by Zoë Fox
“I’ll think about it.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes, both still feeling awkward.
“Are we okay?” She finally asked.
He nodded. “We never were not okay as far as I was concerned.”
She smiled at him. “Good. Now move over,” she pushed at him playfully before sitting beside him. She leaned against him, putting her head on his shoulder.
“I have missed you,” he said softly.
“Yeah, well, then why didn’t you call me?”
He looked down at her, puzzled. “Call you?”
“You now, on the phone, or texted me. Whatever.”
He shook his head. “No, I do not know.”
“Oh, well, I’ll guess I’ll add that to the list of things I need to show you how to work. You could have come and see me, then. I’m not the best at apologies,” she admitted.
“You said you didn’t wish to see me.”
“And you listened? You’ve got to be the first man in history to do that.”
He loved the warmth of her pressed against him. “I do my best to respect your wishes. I did, however, write you a letter.”
“I didn’t get anything in the mail.”
“I sent it yesterday.”
“Oh,” she said, snuggling closer to him, “then I should get it tomorrow.” She liked the fact that he’d take the first step towards contacting her, even if she hadn’t been aware of it when she knocked on the door.
“I was, understandably, a little confused as to the price of postage.” He wrapped his arm around her. “I wanted to ensure that you would receive it.”
“What did you do?” Lying against him this way, she could feel the rumble of his voice inside his ribcage. There was something comforting about the way it vibrated against her.
“I covered most of the front of the envelope in stamps.”
She suppressed another giggle. “I look forward to seeing, uh, I mean reading it.”
Chapter Forty-Three
“So, you two made up, right?” Sean asked, taking a seat on the couch. Alex sat to his right in the recliner, checking Toad’s math homework. Her brother had sprawled out on the floor in front of the television and seemed to be deeply engrossed in what the news anchor was saying. Every now and then he would reach out and press his hand against the screen. A moment later he would pull it back, mumbling something to himself as he continued to watch. Neither Sean nor Alex had bothered to ask him what he was saying.
“Yeah, but he doesn’t agree with our opinion of Roderick,” she said, placing the paper on the coffee table.
Sean sighed. “Well, maybe we’re wrong. He sure seems creepy enough to be severing heads.”
Alex nodded. “I know, but Luke is certain it’s not him.”
“Not to doubt your boyfriend, or whatever he is, but he could be biased because he was the one who turned him into a vampire. I mean, if he’s wrong and Roderick really is as psycho as he acts, well, wouldn’t that make Lucas kind of responsible for all those women’s deaths?”
“How do you figure that?”
“If he hadn’t ‘brought him over to the dark side’ or whatever they call it, then Roderick would be dead by now.” Sean brushed his shaggy bangs out of his eyes. “If he were dead, well, then he wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone.”
She glared at him. “Yeah, because I’m sure he ran a background check on the guy before agreeing to his apprenticeship,” She retorted.
“Maybe he should have.”
She rolled her eyes. “Don’t you think that would have been harder to do before the inventions of computers?”
“Oh, I didn’t think of that.” He paused. “He still could have at least talked to people Roderick knew before he bit the guy. Maybe his next-door neighbors saw him torturing small animals as a kid. They say all serial killers do something like that when they’re young.”
“Yeah, ever notice it’s the neighbors of a serial killer who’s always the fool on the news talking about how he was ‘the nicest guy’?”
“Okay, I see your point,” he said after a moment’s thought.
Toad sat up straight, suddenly alert. “Uh oh.”
“What is it, Toad?” Alex asked.
The doorbell rang, catching her attention.
“Don’t answer it.” Toad pleaded. He jumped into her lap and hugged her tightly. “Stay right here.”
“What has gotten into you?”
The doorbell rang again.
“They’ll go away. Stay here.” The intensity of his grip increased.
“I have to see who is at the door,” she said, prying his fingers off of her. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
Toad whimpered in response.
Alex glanced over her shoulder to make sure he was okay before leaving the living room. She’d never seen him get so upset over something this simple. Usually the sound of the doorbell incited him to scream out that he wanted to be the one to answer it.
Peering through the peephole, she spotted the familiar sight of a man in a package delivery service uniform carrying a brown, square box. Why had this bothered Toad so much? Her palms were sweating. Placing her hand on the knob, she considered walking back into the other room until he went away. She shook her head. Her little brother might have the ability to know things others didn’t, but he was still just a kid. The whole thing could simply be one of those odd stunts children sometimes pulled.
“Can I help you?” Alex asked once face-to-face with the man.
“Package for Alexa Leisey,” he said, checking the label.
“That would be me,” she reached out her hands to take it. She quickly jotted her signature down and closed the door behind her. Whoever had sent it neglected to put a return address. Instead they had copied hers at the top as well, thereby ensuring that she would receive it no matter what. It wasn’t very heavy and without an obvious sender, the brown box served only to confuse her.
“Hey, look, I got something.” She placed the box on the floor in front of the chair and sat back down.
“Don’t open it!” Toad had returned to his place in front of the TV, but instead of lying on the floor, he had pulled his tiny knees to his chest.
“You’re just mad you didn’t get anything.” She stuck her tongue out playfully.
“Who’s it from?” Sean stretched his neck out, trying to get a better look.
“I don’t know. It doesn’t say.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t open it.” He said softly, looking at Toad out of the corner of his eyes.
“Great, now you’re not being any fun either.” She forced a smile, trying to ignore the twisting feelings in her stomach as she began to pry the tape off. Lifting the first flap, her nose was greeted with an odd and unfamiliar odor.
Toad, still sitting on the floor, covered his eyes.
Pulling back the rest of the cardboard, Alex looked inside the box. Whatever it was, someone had covered it with layers of plastic, blocking it from sight. Her heart beat inside her chest at a fierce pace as she tore into the opaque layering.
“Oh, my God, I think I’m going to be sick,” Alex jumped out of her chair, heading towards the bathroom. Before slamming the door, she had the presence of mind to shout to Toad not to look in it.
“Poor kitty,” Toad whimpered.
“What are you talking about?” Sean crouched down beside the box. At first his mind refused to make sense of what the cardboard contained. It took a second before he could understand what the gray, fury lump was. Where the head should have been, there was only a small, white stub of bone.
Inside the bathroom, Alex splashed water on her face. Someone had taken a small kitten, cut its head off, and mailed it to her. Her first impulse had been to vomit, but she knew she had to go back in there. She had to look to see if there was any way to know who’d sent it to her. Again, her stomach churned. She spat the bile in the sink and grabbed the mouthwash.
“This is wrong on so many levels,” she said as she walke
d back into the room.
“Alex, there’s a note inside there.” Sean had retreated to the safety of the other side of the couch.
“Toad, go to your room.” She didn’t want him to have to see what was inside.
“Poor kitty,” he whispered again. Without uncovering his eyes, he managed to scamper to his feet and hurry out of the room.
Alex took a deep breath through her mouth, not wanting to encounter the stench of the package again. “I’ll be right back,” she told Sean before disappearing into the kitchen. When she returned, she held a long pair of tongs her mother used to flip meat.
“There is no way I’m touching that,” she explained.
“I don’t blame you.”
Fighting down the urge to be nauseous again, she stuck the tongs inside the box and tried to clamp down on the white paper partially sticking out from under the mutilated cat. The body made a sickly sucking sound as it was separated from the sheet of plastic.
Extracting the letter, she held it over the grisly package. Blood had splattered all over it, creating a crimson Rorschach design. Her eyes scanned the typed letters quickly, despite how it shook from her unsteady hand.
“What does it say?” Sean asked, too afraid to look for himself.
Alex cleared her throat. “It says, ‘A woman’s beauty is best silenced. For you. Something to look forward to’.” She dropped the letter and tongs back into the box. “I’m going to call my uncle. Can you get Toad and bring him into the kitchen? I don’t want to move this again and I don’t want him stuck in his room. We can wait in there until Uncle Jamie gets here.”
Sean nodded as she walked into the other room again. At the moment, he was glad to have anything he could do to help her.
Chapter Forty-Four
“Damn it, Alex, what did you do?” Those were her Uncle’s first words when he walked into the kitchen.
“Hey, Uncle Jamie. Nice to see you, too,” she said. She’d taken a seat at the kitchen table, laying her forehead against the cool wood. Sean had found some crayons to keep Toad busy. Hearing the front door open, she had sat up straight and tried to look as if her whole body wasn’t shaking.
“Cut the crap. I’ve known you your whole life. You get in trouble. That’s what you do. So, what exactly did you do this time?” He leaned against the kitchen sink as he spoke, crossing his arms over his chest.
“I didn’t do anything,” she insisted.
“Well, you’re not getting dead, headless kittens in the mail for no reason.” He ran his hand over his bald head, trying to wipe away the sweat that stubbornly persisted in clinging to his shiny dome. When she’d called him, he’d been stopped on the side of the road in his police cruiser, running the tag of some speeding college kid through the system. He’d been so shaken up that he’d apologized to the shaggy headed co-ed when he let him go.
“Yeah, because most people prefer to give decapitated house pets as presents in person.” She rolled her eyes.
“This is serious, Alex,” he snapped at her. Jamie knew he was coming off a little harsh, but he was furious at whoever had done this to his niece. Robbed of an outlet for his aggression, it was difficult to keep a level head.
“You think I don’t know that?” She snapped back. “I’m not stupid.”
He took a deep breath. “Where is it?”
“In the living room.” She gestured in the general direction. “Mind if I stay in here? I’d rather not have to look at it again.”
Jamie nodded. He wished she hadn’t had to see it in the first place.
“Thanks. There’s a letter in it. I used mom’s meat flipping tongs to fish it out, so it doesn’t have my fingerprints on it.”
“Good girl.” His tone was curt, but he was proud of her for having that forethought. “I’ve got to go out to the car and get some plastic gloves. I’ll be back in a minute. You guys just stay in here, okay?’
He didn’t wait for a reply.
The room was quiet. Alex could hear water droplets falling steadily from the faucet into the sink, counting off the seconds. The sound of Toad’s crayons swishing across the paper seemed magnified. Her head throbbed.
“Oh, God, that’s rank.” Jamie’s disgust could be heard in the kitchen, letting them all know when he’d reopened the gruesome box.
“Do you have any idea who could’ve sent that thing?” He asked when he returned.
Sean and Alex locked eyes. Roderick’s name seemed to hang unspoken in the air, but she couldn’t exactly explain to her Uncle that she’d recently managed to get on the bad side of a vampire. He’d only accuse her of making light of the situation. And if he or any other member of the local law enforcement did have the misfortune of catching him, there was a good chance their lives would be in danger. She couldn’t imagine Roderick quietly dunking his head and allowing himself to be shoved into the backseat of a cop car.
“No clue,” she finally said after a few moments had passed.
“Alex,” he warned, “if you know something and you’re not telling me, you need to spill it and I mean now. Not later. We can’t catch this creep if you don’t speak up.”
“Look, I really don’t know,” she said innocently, comforting herself against the lie by rationalizing that there was no way she could be sure as to the package’s sender, no matter what she thought. She had only called her Uncle on the off chance that she might be wrong. If she was, and this was the act of an entirely different person, then maybe the cops could do something about it. But if it was Roderick, like she thought, she knew there was nothing that any of them could do to stop him.
“This freak knows you. He knows where you live, so think about everyone you know and try to come up with someone who could have a grudge against you.”
“Why would anyone have a grudge against me?”
Jamie raised one of his bushy eyebrows. “Do I really need to answer that? You’ve got a way about you that tends to tick people off and you know it.”
She rolled her eyes. “If I knew, I’d tell you okay.”
“Promise me you’ll think about it. I want a list of everyone you’ve ever upset, since kindergarten.”
Sean snorted. “That’s going to be a long list.”
Alex glared at him before returning her attention to her Uncle. “Do you think this is in any way related to all those girls who’ve been killed recently?”
Jamie tried to swallow the lump rising in his throat. He’d wondered the same thing upon seeing the letter in the box, but had tried to force the thought from his mind. The very possibility of it made his skin crawl.
“I’m hoping it’s just some stupid kid’s idea of a joke, probably someone you go to school with,” he paused, “but we can’t rule anything out. In case it’s not, I don’t want you leaving this house or opening the door to anyone when you’re alone. I’m going to see if a few of my buddies will be willing to drive past her when they’re on duty and check on you.”
“I have to leave,” she said stubbornly. “I have a job now. I’m not quitting just because someone threatened me.”
“Well, you’re not walking anywhere alone either. And I mean it.” He propped his leg up on a spare chair at the kitchen table. Judging by the way his heart was beating, he was certain it was a horrible idea for him to ever have children. Alex wasn’t even his kid and he wanted to put her in a box on a shelf and protect her for her own good. Still, he admired her unwillingness to change her life, despite the fear it caused him.
“I’ll have Sean walk with me.”
Jamie glanced over at the shy boy who’d been Alex’ almost constant shadow since elementary school. “Look, no offense, kid, but Alex is going to need more protection than you can offer.”
“I agree.” He said softly. “No offense taken.”
“Then what do you two expect me to do?”
“Stay put like a good girl, that’s what.”
Her eyes widened in anger. “Of all the sexist—”
“This isn’t the time to tr
y to play the feminist card,” he interrupted.
“The creep could just as easily get the drop on a man as he could a woman,” she continued. “You hit someone over the head hard enough and they’re going down, man or woman.”
Jamie ran a hand over his face. “True, and if it was your buddy there, I’d tell him to stay home, too.”
“Well, I’m not letting whoever sent that control me. I’m not. I can’t. So, come up with another idea.” She crossed her arms and stared at him.
“Damn it, Alex, fine. Be stubborn. Get your head chopped off. At your funeral, I’ll tell ‘em all you asserted your independence to the very end, so it’s okay that you’re dead.” His voice rose as he spoke.
She thought for a moment. “How about you drop me off at Lucas’ tonight and I’ll have him come get me each night. Will that make you happy?”
“Is that the grown man your mother says you’re dating?”
She nodded.
“You don’t have any business seeing a man of that age, Alex.”
She wanted to say ‘you have no idea’, but didn’t. “Your objection is noted. Now is that okay or do you want me to lie to you and tell you I’ll stay here and then keep walking by myself?”
“What kind of choice is that?”
“The only one you’re getting. This is my life.”
“You’re just a kid, Alex,” he started.
“And you are not my father,” she counted.
He sighed. “No, I’m not. And I can’t be here to protect you all the time, so I guess it will have to do.”
“Good.”
“But I’m meeting this guy when I drop off.”
Alex groaned.
“No argument. And you’re taking my mace. It’s stronger than the stuff you can buy at the store.”
“Fine,” she nodded as she spoke. “So, we have an agreement?”
“Yeah, but I don’t have to like it.”
Alex agreed. Neither did she.
Chapter Forty-Five