Page 7 of Your Worst Fear
The two of them had been my best friends for as long as I could remember. They’d pulled me out of a dark fucking time, saving me from a world I almost died in. But because of this shift in our dynamic, I was struggling. Things felt lost, and without them, I didn’t think I could find a way to do…well, anything.
Call me dramatic, but when you found yourself digging your own grave for the sake of appeasing your fucked-up father, you kind of lost the will to look on the bright side of things.
Maybe history was about to repeat itself, and I’d form some sort of fucked-up relationship with my attempted murderer.
A breathy laugh left me as I climbed the stairs to my room, understanding that any normal person wouldn’t react this way to someone trying to kill them.
I hadn’t been normal for a long time, though. I did stupid shit, like betting the place I called home in some fauxshow of confidence, even knowing I lost almost every time I gambled.
It wasn’t because I sucked at it. It was more like exposure therapy, if it could be called that. I lived a childhood of appeasing a fucked-up man, and any failure was punished. So I purposefully squandered nearly every game to make myself immune to the feeling of not doing the very best.
It took a long time to stop slicing the blade of my knife through my skin—something my father did to me when I didn’t meet his standards. But I finally did, and now I didn’t care if I failed or won.
I covered that up by feigning stupidity when it came to gambling. If the guys knew I was well aware of what I was doing, and the consequences that came along with it, they’d ship me off to a goddamn mental institution.
Thing was, I was completely sane.
I simply had a fucked-up way of showing it.
Chapter 4
Grace
Idouble-checked that my phone was off this time, trying desperately to ignore that presence in the back of my mind telling me I was stupid.
When had I ever forgotten to turn the damn device off, let alone silence it? Henley was fucking with my head—distractingme—so even if I hadn’t been tasked with ending his life, I’d still likely go through with it, simply due to the fact that he was annoying as shit.
There was absolutely nothing I was willing to let get in the way of keeping my life. Despite being forced into this job, the money was good. Photography and selling rare plants on the side wouldn’t cover my cost of living—not in this economy. But making money off fulfilling the tasks assigned to me wasn’t the only motivator; staying alive was a big one, too. If I didn’t complete a kill within a certain amount of time, I’d be the next target.
My first job was completed within an hour. I was weaker a year ago, easily taken advantage of because I wastall and skinny—in other words, uncoordinated and in desperate need of a gym membership. Because of that, I’d ended up with a broken arm that night, and more blood on me than the pavement.
Back then, I typically dumped bodies in dumpsters. Now I got creative with things like acid or rocks tied to limbs in large bodies of water or—my least favorite—feeding them to pigs.
Don’t worry. I was careful to find pigs that weren’t destined to be eaten. They lived on a little farm on the outskirts of Whiskey Ridge, where the owners never kept an eye out past dark to see if anyone was trespassing to use their livestock to cover up a murder.
I wondered if the bodies’ remains made for good fertilizer. Would my plants like that?
My nose scrunched as I patted the knife sheathed on my thigh. I couldn’t imagine how badly that would make my house reek, and that’d make me all the more likely to get caught.
I had to separate the sane side of myself from the desperate side. No murder equaled no life. That was what ran on repeat in my head each time I was assigned a new target. Which was becoming more often, due to my excelling at…killing.
Henley was heading to some pool hall, taking his sweet time as he smoked a cigarette outside the main door. In his defense, he didn’t know he was being followed by an impatient woman who was shivering in the frigid Idaho air. There was a reason I rarely left my house in the winter. Damn this job for making me break that habit.
In the dim light outside the building, I watched the cherry burn bright red once more before he dropped it to the sidewalk and snuffed it out with his boot, then walked inside the establishment. Inevitably, he’d be coming out for another one soon. I’d been watching him for days, learning his patterns so I could strike nice and easily when the time was right.
Well, like I said, I was impatient, and by day three, I was ready to get this over with.
Under my gloves, I flexed my fingers to keep some blood flowing through them as I waited. And waited.And waited.
“He better be winning a goddamn yacht in there,” I muttered, breath fanning in front of me in a puff of white. I’d opted not to park nearby for fear he might recognize my car. If he was anything like his friends, he was always aware of his surroundings.
Finally, Henley appeared, lighter and cigarette in hand. He brought the filter to his lips, but rather than lighting it right away, he paused. His eyes scanned the street, and though I was hidden by the dark, I still slid farther around the corner of the brick building on instinct.
Seconds passed, and I counted my breaths. There was no way he knew I was here. The man might be hyperaware, especially after I’d tried to shoot him and missed, but there wasn’t a single chance I’d been spotted. I was wearing all black—I’d even matched my bra and panties—and there were no streetlights here.
I was being paranoid.
Deciding the coast was clear, I peeked my head out from around the building. His form retreated down thealley bordering the pool hall, and I figured now was a better time than any.
