Page 36 of Bird on a Blade

She means the PIs. That one makes me nervous, that they haven’t come around again. Because I know they’re still looking.And if they aren’t investigating Charlotte, they’re investigating something else.

The really fucked up thing, though, the thing that sometimes keeps me wide awake at night, blinking at the ceiling, is that the only time I’m not worried about Scott is when I’m with Sawyer.

That I eventhinkof him as Sawyer, just Sawyer, and not Sawyer Caldwell—that gives me a deep shivery feeling, too.

I haven’t seen him for a few days, which may be why I keep checking my phone, looking to see if there’s a new message from Charlotte or a new Google alert with my name—there never is. Scott’s still keeping my disappearance a secret.

It’s weird, being out at the cabin by myself. My marriage to Scott had been lonely even though I was always surrounded by people. The thing is they weren’tmypeople, they weren’tmyfriends. I didn’t have friends, save for Charlotte. I hadacquaintances, and Scott expected me from the beginning to mold my life to his, to be a reflection of him.

And I accepted it for so long because it was the sort of happiness I had seen in my own family. It was everything my mother told me would make me happy, in fact: being hungry and thin (or as close an approximation as I could manage). Being married to a rich man. Living in a glass and steel mansion by the Pacific Ocean.

It was a happiness I willingly unraveled by finally seeking treatment for the eating disorder that allowed it all to happen.

So I understand loneliness. But the loneliness in the cabin is different. I’m actuallyalone. The only company I have is Sawyer, and he shows up when he feels like it, dispenses a few mind-blowing orgasms with his hands or tongue, talks about killing me in a way that doesn’t make me as frightened as it should, and then leaves.

Two and a half weeks of this. I’ve got another month and a half before my booking runs out and I’ll have to decide what to do next.

I’m wary of driving into Roanoke, the closest thing to a cityout here. Even though Scott hasn’t declared me missing, I worry someone will recognize me. So I make do with Altarida and the cabin’s TV and my ebooks and the walking trails winding through the forest. I walk a lot, actually, listening to music through my earbuds, willing my mind to go blank.

Unfortunately, today has turned out cold and dreary, the sky the kind of steely grey that makes the rest of the colors in the world seem more vibrant and saturated. The leaves are just starting to turn, streaks of crimson and orange veining through the woods, and I go out on my porch to have a cup of hot coffee and watch the rain.

Maybe I’m hoping for Sawyer to step out of the trees. Sometimes I imagine him wearing the mask he wore that night we—met? I suppose that’s the word for it, even though it feels wrong. Kind of empty. Everything with him is so fucking confusing.

Eventually, the rain stops, and the air has turned genuinely cold. I have exactly one sweater, an oversized cardigan that either I or Charlotte shoved into my bag during the flurry of my escape from California. Whichever one of us had the foresight—well, I’m grateful for it now. I need to get out of the cabin.

I shrug on the sweater, grab my earbuds, and head out to the trailhead on the other side of the run-down cabins. I’ve ignored them pretty much the entire time I’ve been here. They remind me too much of my summers at Camp Head Start, even though they look nothing like they did, all weatherworn and peeling, the windows nailed over with boards. The forest though, that’s nice. Funny how the trail feels new. Familiar from the last two weeks and not fifteen years ago.

I weave into the trees. The music starts to irritate me, tinny and repetitive, and so I switch it off and just listen to the sounds of the mountains. There’s a soft rhythmic dripping everywhere from the last of the rain as it falls off the leaves. My footsteps sound slick and soft as I tread over the rotting debris of the forestfloor. There’s no insect sounds like when I first arrived. No frog song. Summer’s dead.

I’m fine with that, honestly. All my nightmares happened in the summer: Sawyer’s murders at Camp Head Start. Scott trying to kill me. My entire life in California, where it’s always summer.

“Fuck summer,” I whisper. I’m much more used to the sound of my own voice.

The forest responds with its own crackling and creaking. I feel a shiver pass over my skin, as if ancient Appalachian ghosts are watching me hike. And when I look out at the gloom, I almost think I see them. But no, it’s just wisps of fog from the thick, choking dampness.

I keep walking, looping around the trail to head back to the cabin. It feels good to get out and move around, but I’m cold, my single sweater is damp from old rain, and water’s seeping in through my shoes. I’ll need to see about getting more clothes. Maybe I can risk a trip to Roanoke after all.

But as I get closer to the cabin, I know that something’s wrong.

My skin prickles all over, and I think at first that it’s Sawyer, that he’s left me another one of his presents and he’s watching to see how I react. The thought fills me with a deep revulsion but also a tiny flicker of shameful desire.

You want him to touch you again.

My body warms at the thought. Traitor.

But when I reach the tree line where I can see the camp in the clearing, that warmth turns to a gripping, terrifying coldness. Somethingiswrong. And it’s not Sawyer.

There’s a car parked behind mine.

I stop, falling back into the trees, my heart pounding furiously up in my chest. The car isn’t Scott’s white Tesla, but it looks expensive, and I know immediately that he’s responsible for this. Either he found out where I am and came here himself, or he sent someone.

Both options are unthinkable.

That’s when the panic seizes up in me. I have my phone and earbuds and nothing else—not my wallet, not my ID, and, most distressingly, not my car keys, which I left hanging from the hook by the front door.

Find Sawyer.

The thought flares in my head like a star, but I push it aside. I have no idea how I would even begin to do that. And he’s a fucking killer anyway.

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