Page 53 of Crawl
“With a knife,” she says immediately.
“You want the mess, then?”
“Of course.”
I wink. “Dirty girl.”
She laughs again, still hesitant, but fuller, like she’s beginning to accept herself. Her hands rub at her sides, then her eyes flicker to the cameras on the ceiling and the one on the mantel above the fireplace. It dawns on me: she knows she’s being recorded; she’s worried I’ll use this conversation against her too.
But right then, I have no interest in that.
“What about you?” she asks, her voice light and airy. “Birthday celebrations? Childhood trauma? Desired murders?”
“I don’t remember my birthday,” I say. She blinks at me, questioning if I’m serious. There are holes in my memory, and the parts that I do remember are enough to eat a person alive. But once I started killing them, it gave me peace. Hit and runs. Muggings. Planned ‘accidents.’ Poison in their drinks. Bullets. Knives.
And that’s what I want to give to her:freedom from her past.
“You don’t remember anything?” she asks. “Why?”
My chest tightens. I don’t want to lie to her like I do to everyone else. I want to tell her the truth, or at least part of it.
“I never prioritize it. There’s no point.” And in some ways, it’s the truth. No one cared about my birthday when I was younger, and there’s no reason for me to care now. “It’s a date.”
The silence stretches between us, but Remedy quickly changes that. “Let’s pick a date then,” she says, straightening her shoulders. “We can celebrate our honorary birthdays. Or our unbirthdays. Whatever you want to call it. Screw those past years. This unbirthday will beoursto celebrate.”
I press my lips together to feign amusement. She wants to make everything seem okay. Like our trauma is nothing compared to who we are now.
I also know that she needs this birthday celebration more than I do, and that makes me want to give it to her. But I want to do something even more for her like she’s trying to do for me. I want to wrap her stepdad’s head in a box and present it to her as a gift.
“All right,” I say, agreeing to the unbirthday. I don’t know what I’m getting myself into, but as long as Remedy is satisfied, I don’t care.
And with that thought, I realize that I don’t want to kill her stepdad because I want to frame her. No—my reason is purely selfish.
I want to kill him because he hurt her.
She squeals in happiness, giving me a side hug, and I pull her into my chest, holding her close, not letting her get away with a half-assed hug. I sniff her hair, sucking in a breath, squeezing every damn part of her closer to me. Then I let her go.
“Okay. I’m going to go prepare for our party,” she says. “Have a good night.”
“Get home quick,” I say. “There’s a killer out there.”
She smiles at me like she’s not afraid. Though she doesn’t know that I’m the Key West Killer, she knows that I’ll do anything to protect her.
Once she’s gone, I do a quick search and learn that her stepdad is living in Tampa.
I could kill him. But that seems off.
No. I want to give him to her. Like a sacrificial offering before an angry goddess.
She has to kill him herself.
CHAPTER 13
Remedy
The wooden stairs creak as I take each step. It thuds in my chest like a hammer, and my lips tingle with nerves. I hold Jenna’s hand. Her hair is freshly bleached, her red lipstick bright as maraschino cherries, and it makes me think of war paint. I cross my fingers, hoping that this tells me what I’m supposed to do. If this destroys Jenna, then Ihaveto get revenge for her. And I’m not sure that I want to do that anymore.
I unlock the front door and step inside, guiding the way, even though Jenna knows this place better than I do. She motions at the open windows.
