Page 48 of Serial Killer Games

It’s not that no one recognizes the killer from her monologue. It’s that theyallrecognize her. The thin-faced woman at the table diagonal to ours stands, and everyone turns to watch as she raises her arm to point at Dodi, specter-like.

She takes a deep breath, and the bottom falls out of my stomach when she says, “Dolores dela Cruz, the Blackjack Widow!”

22

Body Disposal

Dodi

I’ve finally had a chanceto plead my case. For a full minute I think I’ve succeeded in ruining their fun, but then a breathless, murmuring chatter breaks out.A murderer! A murderer amongst us!

“It’sher. It’s definitelyher,” a voice just below the stage says. “I recognize her from that news article—”

“Holy shit.Holy shit.”

“Can we get her autograph?”

The room has gone wild, and they all want a piece of me. Twisted degenerates, the lot of them. I pan the crowd, and in the busy, moving mass Jake sticks out, still as a statue. Lips parted, expression blank, the image of a man spun around and dropped in a world where up is down. It’s that frozen audience of one that gives me stage fright. He looks at me like he’s seeing me for the first time.

I’m rocked, the way I was five years ago when a random email with a link to a podcast fell into my inbox. I’d had a lot of feelings, which was interesting because I’d sworn off feelings—although what else could I do upon discovering theworst moment of my life was entertainment to a bunch of strangers?—but after having been alone for years by then, a social pariah, a hermit, I suddenly had company. I had people. Very sordid, fucked-up people, like me. I listened to podcast after podcast. They were out there, flying under the radar, passing by like sharks swimming in dark water. People who wouldn’t judge me. People who would understand. If I could find one single person, I’d settle for that.

I thought I’d found him. Not a murderer, but someone who understood.

I step back into the shadows. There’ll be an exit somewhere back here, behind the stage curtains—there. One robotic step and another before I pick up my pace. I’m running by the time I reach the exit. The fire alarm triggers when I slam through the door and burst out into the night like a bat out of hell.

“Wait!” A voice follows me as I pelt down the sidewalk. My shoulders knock into tourists, and someone’s drink splatters on the ground near my feet.

“Dodi—”

I push at the crowd in front of me and become ensnared in a writhing mass of elderly ladies all wearing pink shirts with flamingos on them, posing for photos in front of the Bellagio Fountains, now frothing and spurting all over the fucking place. I whirl on the spot when a hand touches my elbow.

“What?”I shriek.

Jake recoils a step and bends over, hands on his knees, breathless from the pursuit. It occurs to me I’m panting too.

“Dodi—”

“Don’t call me that!”

“I didn’t know—”

“You knew!” I shout. “Youknew!”

It comes out sounding feral.

“That day on the roof, you told me I was a ghost. It was like someone finallysawme. Youknewwhat I was going through. You lost your parents—you know about loss—ever since he died, I’ve felt like I died too—I’m just—haunting the living—unfinished business—” My breath catches in my chest, and it’s a moment before I can speak again. “Youknew. I told you. Itoldyou I was a widow. You told me—you told me you knew about the secret I keep in plain sight on my desk. You got me tickets to their show. Youknew.”

Jake stares at me. He didn’t know.

I feel like I’ve been mugged. Something precious and special I kept clasped in one fist since that day on the rooftop has been stripped from my possession. Another person’s understanding. Another person’s acceptance.

Anotherperson—full stop. He’sdying. I could fucking kill him.

If he’s looking at me like that, I’ve already lost him. I turn on the spot within the throng of flamingo ladies.

“I’m glad you did it,” he says, voice raised over the cackling hubbub of the Flamingo Squad. I freeze, and turn back.

“Notglad,” Jake amends, voice dropping. He opens and closes his mouth. “I’m dying,” he says quietly, and I wouldn’t hear the words if I couldn’t also see his lips moving. It’s almost experimental the way he says it, like he hasn’t had practice with the phrase. He holds his hands to show me: ghostly white fingers, like they were during our serial killer date.

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