Chapter Sixteen Potential Burial Sites
sixteen
Potential Burial Sites
For the first time in my life, I feel like a normal teenager.
Even in Allentown, where hiding my identity wasn’t as imperative as it is here in Starling, I kept to myself.
I had one family member—Gran. One good friend—Jess.
And one boy I occasionally hooked up with—Marco.
That was the extent of my social life, and it was just how I liked it.
Now I have an entire family unit, I’m dating the quarterback of the Crockett High Falcons, and I have friends—plural—at school.
It’s times like these, when I’m walking down the hall with Everett to last period, laughing at some corny joke he told, that I manage to forget how my father killed seven women.
Everett takes my hand like that’s totally normal, and as we pass by Sofia and her friends I hear a gasp in our wake.
“Are you fucking kidding me,” one of them hisses. Sofia’s friend Karlee, I think.
If Everett heard that, he doesn’t let on. “I forgot to tell you, my grandparents are going out of town in a couple weeks. They have a place by the lake, so I’m throwing a party.”
“You have grandparents?” I ask before realizing how utterly asinine I sound.
He must agree, because he snickers. “No, Gemini, my parents just appeared out of thin air. Sort of like a reverse Rapture.”
I sigh. “I deserve that. Is this your grandparents from your dad’s side or mom’s?”
“My mom’s folks. We’re not that close,” he admits. “Things became strained between them and my dad after she died. But they let me stay there whenever they go on vacation, and they don’t care if I have people over.” He tips his head at me. “Your cousins are coming. You should too.”
My dad’s execution is in a couple of weeks. I suddenly wonder if Everett’s party is one of those Thorn-Pokes that Ty told me about in class. I want to ask him, but I don’t know how to raise the question.
To my surprise, he broaches the subject himself. “It’s not an execution thing,” he assures me. “I know you said the whole capital punishment thing makes you squeamish. And, yeah, there’s definitely gonna be parties celebrating the execution. But mine has nothing to do with it.”
Relief trickles through me. “That’s good to know.”
“So you’ll come?”
The idea of partying on the same weekend my father will be put to death makes me sick to my stomach.
“Maybe,” I say before slipping into my calculus classroom.
The first person I see is Chase Hedlund.
He nods at Everett, who’s lingering in the doorway, clearly displeased that I won’t commit to attending his party.
As much as I like him, his pushiness bugs me.
I’m naturally oppositional. Push me hard enough and I’ll do the opposite just because.
And he always seems to be pushing me for something.
A date. A conversation. A party RSVP. My secrets.
I wish he’d back off sometimes, but he’s so charming and sweet that I feel guilty even thinking that.
“You don’t seem like the type to be into quarterbacks.”
The rough-voiced remark comes from the seat behind me. Chase, of course. He sits behind me in both classes we share.
I twist around in my chair to find a pair of mocking gray eyes staring back at me. “And my type is any of your business because…?”
“It’s my business when you’re playing with my boy.”
“Your boy?” I echo in amusement. “What are you, his daddy?”
He ignores that. “Just don’t get your game, is all.”
A frown touches my lips. “I’m not playing any game.”
“You are.” Chase leans back in his chair, his eyes fixed on me. Boring into me. I want to look away, but I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing how that heavy-lidded gaze affects me. “You’re not who he thinks you are.”
I suck in a sharp breath, my mind instantly flashing to the ominous messages.
Did Chase send them? Because right now it’s sounding a lot like he’s implying I’m hiding my identity.
“What the hell does that mean?” I scowl at him.
“It means when you laugh at his jokes, it never reaches your eyes. And when you stare out the window during every class, it’s not because you’re seeing something peaceful.”
“What am I seeing then?” My throat feels clogged, tight.
“Escape,” Chase says, shrugging.
I want to demand what he means by that, but our teacher starts the lesson, and I spend the rest of the class feeling Chase’s gaze heating the back of my neck.
After school, Mar and I head for the abandoned railroad tracks she keeps talking about. She has her own car, a beat-up hand-me-down sedan from her older brother who just started college, and she drives way too fast for my comfort as she peels away from Crockett High.
“I can’t believe you’re not going to the game tonight,” she says, grinning at me as she drums her fingers on the steering wheel. A folksy rock song plays at a low volume in the background.
“What game?”
“The football game?” she prompts. “You know, the sport your new boyfriend plays?”
“He is not my boyfriend,” I protest.
That makes her laugh. “Uh-huh. Whatever you say, Ship.” This is her new nickname for me.
“He’s not. We’ve been on, like, three dates.”
“Five. And spent all of them making out in his truck.”
I wish I’d never told her that. I blush even harder, trying to focus on adjusting my camera settings instead of the butterflies fluttering in my stomach. “We’re just hanging out.”
“Hanging out. Right.”
We reach our destination, putting an end to her teasing.
She parks in a small gravel lot in front of a crumbling, dilapidated structure that I think used to be the rail station.
While I grab my camera bag from the back seat, Mar grabs some of her own supplies from the trunk of her car.
A few minutes later, she sets up her tripod near the rusty old tracks.
Her camera clicks as she focuses on the shot.
“I’m telling you, Ship, these tracks have some of the best angles for light. You see the way it bounces off the metal? So cool.” She steps back, adjusting the lens.
I pop off my lens cap so I can focus my own camera. I’m excited to just be here and take some pictures. It’s been a rough few weeks.
I squat down to snap a test shot as Mar keeps talking behind me.
“I came out here one time to shoot and there was blood all over the tracks.”
“Oh my God. Did someone get hit by the train?”
“No. These tracks aren’t operational. No trains come through.
I think it was some kind of animal-on-animal attack.
I saw bloodstained fur nearby, maybe from a coyote or a fox.
The blood wasn’t fully dry, so it kept catching the light in the eeriest ways.
I must’ve taken about a hundred shots.” She turns to me with a self-deprecating look.
“You think that makes me a psycho or something?”
“Why? Because you took pictures of blood?” I shrug. “That doesn’t mean anything.”
“My parents think it’s weird. I did a whole blood series once and when I showed it to them, instead of praising me, my mom made me an appointment with a shrink.”
I can’t help but snicker. “Wow. That feels a bit extreme.”
“They’re probably worried I’ll be the next Starling Slayer,” Mar says, rolling her eyes. “Apparently all artsy people are destined to serial-kill.”
I paste on a blank expression, because I’m supposed to be new to town. “What do you mean?”
“Has Jasmine seriously not spilled all the tea about her uncle?” she says, seeing my face. “I assumed the Shipleys talk about Thorn all the time at home.”
“Not really. They barely bring him up.”
Mar adjusts her camera again, still clicking away. “Well, the dude was an artist.”
“Was he any good?” I keep my tone neutral, feigning interest without giving too much away.
“Apparently so. He was well-known around town as being super talented. He sold custom sketches, portraits. Built these little wooden knickknacks or whatever.”
Birdhouses. Not knickknacks.
“People actually liked him. And they loved his work. He used that to his advantage.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, because she expects me to ask.
“That’s how he lured them, the women. At least that’s what he said in his confession. I think there’s a transcript of it online somewhere. You should read it. It’s really fucking fascinating. Like, a scary glimpse into the mind of a psycho.”
I feel my throat tighten.
“He stalked the women he was obsessed with. He knew their routines, where they liked to go, who they were friends with—everything. He’d pretend to randomly bump into them in the park or on a hiking trail. Real casual, you know? Always carrying his sketchbook.”
I shift uneasily on my feet, glancing down the tracks as she continues.
“They all knew him, or had heard of him at least, because he was ‘the local artist,’ right? So when he offered to sketch them, they were flattered.” Mar shakes her head, her tone laced with disbelief.
“He was charming, apparently. He would talk about his wife and daughter all the time. Show pictures of his little girl to make himself seem harmless.”
I lift my camera and pretend to zoom in on a nearby fence post.
“Those poor women willingly went with him to his studio. Four of them, anyway.”
“Weren’t there six in total?”
“Yes, but only four were local. Two were from Brice. Thorn said he lured those two into his car, chloroformed them, and drove them back to his studio. That’s where it all happened.
He would draw them. Hundreds of sketches, supposedly.
They found sketchbooks hidden under the floorboards after he was arrested.
He drew them, made them feel at ease, and then… ” She shrugs. “Stabbed them to death.”
I swallow hard. The air feels thick around me, pressing in. “But they never found the bodies.”
“Nope. He refuses to tell anyone where they are. It’s like this asshole’s still got some kind of power over the whole thing, even from prison.”
Leave them in peace.
It’s becoming difficult to mask the waves of nausea rolling through me. “And this stuff is all readily available online?”