by Gwen Rivers
I offered a tight-lipped smile and no comment. Mercifully, she’d dropped the subject. How like Sarah to believe that every being who encountered her would want her. Sometimes late at night I wonder if I’m so arrogant. After all, I always assume any game I sight will pursue me. And so far, they always have. I have a perfect record when it comes to perverts. Batting 1000 for a decade and counting.
“You want to dance?” A tall, lanky guy wearing a host of glow in the dark bracelets swings his hips in what normals might consider an alluring rhythm.
I study him for a moment. Eager yes, but not one of mine. Even if he had been I won’t hunt in the same spot twice. I move about to lessen the risk of exposure. With what passes for a regretful smile, I decline his offer. He shrugs as though I’m the one missing out and then wanders off in search of greener pastures.
The strobe light flickers annoyingly. I shut my eyes, tired of the whole scene. Partying bores me and I’m always fatigued after a takedown. Addy explained why to me once. The chemical process that goes along with the hunt. Anticipation combines with a spike of adrenaline to see me through the danger. When it’s over, the spike crashes and depletes my reserves. I want to get in Sarah’s rattletrap Camry and head back up to the farm, see how Chloe and Addy are getting on with Paul’s remains and then stumble to my room and pass out cold.
But judging from her bump and grind, Sarah doesn’t look at all ready to leave. One of the meatheads has left, but the other seems determined. I could hound her, feign sick, perhaps. I know she’ll take me home if I ask. For all her many faults she is a decent friend. My only friend. I like it better that way.
I decide to give her a few more minutes to enjoy herself though. Sarah’s home life is rough, and she lives for the nights when we escape. Though I desperately want to take her drunken lout of a stepfather out of the picture, Addy has forbidden it.
She’d been wearing her bifocals, studying one of her medical texts when I’d brought the subject up. She’d peered over the top of them at me all school-marmy and stern. “It’s too close to home, Nic. Don’t shit where you live.”
“He’s one of mine,” I’d whined like a child denied a treat. The aunts had never said no to me before. “I’ll take extra precautions. Lure him to a city.”
It was Chloe, fun-loving, live-in-the-moment Chloe, who’d tipped the balance against me. “There are too many angles, sweets. If you give him the Goodnight Kiss too far from where we can properly dispose of him, he’ll be on record. You know the FBI has a task force looking at your victims already.”
It was true, though they had nothing concrete other than a stream of missing persons and unexplained deaths. On the rare occasions the aunts and I leave the body behind, the toxin in my kiss doesn’t appear on an autopsy. Still, you can only gank so many convicted sex offenders before the red flags go up.
Sarah endures as best she can while I continue to seethe in impotence. With any luck, her stepfather’s liver will implode before the thin thread of my patience snaps.
Self-denial isn’t my designer handbag of choice.
The noise and the crush of bodies are getting to me. Decided, I wind through the writhing bodies until I can lay hands on Sarah’s bare shoulder and shout into her ear. “Going to wait in the car.”
She rolls her eyes but forks over the keys. “Take it. Cliff’s giving me a ride.”
Cliff, who I assume is the knuckle-dragger groping her ass, smirks at me. “There’s always room for one more.”
I taste bile even as I force my lips to tilt upwards. “I don’t share.” Except with Death herself.
The night air caresses my skin like a lover, lifting my hair off the base of my neck in a playful tease. I drink in the breeze and it restores me, as fresh air always seems to do. I could never exist in a city, where the wind is blocked by tall buildings and thick with the scent of humanity. Car keys in hand, I stride briskly toward Sarah’s POS. It’s a standard, but I’ve driven it before. Our farm is only twenty miles from the factory but still a world apart.
The engine catches and I roll down the driver’s side window, glad for the breath of fresh mountain air that joins me for the ride. The dashboard clock reads 12:01. The spring equinox. No wonder I’m tired. Since I’m a nocturnal predator, longer nights mean more time to hunt. At least I live in North Carolina, not Norway or somewhere where the summer nights are practically nonexistent. If I ever visit the land of the midnight sun, I’ll be sure to do so in winter. The cold doesn’t bother me the way daylight does.
I turn off the factory road and onto the main highway that’s more a series of switchbacks giving way to the higher elevation of the Blue Ridge Parkway. The high country is quiet this time of year. Too late for skiers, too early for hikers and after full dark, I have the road to myself.
I’ve just turned off onto the gravel drive that leads to our farm when the small hairs lift on my arms. The reaction has nothing to do with the plummeting temperature. Someone is watching me.
Not following. I don’t have that same urge to escape as I had earlier with Paul. No headlights in the rearview either, not since I turned toward our land. My instincts, carefully honed over the years, give me no clue where to look for the source of my discomfort. It’s a physiological response. A tightness in my stomach, an increase in heart rate. There is a predator out there. One who has me in its sights.
My foot taps the brakes lightly, halting all vehicular forward motion. The Camry’s headlights form two clear trails through the darkness. I scan the shadowy shapes of the evergreens on either side of the road, trying to pick out whatever it is that doesn’t belong. Naked branches stir in the wind and some of the heavier boughs creak with age, but otherwise nothing.
I sit longer than any normal would sit. My instincts have never steered me wrong when it comes to prey or predators. Of course, I’m tired. It’s the first day of spring. And I did just hunt. Even a well-disciplined mind can play tricks if the reserves are too low.
I prepare to lift my foot and creep ahead when he appears in my headlights. A massive black shape on all fours. I suck in a breath, stunned by the sheer size of the wolf. We have bears and mountain lions in this area, but wolves are rare and never so large.
He turns and looks right at me. Something electric shoots down my spine. His eyes are the color of new spring leaves and he stares, not half as nonplussed at spying me as I am at seeing him.
My heart stops as our gazes lock. He seems to take me in and not just my appearance. Me, he sees me, Nic. All my misdeeds, every secret I keep as though I’ve been laid out for him like a sumptuous feast.
Not a wolf! My instincts scream.
But before I can question them, he turns and vanishes into the trees.
Chapter 2
Serial Vegetarian
Mornings come early on a farm. Even earlier when a pissed off Fate slams your door open sans knock.
“Where is it?” Addy storms into my room, gold eyes ablaze.
I sit up and the blankets fall past my waist. “What?”
“Don’t play games with me, Nic.” Her braid lashes around like a whip as her head snaps from side to side. She heads to my dresser and starts opening drawers, rifling through socks and underwear, yoga pants and tanks. “It won’t end well.”
“I’m not playing games. I need to know what you’re looking for.” It’s a lie, one of my habits coming back to bite me. I know exactly what she’s so determined to find.
“The license,” Addy snarls. “Did you think I wouldn’t check the wallet?”
“Calm down, sis.” Chloe drifts in and perches on the foot of my bed. Her scent de jour is vanilla. “It’s not that big a deal.”
It’s the wrong thing to say. Addy rounds on Chloe, hands on hips, eyes ablaze. “Don’t even start. She can’t keep trophies. You know that. I know that. She knows it. Trophies means she’s a serial killer.”
Chloe winces and raises her hand in mock abashment. “Hate to point out the obvious, but she kind of already is
a serial killer, trophies or no. I have the crud under my nails to prove it.”
“It’s a mindset.” Addy retorts as if she hasn’t been stating the same thing every single day since they brought me home. Sure enough, her work-roughened hand starts ticking off all the reasons she doesn’t consider me a serial killer. “She’s not a Caucasian male. She’s not in her prime. She isn’t compelled to kill. And she doesn’t keep trophies as evidence for the fucking FBI to use against her!”
Chloe opens her mouth, some pithy retort at the ready, but closes it again at the sound of a heavy vehicle on the gravel drive.
“Are we expecting someone?” Chloe rises and moves to the window, pulling back the curtain to peer out.
I get out of bed and stand on my toes, so I can see, too. A big black truck skids to a stop in front of the farmhouse. “It’s Sarah. I took her car last night. That’s probably her date dropping her off.”
Addy’s nostrils flare but all she says is, “Get rid of it,” before storming out of the room.
“What crawled up her ass and died?” Chloe rolls her eyes.
Her nonchalance doesn’t fool me. My aunts have adapted a good cop, bad cop stance. Addy is the heavy hitter, the one who keeps her temper on a short leash, while Chloe is the gal pal, the confidant. The closer.
“She’s wrong,” I watch Sarah do the walk of shame from the truck to our front porch. Her hair is a wreck, her sparkly top is inside out beneath her ragged denim jacket and even though there’s frost on the ground, her strappy heeled shoes are in her hand. She waves jauntily at the driver and then sashays out of view.
I let the curtain drop. “I don’t know why she’s in denial. I am a serial killer. I kill people I don’t even know. What else could I be?” There is no self-pity or remorse in my words. I don’t feel either, only frustration. I was born to kill, and I don’t understand why.
Chloe puts her hand on my arm. “You have a purpose. Not knowing isn’t the same as not possessing.”
Of all the infuriating things she’d ever said to me, this might be the worst. “Do you know?”
She stills. “Don’t, Nic. You know I can’t say.”
She’s right, it isn’t an appropriate time to press for answers. Not with Sarah in the house and Addy on the warpath. But what’s the point of being adopted by the Fates if they can’t at least drop a hint about my destiny? “I’m some sort of weapon, aren’t I? A mystical assassin?”
Chloe’s eyes land on my overflowing bookshelf. I am an avid reader, devouring history, mythology, religion, and fairytales by the gross. The stories come from somewhere and I’ve gleaned bits of truths in each one, reflections of the real world buried in someone’s make-believe.
The aunts know about my research, but they’re deliberately obscure when I question them. Some things are obvious, like that they don’t age. Not a wrinkle or a gray hair has appeared in the decade I’ve been with them. Other times I’ve eavesdropped, hoping to hear something they’ll never discuss openly with me. At one point, before they took me on, there was a third sister. Her name hasn’t come up and there’s no indication if she died or just moved on. The holes in my information gnaw at me.
I probably shouldn’t complain. How many parents would literally hide bodies for their children?
Chloe won’t—or can’t—give me a direct answer. Instead, she brushes some of my hair back over one shoulder. “Right now, the only thing you need to be is a teenage girl. One who’ll be late for school if she doesn’t get moving. Come on, breakfast is hitting the table in five.”
Chloe shuts the door behind her. I listen as her footsteps fade down the hall, the murmur of voices, the sound of laughter. My aunts go out of their way to make Sarah feel at home. They aren’t exactly social butterflies. Neither am I. It’s hard to be the life of the party when you have the potential to kill someone by accident.
The Goodnight Kiss doesn’t require lips on lips. That is, it doesn’t have to be a conventionally accepted sort of kiss to do the deed. Through trial and error—some of it dicey—I’ve discovered that any contact my mouth has with a normal’s bare skin will do the trick. The rest of my parts aren’t toxic. I haven’t killed anyone with a handshake or a sneeze to date. Sarah has even given me hugs with no ill effects. The first time she embraced me I knew the true meaning of terror. Not only did I worry that I’d “Nic her” by accident, but that I’d do so in front of half the school. There would be no coming back from that sort of scene. In the era when social media reigns supreme and everyone has a camera phone, denial isn’t an option.
Dread coils in my gut at the thought of exposure. No wind lifting my hair, or fresh scents to mark the changing seasons. Locked away in a cage. Or worse, studied, vivisected so some mad scientist could figure out where my ability originates. The fear isn’t enough to make me stop, though. The world is better off without the likes of Paul Anderson.
I dress in jeans and a flannel shirt over a tank top and hiking boots, standard high country all-season gear. In the winter add a parka and gloves. In the summer swap the jeans for cut-offs and the flannel goes around my waist instead of over my shoulders. But otherwise, my clothes are simple, comfortable and nondescript because I don’t care how I look. Apart from the bait clothes but those aren’t for school. I sported a capsule wardrobe long before anybody on Pinterest.
Once my hair is brushed and my boots are laced I pause and crack open the door. Chloe and Sarah are chatting away in the kitchen. Sarah at the table, her back to me, the wild red and black streaks illuminated by the sun streaming through the skylights. I don’t hear Addy but she’s most likely with them. She doesn’t trust Chloe not to slip and say something she shouldn’t in front of normals.
I shut the door again and stride over to my bookshelf and separate Modern Paganism from The Iliad. The book between the two tomes is a chintzy pink fluffy nightmare thing with a heart-shaped lock and a key the size of my pinky nail. A gift from Chloe the year I turned twelve, to write down all my tender wittle feels. I’d shaken my head, sure I’d never use it.
I’d been wrong. The diary is my most prized possession. I leave it hidden in plain sight, always in the same exact spot so the aunts won’t know. Even in their wildest imaginings, they wouldn’t guess that the cheesy faux fur covered diary has been repurposed.
Unable to resist, I flip to the latest entry, the one with Paul Anderson’s driver’s license taped to the page, and smile.
“And then he asked me to forgive his sorry lying ass,” Sarah says. “Can you believe that shit?”
“Forgiveness is for quitters,” I say the words at the same time as Chloe. She turns from the stove, a grin in place and casts me a wink.
“Morning, sunshine.” Sarah sets down her glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice and smacks the table dramatically. “Gimme my keys afore I cut a bitch.”
I roll my eyes at her. “You’ve been streaming too much Orange is the New Black.”
She forks pancakes onto her plate. “Ain’t shit else to do on the weekends. Besides, it’s a good show. You should watch.”
“Our internet speed isn’t fast enough for streaming here.” Chloe sets down a plate of bacon on the table. Bacon only Sarah will touch. The rest of us are vegetarians, something Sarah doesn’t know. Another part of our look as normal as possible cover. In some areas of the country, eating vegetarian wouldn’t be out of the norm, but on a Western North Carolina farm, it would raise a few eyebrows.
Ignoring the pancakes, I help myself to a bowl of steel-cut oats and chia pudding.
Sarah makes a face at my breakfast. “How can you eat that? It looks like fish eyeballs.”
I shrug. It’s the fuel my body performs best with, like a tank full of high test. But I murmur one word that’s like a free pass. “Diet.” It is the easiest explanation, one any teenage girl would swallow.
“You don’t need to diet. Half the rave was eye humping your bod last night.”
“Half the rave was drugged out of their minds.”
&
nbsp; “Do tell.” Chloe sits down, hands wrapped around a mug of coffee. “Nic never mentions the eye humping.”
“She’s the Ice Bitch.” Sarah chomps on a piece of bacon and I curl my lip at the nickname. “Plays it all cool. It drives the guys fuckin’ crazy, pardon my French.”
Addy nods, as though this is what she wants to hear, then rises from the table. “If you’ll excuse me I have an early surgery.”
“We need to get going, too.” Sarah rolls up the remaining bacon in a pancake and then slings her shoulder bag over her arm.
I raise a brow at her been there done that ensemble. “Um, do you want to borrow something to wear?”
She rolls her eyes. “Like I’d fit in any of your munchkin outfits. Nah, I have a change of clothes in the car. Let’s motor already.”
I slurp down what remains of my breakfast, say goodbye to Chloe and Addy and follow Sarah out to her car. She unlocks it, then, stuffing the makeshift sandwich into her gaping mouth, leans over to unlock my door.
“Why did you bother locking it?” she grumps. “It’s not like there’s anyone wandering around on the zillion acres you guys own.”
I climb inside, tossing my backpack on the backseat. “It’s only 140 acres. And Addy’s practice is down at the other entrance. She leaves it open in case of an emergency.” That isn’t why I locked the door though. For some reason, I don’t want to tell her about my eerie encounter with the wolf.
“’ Scuse the shit outta me.” Sarah backs up to the hundred-year-old oak that shades the farmhouse, then, just when I’m sure she is going to hit the tree, cuts the wheel hard to point the car back down the drive.
“So, tell me about that guy who was all over you.” I really don’t care. One big dumb goon is the same as the next. Asking people questions is another one of my pretending to be normal tricks with the added bene it keeps their focus on themselves instead of on me.