Page 25 of Little Deaths

(I heard you like younger men)

Her grip tightened on the wheel and she let out a little exclamation as she hit a speed bump too hard, her eyes instinctively going to the rearview mirror.

That sharp feeling rose in her throat again—dread, as sharp and bitter as lemons. Shifting the wheel to one manicured hand, she selected Opal’s number from the phone menu. She didn’t pick up.Probably screening her calls, Donni thought.

The Walterses lived in a big two-story house in a newer development around the block. More of a classic McMansion style than Marco’s mid-century modern ranch. The garden was so nauseatingly whimsical that it could have been taken from a Thomas Kinkade painting, with bright blots of color leading all the way up to the decorated porch.

She looked at the pumpkins which had annoyed her so much as she stormed out of book club a few nights ago. Some of them were spattered with a red substance that looked a little like blood. It made her uneasy. That was rather morbid for Opal.

Donni had intended to tuck the bag behind the wicker porch swing (covered in seasonal throw pillows, because ofcourse), but the door to Opal’s house was standing slightly ajar. In the silence of the street, she could hear a strange electronic white noise, high and menacing, coming from inside.

“Opal?” Donni leaned towards the crack. “I’ve got your cake platter. Did you know your front door was open?”

No response.

Frowning, she fingered the reassuring shape of her cell phone as she nudged the door open with her shoulder and edged carefully inside the house. It looked exactly the same as it had that evening. Pictures lined the walls of the foyer, most of them of Christophe. It made her realize that there were no such collections of Rafe in hers.

Her teeth clenched briefly when her eyes landed on the patch of wall where Christophe had cornered her outside the bathroom. “Opal?” She tore her eyes away from the walls. “It’s me—Donni!”

She dialed the woman’s number again and heard the bouncy strains of Captain and Tennille’s “Love Will Keep Us Together” coming from somewhere inside the house.

She’s probably in the bath, Donni thought, trying to shut away the voice that whispered,Then why was the front door open?

The muted roaring sound was coming from the television, which had been tuned to static. The flickering white and black bursts caused the light in the otherwise dim living room to undulate spastically, like small encapsulations of lightning, making all the shadows in the room jerk like puppets in a way that felt incredibly unwelcoming.

All the hairs on the back of her nape rose.Get out, that same voice from before whispered.Something is wrong. Leave the cake platter and run.

She set the platter nervously down on the edge of the table and turned to go, not noticing that she’d placed it too close to the edge until it fell down with a thud that made her jump and cry out. That was when she noticed the figure huddled on the sofa.

Despite it being nearly three in the afternoon, Opal was wearing cheap red lingerie that contrasted horribly with her pale white skin. Her lips were parted and there was a strange, almost frosty-blue tone to them, which made the veins around her mouth look gray.Dead veins, thought Donni.She’s dead, I really think she’s fucking dead, oh GOD.

That was when she noticed the needle sitting incongruously on the floor beneath the woman’s spread, claw-like fingers, and the bloody wound matting her gray-brown hair.

???????

After enjoying the relative anonymity of the city, Rafe had forgotten how claustrophobic even a suburb like this could feel. Despite its not-inconsequential population of 45,000, the people in town were creatures of habit and tended to congregate in the same place. When he had gone to the grocery store to stock up on food, he had been stopped by six people who wanted to talk to him about his books or his father.

He saw Elizabeth and Denise Banner, too, shopping for ingredients for their little family-owned café. Michael Banner had been a friend of his father, and the Banners had been regular guests at his family’s house once.Not anymore, he thought wryly, when they both turned away from him, giving him the cut direct.Just another casualty to my father’s devices, I suppose.

He could feel his face hardening, reverting to the sullen scowl of his youth. His agent was constantly bemoaning his lack of interview skills, claiming that he came across as unemotional, but he had been taught at a young age that emotions were a sign of weakness that invited mockery, or the signs of a sickness that needed curing. His books allowed him to express himself in ways he could not do in person, but that didn’t mean he wanted to discuss them. He preferred to keep his life compartmentalized, and away from the eyes of drooling, public scandal.

So of course, his old friend Christophe Walters, chose this exact moment to approach him.

He looked particularly pleased with himself for some reason, which immediately put Rafe on his guard. Christophe had always been the kind of child who would join a fight at the last instant, to get one good, solid kick in while the other kid was on the ground.

I wonder what he wants to kick right now.

“Aw, come on,” Christophe said, when Rafe stared at the wine. “You’re not still mad at me after all these years, are you?”

“That depends,” he murmured. “Are you still a dick?”

Irritation cracked through Christophe’s smirk. “I thought you were on the path of forgiveness. You looked like you’d forgiven Donni at the funeral, and she fucked you over worse than I ever did. Kicking you out at eighteen. Man, that’s cold.”

Rafe tossed a bottle into the basket and moved around Christophe, casually wandering around the produce while pretending he wasn’t looking for anything in particular.

“Does this have a point?”

Christophe followed him.

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