Chapter 11
ROWAN
Icrouch on the lower branches of the big, sprawling oak tree that grows in Abi’s yard, right next to the window that opens into her living room.
The funeral parlor is downstairs, so Abi doesn’t spend much time there.
This tree has proven to be a perfect place for me to be with her when I don’t want to risk breaking in.
It helps that her only curtains are these pale, gauzy things that let the sunlight in during the day.
At night, when she has the living room lights on, I can see everything.
She’s not alone tonight, though, nor is she watching movies.
She’s with her two friends on Zoom. I can’t see or hear them, but Abi keeps waltzing around the living room with her laptop in hand, speaking to the screen.
She smoked a joint earlier and then opened a bottle of wine, and it’s made her light and giggly, loud enough that her voice spills out through the thick, distorted glass of the window.
My hearing’s always been good—uncannily good, Uncle Nash would say with a knowing wink, just like I’m uncannily strong and uncannily talented at killing—and I know they’ve been talking about some development in Chloe’s life.
But since I only hear Abi’s side of the conversation, I don’t know the details.
Something about Chloe getting a house on a lake.
It doesn’t matter. I’m here to make sure Abi’s safe, not to eavesdrop. Although when I hear my name, my whole body lights up, and I lean forward, making the tree branches rustle.
“—coffee together,” Abi’s saying. She’s stopped next to the window, holding the laptop like a waiter balancing a tray on one hand. She has her wineglass in the other. “He’s really nice. A lot nicer than most guys around here.”
I get that weird twist of guilt again. She wouldn’t say the real me is nice. That encounter, she hasn’t even mentioned to her friends.
She pauses, staring down at the computer, then gives a shriek and a giggle and cries, “Oh my god! No! It was just coffee!”
Heat warms my cheeks.
“Stop!” she cries. “I never should have told you two about him.”
Abi turns away from the window, drifting out of my line of sight.
I can still sense her inside—the quiet hum of her voice, too far away for me to really hear, and something else, a kind of underlying rhythm that feels reassuring.
I settle back agains the trunk of the tree, staring at the window of light through the canopy of leaves.
She thinks I’m nice.
No, she thinks Rowan Hanover is nice.
I am Rowan Hanover.
You’re a fucking monster.
That last bit, it’s in my mother’s voice, screaming and hysterical. She was drunk, too, when she said that to me. I don’t even know how she knew what I was capable of. I was only eight. I hadn’t killed anyone yet.
More laughter from inside. Abi’s settled down on her couch, but all I can really see of her is her long, pale legs, stretched out on the ottoman.
Still, I don’t want to leave her. Even seeing that little bit of her is an assurance that she’s safe. That she—
The damp wind gusts through the tree, making all the leaves shimmer, and I sense something.
I sit up, adrenaline prickling over my skin.
Someone else is here.
I check my killing face to make sure it’s secure. Then I slide out of the tree, dropping lightly on the grass into a crouch. I go still for a minute. Listening. Sensing.
It’s the same presence as last night. Not human. Not an animal.
I rise up, my muscles tense. I can still sense Abi, too. She feels calm.
I move forward, following the trail on the breezy, salt-kissed wind. It leads me around to the front of the house, and I stop beside Abi’s flower garden, the sunflowers bobbing in the darkness.
The presence is in the cemetery.
I sweep my gaze around, but I don’t see much. The street lamps illuminate the road and the black wrought iron fence that wraps around the burial grounds, but even in the darkness beyond, I can’t see much. Just the pale teeth of headstones.
But that presence is there. I’m certain of it. I feel it, hot and coursing and vaguely sinister, like spilled blood. The interloper. Olivia Pearce’s murderer. Who else could it be?
I don’t want to leave Abi alone, but if this is my chance to dispatch the interloper before he can hurt her, I’m going to take it.
So I dart out of her yard and across the street, keeping away from the street lamps. Something about the presence changes, somehow. It feels brighter. Clearer.
Does he sense me the way I sense him?
I weave through the cemetery’s pecan trees, leaving the funeral parlor behind me. The presence shifts; I thought it was directly in front of me. Now it feels like it’s off to the left.
I jerk my gaze up, and just for a second, a split second, I see a flicker of movement, like a rabbit darting back into the woods.
Like a victim giving chase.
I take off in a run, my feet pounding against the dirt, my breath quick and steady. Adrenaline surges up in me again, along with that inky blackness that starts to take over before I make a kill.
A kill. I can’t kill the interloper here. I’m not ready for my Neptune’s Adventure kill yet, either. Fuck. I hate killing without any preparation. As Uncle Nash constantly reminded me, that’s how you get yourself caught.
Another flicker of movement, this time off to my right. I stumble to a stop, nearly tripping over a mossy hedge of gravestones, and I whip around to see a figure disappear into the shadows between the pecan trees.
I follow it, hungry for the pursuit. I don’t chase my victims often. Not like this. Usually, I watch them from the shadows, the way I watch Abi, waiting for them to fall into whatever trap I set for them.
But I don’t have a trap here. I just have a target.
I dart across the cemetery, moving through the darkness. I don’t see much of anything beyond the pale headstones, but I can sense the trail my prey has left behind. It’s not a scent, not a sound. Just an intuition, telling me where to go.
The wind howls, damp and smelling of the sea, and the trail vanishes.
“Fuck!” I whisper, skidding to a stop. I’m at the far edge of the cemetery, where the black fence juts up against the overgrown field that eventually rolls down the shore. I sniff, sweeping my head around, trying to catch on to that presence again.
Gone. It’s gone. I squeeze my eyes shut and strain against the night, listening for something, although I’m not sure what. It’s worked for me in the past.
I can sense nearby animals, small and cautious. But nothing human or close-to-human. Not my prey.
The wind settles into stillness. I open my eyes.
Still nothing.
Then something sparks in the distance. But it’s not my quarry. It can’t be. Because they disappeared into the open field, and this is coming behind me. It’s coming from—
From Abi’s house.
I whirl around, a thick, black dread coiling in my stomach. And I realize this can’t be the presence I was tracking. Because it’s human, undeniably so.
But that humanity is wrapped up in cold, terrible malevolence. Anger. A propensity for violence. I’d recognize it anywhere because for ten years these were the kinds of humans I was always killing for Uncle Nash.
And I realize, with a thud of despair, that I’ve completely fucked up.
Whoever I was chasing isn't Olivia Pearce’s killer.
This is.
And he’s at Abi’s house.