I sucked in a terrified breath. Stanley’s keys . . .
I dropped the bottle as if it had burned me, and it spilled across the cement floor of the living room. I stared at the growing pool of red as I hugged the wall, trying to breathe.
This couldn’t be happening.
I stumbled slowly along the wall to the kitchen and fumbled to grab the salt bottle. I knocked over glasses in my clumsy haste, and they shattered across the floor. I grabbed the salt and poured it into a glass with shaking fingers, filled it with water, and chugged.
The salt water hit bottom, and my stomach heaved to push it back out. I vomited red fluid into the sink and prayed that enough of the drug went with it to keep me conscious.
“Sam,” I called. I banged a hand on the window desperately, but my strength was already waning, and it sounded like little more than a quiet tapping. “Sam,” I tried again.
I gripped the counter tightly to keep the world around me from spinning as I looked at the front door. It was still bolted from the inside. If the killer had Stanley’s keys, the dead bolts wouldn’t keep him out, but they would keep Sam out.
I wasn’t sure I had the ability to make it to the door and unlock it. I took one step forward, and the room bent around me, nearly sending me to the floor. I pulled my foot back and huddled in the crook of the cabinets. I needed to get to Sam.
I spotted my phone on the edge of the counter and reached for it. I barely managed to grab it before my legs gave out beneath me and my body melted into a puddle on the floor. Whatever was in the punch was moving too quickly. I didn’t have enough time to react.
My fingers trembled as I flipped open my phone. I blinked at the dial pad, trying to pin down the shifting numbers with my eyes, but they wouldn’t stop moving.
If I could manage to dial 9-1-1, they would ask for my address, and I didn’t have one. I wasn’t even sure I had enough strength to explain the situation. It was taking all my effort just to breathe and hold my phone.
I had the strangest sense of being outside myself, a bystander watching as I stupidly stared at the numbers on the phone. I needed to make a decision before I lost that ability too. What was wrong with me?
I hit redial and the phone automatically called the last number I had dialed. Please answer, please answer the phone this time.
Marx’s groggy voice came on the line, “Holly.”
Thank the Lord he answered. Now I just had to force words from my throat. “Help,” I rasped into the phone.
All traces of tiredness fled his voice and he sounded alert. “What’s wrong?”
A shadow shifted across the room near my bed, and my breath caught in my lungs. He was already inside, concealed behind the edge of the drapes that cordoned off my bedroom.
“He’s . . . here,” I forced out.
“I’m on my way, Holly. Can you hide?” I heard a car door slam in the background a second before an engine roared to life.
I couldn’t hide; I couldn’t even pull myself up against the cupboards. I was slumped against them like a puppet whose strings had been cut, and I had no control over my body. I could barely hold the phone to my ear.
“He’s inside,” I tried to tell him, but I wasn’t sure the fleeting whisper traveled across the line.
I heard the rattle of hangers over my bed as
he rifled through my wardrobe. I couldn’t imagine what he wanted with my clothes.
My heart nearly stopped when he appeared beside the foot of my bed. He wore the same ensemble he’d worn the night he killed Jacob, except for one glove. I could see the skin of his hand as he gripped the tank top I’d worn yesterday and pressed it to his face, drawing in the smell.
It sent a shiver of revulsion through me. He rubbed the soft material between his fingers before setting it gently aside. He ran his bare hand over the soft throw blanket draped over the end of my bed.
He moved with luxurious slowness, absorbing everything around him as if he were trying to memorize it. He even ran the back of his hand along the wall, careful not to leave fingerprints. I knew the drug was trying to pull me under, because one moment he stood by the bed and the next he was in front of the couch.
“Holly,” Marx called through the phone. “Talk to me, Holly.”
I watched the killer as he picked up the two flat pillows on the couch and smelled each one of them before returning them to their proper place. I blinked and then he was walking toward me. Every slow step sent another jolt of fear through me.
He was too close. Too close . . .
He crouched down in front of me, and I wanted more than anything to pull myself away from him. I pressed my palms to the floor and tried, but someone had filled my body with lead, and it was too heavy for me to move.
I remained slumped against the cupboards, panting from the exertion of trying to move. My heart felt like it was trying to outpace death, and it made it hard to breathe.
God, please help me . . .
The killer lifted his ungloved hand and brushed the back of his knuckles down my cheek in a gentle caress. His touch sent goose bumps cascading across my skin. “You grew up nicely, Holly,” he said, his voice a pleased purr.
His fingers were light as they moved over my jaw and down my neck. I cringed inwardly at the feel of his hand near my neck—remembering the feeling of someone else’s hand there—and he let his fingertips trail all the way to the hollow of my throat. “Such beautiful skin.”
