Page 45 of Ramsay

“Yeah,” she says, dropping her chin. “What happened between you two?”

“I don’t know. I assume it has something to do with Ramsay, though. Whatever.”

“Willow,” she says, stepping up and whispering, “she’s always got eyes out. She knows shit about everyone, even stuff nobody should know. Don’t you think that’s weird?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, how did she know about your sister? And why now? Who’s out to get you, Will? Because someone wants you off their back.”

Who indeed? Is Ramsay feeding her the information?

“Why are you telling me this?”

Laughing bitterly, she says, “Because it could just as easily be me. See you around.”

“Maxie?” I ask and she turns back with her hand on the door.

“Yeah?”

“I heard a rumor about you. That it was Sabrina who cut your hair back in the day. And apparently stole your boyfriend right after?”

She doesn’t answer, but she doesn’t have to because it’s evident in the lines of her stiff body as her shoulders slump in defeat.

She’s known all along, whether she chose to acknowledge it or not, and she fell into bed with the devil anyway.

∞∞∞

On Sunday morning, Dad orders me downstairs and grimly, I round the corner into the dining area where he’s sitting at the table. I hate that fucking table. Every single bit of bad news I’ve ever received has been while sitting there.

Mom’s not around, and it’s so unusual that the first trickle of fear shivers down my spine. His blue eyes, so like Carmen's, look me over, the irises black with pain. With a shaky exhale, I slip into the chair beside him and drop my eyes to the wood.

His heavy sigh practically parts my hair when he says, “We heard back from the police.”

I don’t want to know what comes next, but I don’t get a choice in this any more than I get a choice in anything else. I’m fucking stuck on this roller coaster.

“They found, they said,” his voice cracks, and I look up, my eyes watering as a rosy flush suffuses his cheeks.

This is so bad.

Clearing his throat, he rubs his hand over his face and says on a heavy sigh, ”Her head. They found her head.”

“Her head,” I echo, dumbly.

My mind is completely blank, and for a moment, I can’t even comprehend what he’s saying.

They found her head. I don’t—

Oh god. Oh god.

Grabbing fistfuls of my hair, I wail as pain ricochets through my chest so fast I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe!

Her head. Where’s the rest of her?

“They don’t know,” he says grimly, dropping to the floor before me and pulling me into his chest.

From a distance, I hear the heart-breaking cries of my mother, only to realize it’s me as Dad rocks me in his arms while I lose the last of my humanity. Some psycho cut my sister’s head from her body. Her head. How the fuck do you come back from that?

Chapter Eleven

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