“Yes,” I tell him, and I mean it. “Yes, I do.” I look back up and our gazes clash. He knows that we have to do this; I don’t have to convince him. We’d do anything for Parrish, the two of us. His best friend and his … whatever it is that I am to him.
His gamer girl, I guess.
“Fucking Christ,” Chasm snarls, but he moves over to the wooden box anyway. Together, we heft it up and carry it over to his car, shoving it into the trunk as he curses and mutters under his breath. “I already sort of figured that I was going to hell.” Chas steps back and then uses some bungee cords he had stored in the trunk to keep the box in place. We can’t exactly close the trunk; his zippy little sportscar isn’t nearly big enough to hold the … box. “Guess this seals the deal.”
Just think of it as a box, I tell myself. It’s just a box, not a person.
It also proves that JJ was, in fact, a victim of the Slayer. Because of me. Because she was my maid for all of one day. I feel fucking sick to my stomach.
“Let’s go.” I climb in and Chasm does the same, resting his forehead on the steering wheel for a minute before sitting back up and starting the car. “If it’s too much for you—” I begin, but he doesn’t let me finish, casting me this death glare that gives me the chills.
“I’m not leaving you to do this alone, and I sure as hell am not leaving Parrish to get killed by some deranged lunatic. Are you kidding me? I know you don’t like me, but you really have low expectations.” Chas backs out of the parking space and off we go, following the directions that were given to us.
“Whoever said I didn’t like you?” I whisper, because it’s just too much to ask me to talk any louder than that right now. There is a dead girl in the trunk of my stepbrother/boyfriend’s best friend’s luxury sportscar, a girl that was killed by my supposed bio dad who also happens to be the Seattle Slayer whose victim count just clicked up one from twelve to thirteen.
If he killed Parrish, too, then it’d be fourteen …
I was missing for fourteen years.
Could be a coincidence or … not.
I clamp a hand over my mouth and lean back in the seat, doing my best to think about anything but the bloodied corpse in the trunk. Well, it’s not even really in the trunk, is it? It’s half-hanging out for the whole world to see. It could theoretically fall out onto the road, crack open, be exposed to anyone driving by …
“You don’t have to like me. Just don’t ask me to stay out of this; it’s insulting.” Chasm turns up the music, and I lean back, wishing that the moment were different so that I could correct him. I do like you. In fact, I’ve just realized that I have a crush on you. Isn’t that sick? The guy I like is missing and could very well end up dead, and I’m thinking about you. That’s all sorts of messed the hell up. “Don’t you think these tasks are escalating rather quickly?” he asks me, but I can’t respond to that right now.
I don’t even want to think about that.
I just have to work harder, do more research, figure out the trick. Because in every game, there’s a trick, something to make it all so much easier, to nail that high score, to snag that grand master rank, to kick big boss Bowser’s ass. Something.
“We have to find Parrish. Period. There’s nothing else to it. There are no alternatives.”
Chasm grunts but doesn’t reply.
About an hour later, we pull up outside a house with cheery yellow siding and an impressive garden out front. There are flowers in every shade, blooming prettily along the edges of the driveway and the sidewalk. In the center of it all, there’s a bright green lawn and a bird fountain with small songbirds hopping around in it. The house sits just outside a town called Granite Falls, another Podunk place in the middle of nowhere. This is the only house for miles.
Great. I’m sure that’s a wonderful omen.
“Fucking hell,” Chasm chokes out. “Whose house is this? We’re not, like, delivering this girl to her parents or something, are we?” He looks over at me, and I meet his eyes. I don’t have an answer to his question, but I sure as hell hope not.
Burning down the theater was the worst thing I’ve ever done in my life.
This is worse than that.
Much, much worse.
At least nobody was hurt in the fire; somebody is dead this time.
JJ. An eighteen-year-old girl who did nothing but end up in the wrong place at the wrong time.
