Chapter Sixty-Seven
Enraged, he drags the girl away from the old swimming pool, his left arm crooked around her neck, his right covering her mouth. She writhes and struggles, making muffled sounds against his hand.
She’s fierce, this one. Not like the sweet, docile girl yesterday.
Sarah. Sarah Greene.
He’d been heading toward his car in the church parking lot when she trudged into his sight line, looking flushed and sweaty.
“Are you here for Bible class?” he called.
“Yes.”
“It’s canceled.”
“What? Oh no!”
He introduced himself as the substitute pastor and told her about the air-conditioning problem. He fully intended to send her on her way, and to go on his.
But she lingered. Such a friendly young woman. Chatty, even. She was grateful for the cold bottle of water he offered.
“Thank you so much,” she said. “It’s going to be a long, hot walk back home.”
“I’d be happy to give you a ride.”
He saw the misgiving spark in her eyes.
“Oh—no, that’s all right,” she said quickly.
Was it a normal reaction to an offer from a stranger, or did she suspect something?
He really would have simply driven her home. That’s what he told himself later. What he tells himself even now.
But that flicker of doubt made him paranoid. Was she suspicious? Did she realize that he was up to something? Was she going to tell someone?
He couldn’t let that happen.
He forced himself to stay calm, to keep her talking. Eventually, she seemed comfortable again, especially when he asked her about Bible study. He could tell she was reassured when he quoted passages from memory.
He was patient, steering the conversation from one benign topic to another. Finally, he asked her if she wanted to see a litter of newborn kittens he’d discovered that morning.
“Yes! I love kittens!” she said.
As he led her toward the woods, she told him that she’d always wanted a cat, but her parents said no.
“Maybe you can bring one of these sweet babies home,” he suggested. “I bet they’ll change their minds.”
She assured him that they wouldn’t, and then they were in the woods, and he cautioned her to tread quietly and carefully, so as not to disturb the kittens. He led her deeper into the undergrowth, pushing aside vines and holding back branches for her.
“Um, where are they?” she asked, hanging back a little.
He turned to her with a finger to his lips and then pointed at a clump of ferns. “In there,” he whispered. “Take a peek. Just don’t scare them.”
He stood aside and gestured for her to move past him.
She was smiling as she did so.
That’s when he grabbed her, in one swift movement, hands around her throat.
In that moment, it didn’t matter who she was . . .
Rather, who she wasn’t.
She didn’t deserve it. Not like the others.
Sarah Greene wasn’t the devil’s spawn, born of his father’s wicked sins.
She wasn’t going to bring shame to his family or add to his mother’s already unbearable burden of pain.
This wasn’t divine redemption. When the moment passed and he stood looking down at that girl, the life squeezed out of her, he wasn’t filled with satisfaction, but with remorse.
It had happened so quickly and easily. His clothes were unsullied. There was no blood. Not hers, anyway. Just a small spot on his arm where he’d been scratched by a bramble. There’d barely been a struggle.
Nothing like this.
“Shut up!” he snarls at the girl. “Shut up, or I’ll kill you right here!”
Maybe he really will kill her here, in the clearing, and be done with it.
He left his car by the dumpsters at the construction site next door, as directed. It was far enough away from the old pavilion where he attempted to lure her. That’s where he stashed the tarp and rope he’ll need to drag her down to the car.
He’s been planning this ever since he read her first email a few weeks ago.
I’m trying to find my birth family via DNA testing on the genealogical website Lost and Found. My results identify you as a close biological relative . . .
Close? You bet.
It’s like Whac-A-Mole with these half siblings. Every so often a new one pops up, searching for their roots, unaware that their biological mothers were teenage assault victims and their biological father was a predator who met his end in the most poetically just way: fed to ravenous bayou gators.
A father-son fishing trip, he’d told his old man, to celebrate the mistrial and release from prison. They could meet halfway between Dad’s home in Texas and his own in Alabama.
When it was over, all that was left of his father was the blue fishing cap floating in the shallow green water. He reached a cautious hand off the boat, grabbed the hat, and kept it as a remembrance. Or perhaps a trophy.
His only regret is the lie he told his mother, claiming that his father never made it to Louisiana that weekend.
It was for her own good. She was ravaged by the ordeal, and it had only just begun.
There were more accusers out there, more indictments looming.
Better to let her think that her husband had left the country than to put her through all that again.
He does what he has to do to protect himself. To protect his mother, his wife, his children.
He did that yesterday, with the girl at the church.
He’ll do it today, with the girl fighting his grasp as thunder rumbles closer and the first drops of rain begin to fall.
He’ll slit her throat right here, right now. The storm will wash the blood into the earth.
He removes his hand from her mouth and grabs the switchblade from his pocket. She lets out a scream. He yanks her head back so that her neck is positioned. Then he presses the button on the knife’s handle, popping the blade, and goes in for the kill.