31

Steven’s first thought was to return to Robert’s house—images of the phone disappearing into the blood, enveloped and lost to the darkening and congealing crimson. He thought about retrieving it, or even stepping over it and seeing what else he could find, a landline, a mobile, something. But he couldn’t go back there. The thought of seeing Robert again—propped on the chair like the centerpiece of a Halloween-themed storefront—was too much to process.

It didn’t seem real; it almost couldn’t be real. Here he was, in the midst of a murderous crime spree, the gruesome scene of a massacre one way, a potential murderer the next. He didn’t agree with Abi. It wasn’t preposterous that her grandmother was the killer; it made perfect sense. It was the only thing that made sense, the only thing that—

A thought occurred to Steven, one even more disturbing than the image of Robert, even more pervasive. He shook it away, ran his shirt sleeve across his forehead. The moisture stuck to the fabric and soaked in, like the blood had soaked the welcome mat, like the brain matter had soaked Robert’s sweatshirt, like—

Another shake of his head, another thought he didn’t want.

“Pull yourself together,” he said to himself, his words cracking.

He looked back at the house as an image of Abi invaded his thoughts once more. He thought about the way she was acting, the strange things she had said.

“Can’t be,” he said to himself. The thought wouldn’t leave him, but he was right. He had to be right. He knew he was right.

It couldn’t be her.

Abi had been with him that night. They had made love for over an hour and had slept, flesh-on-flesh, her legs wrapped around him, his flaccid cock pressed against her, both soaked with sweat, stinking of intercourse and alcohol. He had drunk more than her, much more, and his memory of the events had been fleeting at best, but she had still consumed her fair share.

She had also been asleep.

You can’t kill in your sleep, he told himself. You can’t follow your ex-boyfriend down an alleyway and butcher him in cold blood. He shook his head and allowed himself a laugh, amused that the thought had even entered his head, that Abi, a prudish, gentle, and anxious girl could have done something so insane, so gruesome, so—

And then he remembered being woken up by the sound of the front door, only to realize that Abi wasn’t next to him. “You must have been in the bathroom,” he had told her, but she hadn’t seemed convinced, had barely acknowledged what had been said.

He remembered how dismissive she had been, how quick she was to get rid of him to—

And then there was the encounter with the old lady. It happened the morning after—what was it she said?

I’ve seen you. In and out at ungodly hours.

Get out while you can. Wrong in the head.

“We weren’t even that late,” Steven had told Abi later that night. “She’s probably one of these old ladies whose bedtime is 8 p.m., the minute her favorite show finishes.” They had both laughed at that, but had he been wrong?

He thought about the victims. The callousness. The brutality. He didn’t think she had it in her. She was sweet, innocent, shy—

But as soon as those thoughts entered his mind, they were banished by memories of when they first had sex. She was drunk, yes, and so was he, but she was like a woman possessed. She had pounced on him, pushed his head between her legs and held it there. He remembered wanting to lift his head, to pause and kiss her breasts or lips, but he couldn’t, and she followed that with a vitriolic response to the old woman the following morning.

Steven shook his head, ridding those thoughts. He had to be realistic.

It could have been anyone. In his panicked, paranoid, and traumatized state, he could have easily found reason for it being the mailman or even a spate of particularly brutal suicides.

He reminded himself that none of that mattered, this wasn’t Columbo, it wasn’t a case of whether Abi could or not—it was a case of whether she did or not, and he knew she wasn’t a killer. He had only known her for a few days, but that was enough. They had spoken together, they had kissed, hugged, embraced, made love—she had cried over films, shed a tear when he told her the story about how he accidentally killed his childhood hamster, a story he had intended to be funny.

She wasn’t a killer, and maybe her grandmother wasn’t either, but she was at risk, they all were, and he needed to get help.