Page 17 of Butcher & Blackbird
“No, Rowan, you can’t come. What if itisa date? That would be so awkward.” She pats my chest and grins. “Don’t worry, I’ll fill you in on all the gory details later.”
With a final tap on my chest that’s really more like a slap, she turns and strides away.
“But… I was the one who was supposed to be gloating,” I call after her as she reaches the lobby exit.
“Sorry, not sorry,” she chimes. She flips me the bird before she slips through the doors, leaving only an echoing thud behind.
I stand in her wake, stunned. A wave of confusion and worry and jealousy crashes through my chest. In one fell swoop, I’ve been filled with a fucking ocean of it.
What the fuck?
“Sloane,” I call out after her, marching to the door. I thrust it open with more force than necessary and let it hit the door stopper with a satisfying thud of wood against the rubber-coated metal. “Sloane, goddammit…”
I look left and right. I hold my breath and listen.
Nothing.
My hand drives through my hair. I’m not sure if I’m more irritated that I might be on the losing end of our first game, or that Sloane is on a maybe-date with some wanker from butt-fuck nowhere.
I strain to hear anything but crickets, but there’s still no sign of Sloane.
“Fuck.”
I barrel toward the lobby door and toss it open with more force than necessary as I stalk back into the hotel and head to my room. I pace there for a while as I consider my options. Maybe I should go out and find the local pub and get shitfaced. But what if she runs into someone like Briscoe or Watson? Briscoe must have landed a lucky hit—the bloke was as sedentary as a fucking boulder. But Watson was a crafty bastard. What if she’s cornered by someone like that? What if she’s trapped and I can’t find her? What if she calls for help and I’m pissed drunk at the tavern singing Country Roads?
I never expected I’d be pacing my room as I stress over the whereabouts of the fucking Orb Weaver, my heart racing and palms sweaty, worried about whether she might get hurt.
The ding of an incoming text is the only thing that stops me from wearing a hole into the floor.
I’m fine.
I snort.
I wasn’t concerned.
A complete lie, obviously. I sit on the edge of the bed as I try to resist the urge to resume my track across the room, my knee bouncing.
Oh good.
In that case, don’t wait up!
“What thefuck…”
I barely temper the urge to hurtle my phone against the wall, electing to clutch it in an iron grip and punch the mattress instead. It’s wildly unsatisfying to punch a fucking mattress, by the way.
So I resume pacing.
After a while, I give up on the walking and try to do some research on the local area, but I come up with next to nothing, just like all my efforts over the past three days. The only thing I’ve found of significance is a handful of news articles. Random stories, nothing to tie the pieces to a suspect. A missing hiker, just like Francis said. Another dead body in a ravine. A car with New York plates dredged from the Kanawha River. How the fuck Lachlan put together that there’s a serial killer in the area, I have no idea. In fact, I’m starting to think he sent us here as a hoax.
I give up and flop on my bed to stare at the ceiling.
It’s three hours later when I finally hear the quiet click of Sloane’s door closing as she slips into her room next to mine.
Three fucking hours.
Besides the fact that she could have won our game in that amount of time, she also could have done all kinds ofotherthings. Been on a date, for one. Maybe she had dinner somewhere other than this hotel with Francis’s frozen peas and unseasoned, overcooked pork chops that I’ll probably crack a tooth on before the week is out.
…Maybe she hooked up with some guy.
