Page 31 of The Reaper

“Always go back to this picture whenever you’re lost,” I said, chuckling.

“That’s right. I have to finish up. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“You know what? I am now. Thank you, Jessica.”

“You’re welcome, Father.”

She went back to hanging flowers and I was left standing in the middle of the church. A thought began to crystallize.

Always go back to this picture whenever you’re lost.

I hurried back to the house, heading straight to the office. I fired up my laptop, and while I waited I scrolled through my favorite images on my phone until I found the picture of Andrew and I. We were standing in the same spot as Jessica’s family, in front of Fenway Park’s iconic facade, where the year it opened was etched. I slid the USB drive into its port, and when the pop-up notification asked for the password, I studied the image once again. I keyed in FenwayPark1912 and waited.

Just like that, the file opened.

Shocked, all I could do was stare at the open file containing three folders.

Is this from you, Andrew?

Eighteen: The Reaper

Terraces of old buildings with brown terracotta-tiled roofs lined the hillsides of Monte Carlo. Multimillion-dollar mega yachts bobbed at the marina, peppering the turquoise water of the Mediterranean. Because beaches were a high-priced commodity in this part of the world, luxury residential areas hugged the city’s coastline. I wasn’t gonna lie, Monaco was the shit people made it out to be. It screamed money, a haven for those who had too much.

I paced alongside the interior window of my hotel room, waiting for notifications of any movements in the hallway from the camera I’d hidden, but aside from the occasional member of the cleaning staff making their rounds, Max ‘will-be-dead-soon’ Lancaster was yet to return to his suite.

Hours had gone by and my boredom was at an all-time high, and there wasn’t a fucking thing I could do about it. It was a waiting game until the real action began. I reached for my bag, pulling Max’s file from it. According to the back of the photo, more than twenty women were reported missing and he was linked to every single one of them. People who’d done a quarter of the awful things he did were rotting in jail. The difference between them and Max? Money. Loads of it. The man was a fucking monster.

It took one to know one.

***

Twelve Years Ago

The glass of my bedroom window rattled from the loud roar of a motorcycle passing by. The sound dissipated, but came back after a minute, where it halted right outside. It sounded like a Harley. My fascination with bikes had grown these past few years, and I found myself researching everything about them, even going as far as memorizing the sound of each brand. That distinctive growl was, without a doubt, a Harley. My interest didn’t end with motorcycles. It bled into cars and trucks. I could easily tell what the makes and models of vehicles were from their sound.

I hopped off the bed and looked out the window. A man wearing all black, including his helmet, sat on the idle bike. I was right, it was a Harley. His head was cocked toward my window. His face was hidden behind a black visor, but I knew he was staring at me. Do I know this person?

My cell beeped with a text from my friend Luke. We were in the same class and played basketball together. We weren’t any good, but we decided to join the team because there weren’t many activities to keep teenage boys occupied in our small town. It was exciting at first. Sharing a locker room with a bunch of jocks was fun, but that got old real fast when I realized that none of them were my type.

Still wanna go out tonight? his text read. It was my eighteenth birthday, and our new friend Wolf had invited both of us to a party to celebrate my adulthood.

After typing Hell yeah, I headed downstairs to ask my grandparents, pausing on the last step when I overheard their conversation.

“Where do you think she is?” Grandma asked Grandpa. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but my curiosity always won whenever the subject of my parents came up. “I can’t for the love of me think of any reason why a mother would leave a beautiful boy like that. Poor kid. Orphaned at such a young age.”

“He’s not an orphan, he has you and me,” Grandpa said. It was the truth. They’d raised me, and I couldn’t be luckier to have such wonderful people in my life.

“I know that. But we’re old. What if something happens to us? Who will look after him? He’s been through so much already.” Grandma’s voice broke as she spoke.

I cornered the living room, hiding behind the wall in order to get a glimpse of them. They were sitting next to each other, drinking tea. They enjoyed tea after dinner. Grandma stared into her porcelain cup, tracing the delicate edge of the matching saucer, which held a small slice of the birthday cake she had baked for me. You couldn’t miss the agony of losing her son and daughter-in-law engraved on her face. This was one of the very rare occasions they crumbled.

“Do you think she’s still alive?” she asked, looking into Grandpa’s eyes.

I wondered what hurt the most: her being dead, or to know she was alive and chose to abandon me ten years ago?

“I don’t know,” Grandpa answered. He rested his oversized reading glasses on top of his gray hair, before reaching over to hold Grandma’s hand. “It’s been ten years, and as much as I hate to admit it …” He took a deep breath before kissing her forehead. I’d never seen two people more in love than my grands. “I don’t believe that she would last long without seeing her baby boy. She loved that kid. They both did.”

How could a sentence pack so much sorrow? My parents loved me, but I couldn’t remember how that felt. Their voices were faint whispers, and the only reason I remembered their faces was because of the photos my grandma kept above the fireplace. My chest tightened, pulling a soft sob out of my throat.

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