Page 17 of Slay Bells Ring

“Old man, huh?” I should be insulted. I am only thirty-eight. That’s not decrepit or anything. But, I suppose, to someone Holly’s age—to someone who’s in their early twenties—I’m an old man. “If I’m so old, why couldn’t you take me down, little killer?”

“Well, you’re…” Unless I’m mistaken, I hear her swallow hard while she pauses. “…pretty fit for an old man. Spry for your age, too. You can move pretty fast for—”

I have the feeling she’s going to keep calling me old, so I interrupt her and say, “I’m old. I think you made your point.”

Holly stuns me by her next question. It comes so out of the blue, there’s no way I could have prepared myself for it. “How old were you when you killed for the first time?”

The Guild only employs adults. Still, sometimes there are jobs when a younger hand is needed. My first kill wasn’t an official Guild job—not for me, anyway. My father took me on a job when I was sixteen. The target was a philandering husband of some wealthy CEO. He liked underage boys a bit too much and his wife found out.

There’s no divorcing that.

So my father took me, told me what to do, where to do it, how to make it look like an accident. It was easier for me to get alone with him than my father. I suffocated him in a fancy motel room while my father cut off the security feeds. He never touched any underaged boys again and the wife was free to move on with her life knowing that her cheating husband was dead.

But I can’t tell Holly all that. My kills, as many of them as there are, are mine. The only one I share with her is the one she’s already a part of.

All I end up saying is, “Younger than you.”

“Do you like it? Killing people, I mean? Do you have fun when you end people’s lives, or is it just another job to you?”

I lean back in my recliner and say, “You’re very curious about me.”

She shrugs. “It’s not like there’s much else to do here other than talk. Besides,” she pauses and picks at the sheets around her, not looking at me as she says this next part, “I am curious. I spent the last thirteen years of my life thinking about you constantly.”

It seems we both spent a lot of time thinking about the other, then. Hearing her admit it out loud makes me want to admit the same to her—but it would be different for me. It might help her put two and two together, and call me stupid, but I don’t want Holly to know the real reason I only brought booze to this cabin.

Though I don’t have to, I answer her previous question. “It’s a job. I don’t necessarily enjoy it. I’m good at it, but… it’s not like I get off killing people. I do what I was trained to do, the same as it would be for any other job.”

She lets out a strange sound, and when I glance at her, she whispers, “That’s not… either you’re a really good actor, or you’re telling the truth.”

“Why is me telling the truth so shocking to you?”

The sigh that escapes her after that is explosive. “I guess I just… I had this image of you in my head these last thirteen years. I filled in the blanks. I pictured what kind of person you were, what kind of person I thought you had to be to do what you did to my parents. Evil, cruel, vicious. I thought you were the king of bad guys.”

Watching her come to the realization is almost painful. I want… well, I want to go over to her and hold her, tell her everything will be okay. For obvious reasons, I don’t let myself do that, though.

“I don’t know what’s worse,” Holly whispers. “You not being who I thought you would be or you saying killing my parents was just another job and you didn’t feel a single thing when you did it.”

“It’s complicated,” I say.

She mutters, “No shit.”

As I stare at her, I can’t help but feel as if things are only going to get more complicated from here on out. I don’t know what’s going to happen next, whether Holly will do what she came here to do and avenge her family, but I do know one thing.

If she tries again, I might not stop her.

If my death means she can have peace, then maybe that’s the sacrifice I’ll have to make.

Chapter Nine – Holly

I’m in the dark, hiding. I’m trying to hold my breath, keep it in, but it’s impossible. My nerves are shot and I can’t keep calm. I’m in the corner, huddled against the wall with my legs pulled up tight against my chest—and speaking of my chest, the pounding of my heart makes me think it’s going to burst right out any moment now.

I’m terrified. I’m scared. And, worst of all, I feel helpless.

The closet door, the only barrier between me and the rest of the world, flings open, and a shiny gun is my first greeting, along with an ugly yellow light that illuminates the silhouette of the man who just opened the door.

The only thing I can stare at is the gun for a good long while, and then my eyes travel along the arm of the man holding it. The moment I stare into his cold, icy blue eyes, I’m lost. I know I am.

He’s going to kill me and there’s nothing I can do to stop him.

---