Page 83 of The Fall of Iris Henley
It takes a beat before I realize he’s talking to me. “My… phone?”
“Yes, bitch, your phone.” He gestures with the gun and holds out his other hand. My heart stammers against my sternum.
“It’s in my pocket. Can… can I reach for it?”
He lets out a sharp breath. “Just pull it out and put it in my hand.”
My mind spins. There’s got to be something I can do. Some way I can send a message, some signal I can tell my phone toblast out to everyone. But when I pull the phone out of my coat pocket he snatches it the moment I have it unlocked.
Then the car is quiet. He’s typing something—I can just see him from the corner of my eye. But the gun is still aimed right at my temple. And Hayden is still gripping the wheel, taking us farther and farther away from everything and everyone I love.
When we finally pull up to our destination, I can’t decide whether to laugh or sob. Because of course this was where we were going. Of course it was our destination, all along.
We were always going to end up back at Koenig Ranch. Back at the place where everything went wrong.
CHAPTER 48
MONDAY, OCTOBER 24,8:47
KOENIG RANCH
The main gate was chained shut, just as it has been for months. But there’s another entrance a quarter mile down the road that someone either forgot, or just didn’t bother, to lock. Hayden exchanges a glance with Carter, then jumps out to open it wide. We drive through, and she doesn’t stop to close it. I have a sudden memory of Rocky, uncharacteristically serious, explaining that the number one rule of ranch life is to make sure the gates are always closed behind you.
Insane to be thinking of that right now, to be remembering my boyfriend, my cheating, apparently murderous boyfriend, backlit by the sun as he urged his horse across a field of karst. Insane that time, that precious commodity, could still be so elastic as to allow memories to blossom in between my terrified heartbeats.
We drive around the familiar pathways, the car’s lights angling ahead of us. Past what used to be the office, where they received shipments of feed and hay. Past a handful of outbuildings and storage sheds. Through oak, mesquite, pecan. Wendingleft and right and dipping down. And then off the paved path, down an overgrown dirt road, and I know where we’re going and I don’t want to, I don’t want to, but it doesn’t matter.
Here we are.
The cabin.
“Hayden, get out and open the door for our guest,” Carter says nastily.
For a half second, I think she’s going to argue, or at least try to. But then she gets silently out of the car and opens the door.
I don’t move.
“What are we doing here?” I ask. My voice wavers more than I’d like.
“I’m not asking again,” Carter says.
So I move. I get out of the car.
I try to catch Hayden’s eye for the two seconds we have together before Carter joins us. Her face is streaked wet and red, tears sliding down like she’s been crying forever and will never be able to stop. She stares miserably down at her feet.
“Hayden, please. Just tell me what’s going on.”
“I never wanted any of this,” she whispers.
And then Carter lunges up behind her, throwing one arm around her neck as if he’s nuzzling up to her at a dance, holding the gun in front of both of them with the other hand. His movements remind me of a sick coyote I saw when I was a kid, jangling and unpredictable; it is not so much that he is enjoying this as that he is infected with it. “She says she never wanted any of this, but that’s a lie. She wantedsomethingreal bad, didn’t you, Hay?” Hayden gives a strangled little whimper, but he just laughs. “Come on, let’s go inside. Maybe there’ll still be blood! We can take some pictures, put them on Sekrit too!”
“That’s fucking sick,” I say. It’s out of my mouth before I can think to hold it in, but he grins at me.
“You first, Iris.”
I hesitate, then look up at the cabin’s squat dark form, its square windows pale glints in the scanty moonlight.
“Come on, girls, don’t get shy now. He had you bitches lining up outside thedoorwhen he was still alive.” Carter nips at Hayden’s neck and she closes her eyes, tears clinging to her lashes.
