Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 112449 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112449 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
“So you can use it to chop my home into pieces? Why would I want that, Ellis?”
“Your home is that farm. Admit it,” he said. “How much did you have to do with the townies and their little lives before you started at this university? Your life was always fifteen miles that way.” He pointed. “You never cared what happened on this side of the town line, don’t pretend you care now.
“Make your choice, Rainey. Are you giving up everything your grandmother worked for over a change that’s coming no matter what anyone does to stop it? Or are you going to accept what we all are at our core? Self-serving bastards.”
It was a good speech. On anyone else, he would’ve had them the moment he honked on the horn. But Jeremy didn’t hook me—until he brought up Gran.
Are you giving up everything your grandmother worked for?
No, I’m not.
I got in the car. “We have to make a stop first,” I said. “De Souza Farm. I’m sure you know the way.”
Jeremy drove me out to my empty farmhouse. I texted Paris on the way, telling her not to wait for me. Pulling up to the fence, I told Jeremy I wouldn’t be long and climbed over. A letter waited for me in the box.
I checked to make sure no one was watching, and peeled it open.
Saturday night in the place we always meet.
Midnight.
Come alone or you’ll make me angry.
Don’t make that mistake after all the progress we’ve made.
Till tomorrow.
Stay psycho.
Love ya. XOXO
I tucked the letter in my pocket and kept the words in my mind on the way down. He expected me to meet him tomorrow night at the farmhouse. No other place it could be. No other location that could be worse.
I’d be alone with him miles away from help or witnesses. There was nothing to stop him turning a discussion into a nightmare—except for me.
My mind was made up to go before I got back in Jeremy’s car. It was made up before we drove here too.
I’d meet him alone but I wouldn’t do it unarmed. He’d stand before me at arrow-point and tell me everything. Why he and Cavendish targeted me? Was I some random person they woke up one day and decided to torture, or was this something they’d been doing for years?
Both Letter Men spoke of sacrifice like it was a fact of life. They were doing something that must be done. How many of the missing people or unsolved murders in Bedlam’s recent history could be laid at their feet?
I’ll get there early. Have the bow trained on him the moment he comes through the door.
My head churned, turning over every inch of my plan and what I’d do if it went sour. Jeremy made no attempt to talk to me, and I didn’t start a conversation either.
This is the part in the movie where the audience screams at the girl to call the police.
Let them know what’s going on and have them on standby to arrest him. Even if I put my hatred of the sheriff aside, I don’t know that I would’ve chosen that option. The Letter Man could be anyone. He was certainly someone who remained ahead of me and law enforcement. The cops in this town didn’t know he existed.
What if he’s on the force? What if he’s Sheriff Fucking Jack?
Asking me to trust the very people who let me down to come through and save me this time, was too hard a sell.
I closed my eyes, resting my aching head on the cool glass. If I was honest with myself, none of that was the true reason I was going to walk onto that farm alone. The truth was the police wouldn’t let me meet a serial killer in an abandoned barn armed with a bow. Frankie wouldn’t just idle on the corner, hanging out with the promise I’d be back in thirty minutes.
No one would let me do this the way I knew it had to be done. I was going alone. That fact scared me in every place but one. A deep, calm island buoyed in my soul. That’s where I’d hide until it was over.
Opening my eyes, I landed on the sign for Bay Avenue.
Jeremy drove us to the smallest house on the street, though that wasn’t saying much.
It didn’t have the two-story fountain or turrets breaking the sky. This one was two stories of stone and blackout windows. The lawn was mostly well-kept if not for the donut rings marring the grass.
Jeremy led me inside by the elbow. Did he think I was going to run? I made it this far.
We rounded a corner and I grimaced. Made it this far and it was a mistake.
The place was a dump.
Dirty clothes strewn all over the living room—not all of them men’s clothes. Crumbs ground deep in what used to be a plush, white carpet. It was now a variety of colors.