Come find me before you do.
It was a trick. A carefully veiled trick.
He knew I would struggle to willingly seek him out after all that’d happened. He also knew that I was more confused than ever before.
And that was how I spent the next day holed up in my room, showered, changed, fed, and somewhat rested.
Lou had joined me whenever she could but was called away every few hours to help Murry, practice piano with her dad, or do regular things like take a bath, eat lunch, and get ready for bed.
Such normal things in such bizarre company.
It was as though Thomas didn’t want her presence overwhelming me too much but couldn’t exactly stop her from seeing me. I was glad for it. To see her and to have time alone. Even if both only further complicated everything I was feeling.
Lou brought puzzles, coloring books, and even Clinkers to my room.
But by eight thirty, any proof that she was still this side up of dreamland vanished, the house turning eerily quiet as nightfall descended.
He came to me then.
Clad in his suit and with his hair swept back in its usual perfection without a strand out of place, he strolled in, shut the door, and sat on the bed.
Watching from my preferred perch by the window, I tracked his every move as he leaned forward, his hands clasping together between his knees, and his eyes lowered to his slippers. His jacket was undone, gaping open to reveal what looked like a small notebook tucked inside one of the inner pockets.
Was that some fucked-up ledger? I snorted at the thought and returned my attention to the moonlit trees.
“How are you feeling?” he asked.
The silence that’d arrived with his presence was one so violent that the ticking of the old grandfather clock in the hall could be heard through the thick wood of the bedroom door. “Fine.”
“Little Dove,” he started.
“Don’t call me that.”
Silence again. Then a few ticks later, “But that’s what you are.”
My gaze swung to him, sharp and accusing.
He didn’t even flinch, but his eyes lifted, and the honest shine to them almost blinded me as much as his next words. “That’s what you are to me.”
“I don’t want to be,” I said, not knowing if it was exactly true but wanting it to be. Desperately.
He did flinch then. “You’ve tasted my lips, and I yours. You can lie with your words, but what will it cost your heart?”
“My heart has nothing to do with this fucked-up bullshit,” I seethed.
His lip curled. “But doesn’t it? How else have you ended up precisely here?”
He was right, and I wasn’t in the mood to argue.
After untold minutes had passed, I dragged my finger over the cool glass of the window and asked something that’d been eating at me. “How did you end up like this?”
When he didn’t answer, I glanced over at him, trying again. “How can you do the things that you do and not feel ashamed for it?”
“Shame is personal, Little Dove. I feel shame just like any other person would, depending on what I’ve done. But I won’t lie to you. I don’t lose any sleep over what I do. It’s just”—his hands spread—“what I do.”
“You must like it then,” I stated.
He scrubbed his chin. “Yes, I do. I’m good at it, and it’s good money.”
Sickened, I shook my head.
When he eventually spoke, his words were soft, decadent, and matter of fact. “There is art in blood, Little Dove. And I’m somewhat of a connoisseur. If I look closely, I can find it in every fine detail of ending one’s life.” He exhaled roughly. “I’m not expecting you to understand. I’m merely trying to explain myself, and …” He paused. “I’m doing a terrible job of it.”
“I’ll say,” I muttered.
“That’s probably because there is no defending it. I’d like to say that I’ve only killed and harmed those who deserve it, but I’m no judge or jury.”
“Merely the executioner,” I said.
He agreed. “Right. Most of my victims, if you’d like to call them that, wind up being that for a reason, though. It’s not simply for sport.”
“What happened to you?” I whispered, hating that I sounded concerned for him. “What made you decide that you’d just wake up one day and kill someone?”
“I don’t always kill them.”
I scoffed. “Because letting them live like Murry is much better?”
He sucked his teeth for a moment, and I wanted to slap myself for admiring the way his cheekbones erupted even more with the action. “Murry has his own story to tell. When or if he’s ready, I’m sure he’ll tell you.”
Intrigue mixed with disgust, and at that point, I didn’t know if I was more disgusted with him or myself. For a variety of different reasons, on my part.
“If you won’t tell me how, then at least tell me when you became this person.”
Thomas sighed. “After my parents died.”
I slumped back against the wall and waited for more, but it didn’t come. Then what Milo had said came forward again. “You were digging for information on me and my family. Why?”
He watched me for a pulsating moment, his expression blank. “Did you ever find out what happened the night your mother died?”
My eyes narrowed, heart tightening. “Why are you asking me that?”
“Humor me.”
With a sigh, I lifted my feet to the window seat and stretched the fabric of my nightgown over my bent knees. “My dad said it was an accident, so I never pressed for more details.”
A lone finger rubbed at his brow. “It looked like an accident, yes.”
My hands met, and my arms clenched tight around my legs. “What?”
“I know of your love for stories, Dove. Allow me to tell you one before I leave.”
It wasn’t exactly stated like a question, but still, I nodded even as apprehension coiled around my muscles.
“A couple driving home hit your mother’s car.”
“I know that much.”
“A married couple.” Thomas stood and paced the length of the rug. “They’d been arguing, you see. The husband had been having an affair for well over a year. Nobody knew, except for the misbehaving pair, until one day, a little boy saw them in the woods behind his house, and he was so spooked, his mother almost had to beat what he’d seen out of him.”
“Thomas,” I cut in, my throat drying.
He lifted a finger and continued pacing. “The boy was young, and he didn’t know there would be consequences for telling the truth. But he wouldn’t realize until years later that the events that’d transpired after the affair came to light were not his fault.”
My chest caved, the oxygen in the room becoming too thin.
“The boy’s mother was enraged. Threatened to leave his father if he didn’t end it. So he did. For a time, anyway. A few months later, she discovered them herself, and that was the final straw. By that stage, the boy’s father had decided he wanted out. He wanted this other woman even if it meant he lost half his fortune to his wife. The wife, once she realized she couldn’t win, did everything she could to keep him, but it was in vain.”
Thomas slowed his strides, his tone becoming less factual, more nostalgic. “The father took the wife out for dinner one night, and the boy will never forget how happy his mother looked. Radiant in her shimmering blue dress and red painted lips. Her eyes aglow with hope.”
I didn’t think I could hear anymore. “Stop, please.”
“Almost done.” Thomas went on, “Little did she know, the dinner was a means to get her to sign the divorce papers. He tricked her into signing them, knowing she wouldn’t, by folding and slipping the last page of the papers with the check for dinner.” Thomas laughed, hollow and dry. I didn’t like it. I liked his rust-stained, melodic laugh. His real laugh. “The boy’s father was a fool, gloating over what he’d done to his distraught soon-to-be ex-wife on the drive home. So distraught was she, that when she saw his mistress’s car parked near the entrance to our property, waiting in the dark with the headlights off for my father to produce the good news, she grabbed the wheel at the last second, and ended them all.”
Thomas stopped, his eyes flat and lacking any warmth as he said, “My parents killed your mother, and your mother killed my parents.”