Twisted

by Hannah Jayne

  “You went to KDH? Why didn’t I know that?”

  Denise shrugged and continued rifling through the box. “This thing has been in the garage for ages. I thought maybe you’d want some of this stuff for the big game.”

  “Big game?”

  “Big game.” Denise dropped two strands of red and black beads over Bex’s head. “Tonight. Last game of the season. Football?”

  Bex slapped a palm to her forehead. “I can’t believe I forgot.”

  “I noticed you’ve been kind of distracted lately. Everything okay?”

  Bex nodded sharply, her lips pressed together in a tight, bloodless smile. “What else is in here?”

  “Just some old school stuff of mine and Michael’s. I thought the KDH stuff might be cool for you to have.”

  “Yeah, thanks. So, did you and Michael meet in high school then?”

  Denise shook her head. “No, we didn’t meet until after college. It took a while, but I was eventually able to lure Michael out of the city and out”—she spread her arms wide—“to the beach.”

  “Oh. What city was that?”

  “Raleigh. Seems like a lifetime ago, but it was only about nine years ago that we moved.”

  Bex’s face must have blanched because Denise’s eyes darkened and she put a hand on Bex’s arm. “Hon, are you okay? You went kind of pale.”

  Bex thought about Michael and Denise in Raleigh, living and breathing and being in the same town where she had lived, where she was Beth Anne Reimer, daughter of the “most prolific serial killer” in North Carolina’s history. They must have seen the papers, probably followed the story on the news. Everyone else did.

  They may have even read her name or seen her, Beth Anne Reimer, in that stiff velvet dress, the kid who turned her own father in, the kid who was raised by—and therefore shared the same tainted blood as—a serial killer. Bex’s heart did a double thump when she thought that Michael and Denise could have recognized her from then to now. Something about them living in Raleigh and living with her now tugged at her, ratcheting up the slight tremor of anxiety that never seemed to fully go away.

  Bex tried to force a smile, to put some nonchalance into her voice, but it came out high and slightly cracked.

  “Nothing. I was just thinking about the game.” She took the pom-poms. “These will be great. I’ll just have to find something school colored to go with them.”

  Denise checked her watch. “Well, you’ve got about nine hours until kickoff. Plenty of time to pillage the closet or”—she rifled through her wallet and handed Bex some bills—“the mall. Call the girls. Get out.”

  The girls.

  That same newsreel spun again in Bex’s head. The girls. The victims. Unseeing eyes; hollowed, dirty cheeks; cracked, once-pink lips now an ugly headstone gray.

  “Going to the mall is still a thing, right? Bex?”

  Bex snapped back to attention. “The mall? Yeah, totally. I’ll do that. I’ll call Laney and Chels.”

  Denise stared at Bex, who remained seated. Then she added, “I’ll call ’em now.”

  Bex took the stairs two at a time, her anxiety not lessening even in the relative calm of her bedroom. She yanked out her cell phone and zipped right past Chelsea’s and Laney’s numbers, stopping at the entry for Detective Lieutenant Schuster. Her thumb hovered over the call button, the animated telephone-receiver icon bouncing up and down. What would she say to him? Everyone knew that the Wife Collector was out there, escaped.

  Bex thought of the request flashing on her computer screen: GAMECREATOR has requested a private chat…

  She hesitantly pushed the button, counting the rings until Schuster’s voice crackled over the line.

  “You’ve reached Detective Lieutenant Schuster. I’m currently leading a training session and will have limited access to email and messages. If this is an emergency, please hang up and dial 911. If this is a pressing matter, please call my assistant, Sheila, at…”

  Bex held the phone to her ear, wondering if she should take down Sheila’s number or dial 911. Connecting with someone who might be masquerading as her father wasn’t an emergency. Was it even pressing?

  She hung up before the message tone signaled.

  • • •

  The ride out to the mall in Nag’s Head was quick, and with Laney driving and Chelsea cranking up the stereo, Bex was able to let go and sink into the Outer Banks sun streaming through the open car windows—almost. Each time traffic slowed and they pulled alongside another car, she found her eyes cutting to the driver. The rest of the time, she was eyeing the passengers in the cars around her, wondering if maybe he was in one of them, having stolen his way out of Raleigh, and was now doing his best to blend into the last remnants of beachgoers and tourists in the beach town. It wouldn’t be hard, Bex reasoned, as she eyed a box-shaped SUV with tinted windows, the driver wearing dark sunglasses and a low-pulled East Carolina hat.

  “Are you going to get a dress, Bex? You should get a dress. Something with sequins or something.”

  Bex’s eyebrows rose. “We’re still talking about what we’re wearing to the game tonight, right?”

  Chelsea sighed. “Yeah…but Trevor loves you. He’s so into you! And that’s so romantic.” She growled at her phone. “I need my new boyfriend to be romantic!”

  “You have a new boyfriend?” Bex asked.

  “She wishes,” Laney said. “She got some dude’s number at the coffee place and is all whipped.”

  “I’m not whipped. If he would text me, then I could be whipped. Anyway, dress. No chick looks sexy in a football jersey.”

  “I’m pretty sure Bex wasn’t planning on wearing an actual football uniform to the game.” Laney caught Bex’s eyes in the rearview mirror, then rolled hers. “And because Trevor loves her, that’s all the more reason she should totally be herself and dress like herself. If she showed up in an evening gown, Chels, Trevor wouldn’t even know who she was!”

  Chelsea and Laney laughed and Bex wanted to. But all she could think about was the fact that Trevor wasn’t really into her at all. He was into Bex Andrews, and with each thought of the Wife Collector fan forum, with each memory of her father, with each callback from Detective Schuster, it was becoming more and more obvious that she was and would always be Beth Anne Reimer. There was no Bex Andrews.

  The mall was packed, but Laney seemed to find the last spot in the parking garage. They got coffees and people watched, then Chelsea yanked Bex by the arm to a store displaying a series of funky shirts that just happened to be in the Kill Devil Hills High colors.

  “These are amazing, right? You’ll look incredible but also not like you’re trying too hard.”

  Laney rolled her eyes.

  “Try this one. And this one.”

  Bex did as she was told, throwing an impromptu fashion show, feeling better and lighter as Chelsea tried on a half dozen dresses that made her look like a Las Vegas lounge singer and Laney clomped around in a pair of hot-pink, sky-high stilettos.

  “I never really thought I was a stiletto person, but I’m kind of digging these,” she said, crossing the store with an awkward walk. “Seriously.”

  “They cost more than your house. So you’re getting that, right, Bex?” Chelsea wanted to know.

  “Yes.” Bex rifled through her purse. “Crap. My wallet. It probably fell out in the car.”

  “No worries,” Chelsea said, picking a credit card from her wallet. “You can pay me back.”

  Bex bit her lip. “Thanks, but I feel weird without my wallet. I’m just going to run back to the car. I’m sure it’s there. Five minutes.”

  Laney tossed Bex her keys and Bex zipped out of the shop, making a beeline for their third-floor parking space. The air was hot and still, the parking garage eerily silent after the dramatic din of mall voices and canned music.

  A man stepped o
ut of a car just across the aisle from Bex and locked eyes with her. Her hackles went up, tension shooting up her spine like a live wire. The man slammed his car door and locked it, then slipped into the mall without looking back.

  Bex pinched the bridge of her nose. “I have to stop freaking out.”

  A couple rolled down the aisle in a dark sedan, slowing as they got close to Bex. Her heart started to thud, and she could feel the lactic acid slipping through her muscles, tight and taut, waiting for flight.

  The car stopped, the passenger-side window rolling down. Bex’s heart thudded in her ears.

  “’Scuse me. You leaving?”

  Bex stared at the keys in her hand, then back at the woman whose lips were pursed impatiently, one brow cocked.

  “Well?”

  “Uh, no, sorry. Not leaving.”

  The couple sped away with an irritated squeak of their wheels. Bex slumped against Laney’s car, her palm pressed against her jackhammering heart.

  “I’m going to die,” she mumbled to herself. “Whether or not my dad comes around, I’m going to give myself a heart attack and die.”

  “What about your dad and your heart attack?”

  Chelsea was standing behind Bex, hands on hips, shopping bag slung around one thin wrist. “And why are you talking to yourself?”

  If it were physically possible for Bex to jump out of her skin, she would have. “You scared the crap out of me.”

  “You were taking forever so we got you this.” Laney held out a bag to Bex, the T-shirt she had decided on wrapped in tissue paper inside. She rolled up onto her toes and waved, calling, “See ya, Mr. Pierson!” Then, to Bex, “Were you not supposed to go out or something?”

  Bex looked dumbfounded, staring in the direction Laney was waving. “Did you see Michael?”

  Laney frowned. “Didn’t you? You were talking about your dad giving you a heart attack, and he was right there.” She pointed. “He was looking right at you.”

  Again Bex looked. There was a vacated parking space and a pair of taillights disappearing down the garage driveway.

  When Bex let herself into the house after Laney dropped her off, Denise and Michael were sitting on the couch watching television.

  “Did you get something good?” Denise asked.

  Michael turned and smiled, ready to inspect Bex’s shopping spoils.

  Bex held up the shirt Laney and Chelsea bought for her, a feeling of unease overwhelming her. “I’m sorry if I just stared at you in the parking lot, Michael. I…guess I didn’t recognize you.”

  Denise’s eyebrows rose when Michael turned to Bex. “Which parking lot?”

  “At the mall just now. Laney saw you.”

  Michael and Denise shared a look, and Michael’s eyebrows knitted together. “Wasn’t me.”

  “We’ve been here all afternoon.”

  Michael gestured toward the TV. “Denise has me fully enthralled with this home decorating network. Apparently, I’m supposed to be taking notes on something called ‘tinning.’” He stood up and patted Bex’s shoulder conspiratorially. “Maybe it was my super-lucky doppelgänger that you saw. Enjoying his non-house-remodeling freedom.”

  Denise hopped up after him. “It’s adding an antique tin ceiling and you’ll love it!”

  Bex blinked, watching them go. Were Michael and Denise lying, or was Laney just mistaken?

  “My God,” she mumbled, pressing her palms against her temples and making little circles. “I’ve got to stop freaking out over every little thing.”

  Of course Laney was mistaken. She and Chelsea had only met Michael once.

  Bex glanced down at the bag in her hand, at the coffee table where Denise’s red and black pom-poms were discarded. She wanted nothing more than to skip the game and crawl into her bed and pull the covers up over her head. “If I could wake up sometime around senior year of college, that’d be excellent.”

  Sighing, Bex climbed the stairs to her room, glancing at her laptop tucked silently under her bed. She thrummed her fingernails over the closed lid, curiosity pulling at her.

  GAMECREATOR is probably some crazed fanboy, she reasoned. He’s not my dad. He’s not. And the memory? Just happened to fit. All little kids played games. All dads said stupid things like, “I invented the game.” It was nothing.

  She glanced again at her cell phone. Not a single missed message or call from Detective Schuster.

  But still that little voice inside Bex’s head said, What if?

  She sat down at her desk, opened her laptop, and touched the trackpad, and the screen flicked to life.

  She navigated her way to the fan site, no longer shuddering when the page pulled up, no longer flinching at the macabre pictures. Her Forum inbox was bulging with a series of post replies and private message requests, but not one from GAMECREATOR.

  Bex slammed her laptop shut, not sure whether to be disappointed or relieved.

  Twenty-Nine

  The closer Trevor and Bex got to campus, the more thoughts of Detective Schuster, her father, and anything Wife Collector related faded away. With each stoplight, the energy of Kill Devil Hills High seemed to pulse and throb more.

  “Oh my gosh,” she said as they reached the school. “Is the whole school here?”

  “Try the whole town,” Trevor said as he smoothly coasted the car into the lot. “There’s not a lot to do around here if you haven’t noticed. Ooh, spot.”

  Trevor continued to chatter, but Bex was focused on the crowd streaming by the car. They made a fairly solid red-and-black mob, girls with Red Devil pitchforks on their cheeks and ribbons in their hair, guys with football jerseys and faces painted red and black.

  “I can’t believe that everyone gets so into it.”

  He gestured toward her shirt. “Looks like you got a little school spirit too.”

  Bex could feel her cheeks redden. “I had to go out and buy it today.”

  “Good choice. Anyway”—Trevor shrugged—“football is life.”

  “So, why don’t you play?”

  “Ugh…football is also guys who are a lot bigger and faster than I am. Besides, the high school team was basically formed before I got here.”

  Bex felt her eyebrows go up. “Got where?”

  “KDH.”

  “I kind of thought you were born here like everyone else.”

  Trevor pushed the car into Park. “Thanks…I think. We actually moved here just after eighth grade. From Chicago.”

  “Is that where you were born?”

  He nodded. “Uh-huh. So I kind of know what you must feel like being the new kid.”

  Bex clicked off her seat belt and glanced out the window to where the students seemed to be moving together in one hulking mass. If you only knew…

  “Yeah,” she said.

  • • •

  Kill Devil Hills High was ahead by a single field goal, which meant that the stands were thundering. Laney, Chelsea, and the other cheerleaders were stomp-clamping and screaming themselves hoarse, jumping and cheering and urging the Red Devils to Go-Fight-Win. Corolla’s Fighting Mustangs were doing the same—cheerleaders chanting, crowd roaring, team huddling together. It was only a fluke that Bex happened to glance down at her purse and see the blinking light from her ringing cell phone. Caught up in the moment, she grabbed the thing from her purse, slid the answering bar, and said, “Hello?”

  She could barely make out the caller’s words. “Hello?” she said again. There was a sound like crinkling paper on the other end, like the caller was hanging his head out the window while he drove on the freeway. If the caller did try to speak, Bex couldn’t hear on her end. The Red Devils were gaining yardage, and the bleachers pulsed with whoops and cheers.

  She hung up the phone, then glanced at the readout. The number was from the same Raleigh area code—Detective Schuster.
/>   “Everything okay?” Trevor asked when the crowd roar died down.

  “I’m good,” she said, shrugging. She didn’t realize that a thin sheen of sweat was covering her upper lip and brow until a breeze swept over them. Again, Bex glanced at her phone, this time seeing that she had two missed calls from the detective and had three messages. She chewed the inside of her lip and tried to focus on the game. Each play seemed to morph into a swirl of red and black and screaming and stomping, but all she could think about was what the detective might be trying to tell her.

  Maybe they had found her father.

  Maybe he was headed to prison and the whole mess was over.

  “Actually, I’d better get this message.” She paused for a beat. “It’s my mom.”

  “You could probably get better service down there.” Trevor pointed to the bottom of the bleachers. “Might be a little quieter back there too. Do you want me to come with? I won’t listen or anything.”

  Bex liked the way his cheeks flushed a sweet pink and he barely made eye contact with her, suggesting that he wouldn’t eavesdrop.

  “I can manage,” she said, giving him a quick peck on the cheek and pointing to the field. “You just make sure we win this one.”

  Bex took the steps two at a time, the anxiety about Detective Schuster’s message drowned out by the kids she passed who grinned at her and said hello, who called her by name and punched at the air screaming, “Go, Devils!” Bex Andrews was part of something so normal and so real and so far removed from Raleigh and Beth Anne Reimer and the Wife Collector that nothing could reach her, nothing from that old life was big enough or real enough to change who she wanted to be.

  When she set foot on the ground, she hit the voice mail button, thumbed in her password, and listened while the automated lady told her about her saved messages, that she had three new messages, and when the first was sent. Bex leaned up against one of the huge pillars that held up the top row of the bleachers and mashed a finger into her free ear, trying to hear the voice on the message. The crowd swelled and screamed right when the caller began speaking, so Bex ducked her head under the bleachers, trying to get some quiet.