Page 51 of Lust

“I don’t like that,” Seth says. “It sounds dangerous.”

“It’s all dangerous,” Cody says. “But with that thing out there, we’re gonna have to take risks. We also have to hope I’m right and that we have some time to try and make sense of this.”

“And if we’re wrong?” I ask.

Cody’s gaze sinks. “Then at least one more person will die.”

So like with so much of this shit, what choice do any of us have?

15

LUKE

“You can’t keepdoing this,” I say.

Brad messaged me this morning to let me know the guys were meeting at the church again. He didn’t push, but I agreed to meet them. We were gonna have to deal with all the shit that came up on Friday sooner or later.

Once there, Cody took the lead, telling me about their interpretations of the visions, about a monster called the Slasher that the original Sinners discussed, and about their plan.

“Keep doing what?” Seth asks. I don’t know if this guy can talk without sounding like an asshat.

“You clearly had another of your secret club meetings and reached all these conclusions without running any of this by me.”

“We actually know what we’re dealing with here,” Seth says. “You don’t.”

“If I’ve learned anything, it’s that you don’t know all that much about what’s going on. And as long as you keep having secret meetings, I’m always gonna be in the dark.”

“Luke has a valid point,” Cody says, glaring at Seth. “I understand why you feel that way, but we were trying to give you some space, and we had some insightful discussions that included how we need to involve you more.”

His words set me at ease. Given how pissed I was when I rushed out last time, I hardly expected them to text me to brainstorm about our next steps. But they did ask me here, andat least Brad and Cody sound like they’re trying to involve me in the process.

“That’s fair,” I say. “But I don’t think you guys appreciate how shitty it is to always be the last to know what’s going on, and on top of that, getting curveballs like finding out my dad was in this group and none of you bothered to mention it. It makes me feel like you’re probably not telling me other things that are gonna rear their head and fuck with me later.”

“I get that,” Brad says. “But that’s not how we’re moving forward. You said it yourself: we have to work together if we’re gonna find and kill this thing. And the plan Cody was describing isn’t set in stone. You can interject if you have a better idea or if you think of a way of looking at this that we haven’t considered.”

I’m waiting for Seth to chime in with some asshole remark, but he just stands there, arms folded, silent.

Even though the guys sound much more reasonable than on Friday, it doesn’t change that they kept that secret about my dad from me. It’s the sort of thing that’ll make it hard for me to trust them, but knowing Dad was part of the original Sinners when he went to St. Lawrence is one of the reasons I’m standing here today. As much as these guys may have tried to fuck me over when I first got here, there’s an important connection here, one I have to explore.

“Okay,” I say. “So based on what I described, we have some time to see if we can find this Slasher—if that’s what we have to call it.”

“It’s what the original Sinners called it,” Cody clarifies. “I feel like if I’d been around, we would have come up with more scientific-sounding names. Do you mind if I see the Sinners’ bible?”

I fish into my backpack and retrieve it, handing it over. Cody flips through until he gets to a sketch of…a creature without hands but with elongated, sharp-looking arms.

“This is the Slasher they encountered,” Cody says.

“Doesn’t look like the sketch you showed me of what you saw in your vision.”

“From what Dobbers and your father say in here, they don’t have to manifest in the same form, but from what you described, it works the same as this creature as far as feeding off blood and fear, so even if we’re not spot-on, it seems safe to assume these creatures are similar enough, at least to find and kill.”

“How did they find it?”

“The Guides offered Dobbers a similar vision, which they apparently had an easier time interpreting. I think because he had a better connection to the Guides than I do. Sort of innate, like your ability. It’s the difference between a singer with natural talent and someone with skill. Both in combination are ideal, but separately there are weaknesses. You seem to have a lot of innate talent, but the rest of us have acquired what we have through training. Dobbers was more of a mix.”

Of course it wouldn’t be so easy for us. “Okay…so if we don’t know where it is, what do we know?”

Seth replies, “I did some research on the victims Dobbers and your dad listed. There were four. It looks like it was a month and a half from the first disappearance to the next victims, which confirms our timeline for the attack on the fairgrounds.”

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