74. Sage
SEVENTY-FOUR
SAGE
The words sit between us. Amy doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t gasp. Doesn’t look away.
“On the beach,” I continue. “The night of the party. He attacked me and I stabbed him. He died on that beach. The guys were there. They helped me cover it up. Made it look like he left town.”
“What were the guys doing there?”
I brace my palms on the counter behind me.
The old instinct is to deflect. To shave the truth down until it’s safe to hold. But Amy’s looking at me like she already knows this is the hinge. The thing everything else swings on.
“They were following Brock,” I say.
Her brows pull together. “Why?”
I close my eyes and steel myself—there is no clean on-ramp to this.
“Because the men I’m living with,” I say, pausing to get the wording right, “they aren’t regular guys.”
Amy gives me a look. “I gathered that much.”
My mouth twists a little—somewhat of a smile.
“They hunt people,” I say. “Specific people. Men who hurt others. Rapists. Predators. Pedophiles. They kill the ones who get away with it.”
She doesn’t move.
I keep going before I lose my nerve.
“They’d been watching Brock for a while. They had evidence. Not enough to make anything stick through the police, but enough to know what he was.”
Amy’s fingers tighten around her mug.
“They were going to kill him?”
There it is. No dramatic gasp. No stagger backward. Just the clean, horrifying conclusion set gently on the table between us.
“Yes.”
Amy nods slowly. “But you killed him first.”
I nod.
She stares at me for a long second, then laughs once—short and disbelieving. “Okay. Wow. Jesus Christ.” She drags a hand down her face and then freezes in shock. “Oh my God. I just realized I practically begged you to walk home with a rapist!”
“What?” I pull my head back, then remember the moment at the party when I said I wanted to go.
“No, Ames. No. You can’t put that on yourself.
You had no idea. He seemed . . . charming, right?
And technically, you wanted to leave with me, remember?
Tyler was the one who convinced you to stay. That’s when Brock swooped in.”
She lets out a gasp. “Oh my God,” she says again. “Do you think they were working together? Do you think Tyler knew? Is that why he wouldn’t let it go? And why he tried to kill you?”
“I think so. The pieces came together pretty slowly. But it looks like that whole group had a thing for assaulting women.”
“Oh my God!” Amy gasps, horrified. “I was dating a rapist?” She gasps again. “My God. I was. That shit he was doing—the way he— Holy fuck, Sage.”
“I know. I know. And we didn’t find out until after you two broke up. But the guys made sure you were safe as soon as we realized. And I know it’s a lot. But I’m pretty sure it’s over now.”
Amy makes a face that says she wants to believe me and also wants to punch reality in the throat.
“Pretty sure,” she repeats. “That is such a comforting phrase. Really inspires confidence.”
“It’s the best I’ve got.”
She huffs out a breath and looks down into her mug again. When she speaks next, her voice is quieter. “So let me make sure I have this straight,” she says. “Because this is a lot.”
“I know.”
“Your boyfriends are—what? A murder cult with good skincare? Dexter, but horny?”
I snort despite myself. “That is an offensively reductive description.”
“But not inaccurate.”
I consider it. “No, not entirely inaccurate.”
Amy points at me with her coffee. “And what’s Dean’s role in all of this? He, what? Disposes of their victims. Is this where you brought Brock?”
“Dean is actually a newish part of the equation. The guys only brought him in recently.”
“But he knows—obviously—about what they do?”
I nod. “He has his reasons for joining. They all do.” So do I.
She sets her mug down again and looks at me hard. “Do you trust them?”
It shouldn’t be such an easy question after everything. Blood and lies and bodies and ropes and fire and all the things that should make trust impossible.
But it’s the easiest question in the universe.
“With my life,” I say.
Amy searches my face like she’s checking for cracks. “That’s insane.”
“I know.”
“Do you hear yourself?”
“All the time. It’s exhausting.”
She huffs a laugh, but it dies quickly. “Sage, I’m trying really hard not to have a full existential collapse in Dean’s kitchen right now.”
“You’re doing amazing.”
“Thank you.” She rubs at the space between her eyebrows. “Dean is one of them. Does he kill people too?”
“As far as I’m aware, he only disposes of the bodies.”
“As far as you’re aware,” she repeats before she lets out a sigh.
“Do you feel safe with him?” I ask, because I can see the war going on in her mind right now. The morals fighting with feelings.
“Yes,” Amy says. No hesitation. “That’s the fucked-up part.
I feel safer here than I’ve felt anywhere in months.
Maybe ever.” She looks toward the stairs where Dean disappeared.
“He knows what I did. He knows everything—even the fucked-up stuff Tyler tried to do to me. But he also makes me French toast every morning and lets me paint his toenails. That’s insane too. ”
I hide a smile. “In this group, maybe not.”
“Apparently not.” She picks up her donut again and takes a bite, chewing slowly. “So you’re asking me if I’m okay with all of this. With knowing.”
“Yep.”
“I don’t think I’ll ever be okay with it,” she admits. “But I understand it. I’m not going to tell anybody.” The crooked smile appears. “I mean, technically, I’m a murderer now too. So it’s not like I’ve got the moral high ground.”
“Stab sisters,” I say.
She holds up her fist. I bump it.
“Stab sisters,” she confirms. “That’s our band name now. Nonnegotiable.”
We grin at each other—two women who’ve crossed lines they can never uncross, eating donuts above a crematorium, and somehow still finding the funny in it.
Her breath catches, but she controls it and finishes her donut. “Can I say something that might sound weird?”
“Everything we’ve said in this kitchen sounds weird. Go ahead.”
“I actually feel better. Now that I know. The not knowing was worse—having pieces of a picture and no frame to put them in. My brain kept filling in the gaps with stuff that was scarier than the truth.” She shrugs.
“The truth is still terrifying. But at least it makes sense. Dean hasn’t really said much—just that he helps when he’s needed, no questions asked.
But now that you’ve talked me through it, I can stop building conspiracy theories in my head until four a.m. and finally sleep. ”
“You still haven’t been sleeping?”
“Not really. But I’ve been a little better since you and Holden got all my things.
Thanks for that, by the way. Having my own clothes and books and stuff—it makes this place feel like mine instead of somewhere I’m hiding.
” She pauses, looking down at her mug. “I really, really don’t want to go back though. To the apartment. Ever.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I mean it, Sage. Not even to pick up whatever’s left. The furniture, the kitchen stuff, whatever didn’t fit in the boxes—I don’t want any of it. Don’t want to look at it again. Every time I think about that living room, I see—” She stops. Swallows. Regroups. “I just can’t.”
“What do you want me to do with it?”
She looks at me. Steady and certain, the Amy who stabbed a man twice and watched a truckload of bodies disappear into a crematorium is still standing.
“Burn it,” she says. “Burn it all.”
“I know a guy.”
“Of course you do.” She laughs—bright and startled, the kind that sneaks past the grief. “God. My life. My actual life.”
“Welcome to the family, Ames.”
“The murder family.”
“We prefer ‘justice collective.’”
“That’s worse. That’s so much worse.”
We’re still laughing when Dean appears in the doorway. And the expression on his face—quiet, relieved, like he’s been listening for exactly this and finally heard it—helps the tightness in my chest ease.
“Good talk?” he asks.
“The best. She’s strong, Dean.”
“Strongest person I’ve ever met.” He says it simply. And the way he looks at my friend tells me everything about where this is heading.
Go Amy!
“Take care of her,” I say.
“Already am.”
I walk out into the sunshine and drive to the diner for my shift.
Jamie is in his booth.
He looks up when I walk in and his whole face changes—the slightly guarded expression dissolving into the warm, uncomplicated smile that I’ve come to depend on more than I should. He closes his laptop and waves me over before I’ve even put my apron on.
“Sage Adams!” He grins. “God, I’ve missed you.”
We’ve barely spoken in six weeks. I took two weeks off after Milo’s episode so I could stay close to him and move my things out of the apartment. By the time I returned to work, Jamie had disappeared from his regular booth. I texted and got three quick responses:
Jamie:
Busy! Project!
Sorry!
Love you!
So I left him to it. God knows I had enough of my own shit to deal with.
“Where the hell have you been?” I ask.
“Buried under my final grad-school project. I submitted the bastard last night, which means I’m officially alive again.” He gestures at himself. “Exhausted, unwashed, and approximately seventy percent caffeine, but alive.”
“You picked one hell of a six weeks to disappear.”
His smile slips. “Why? What happened?”
“We moved,” I say, sliding into the booth across from him.
“Moved? From the apartment?”
“The landlord kicked us out. After the spray tan incident.”
Jamie’s eyes go wide. “The spray tan incident got you evicted?”
“There was tanner on the ceiling, Jamie. On the ceiling! The carpet was ruined. Apparently that violates the lease.”
“I knew that booth was going to cause problems. I knew it. Darlene on Facebook Marketplace is not a name that inspires confidence in industrial equipment.” He shakes his head. “So where are you now?”
“Holden’s. The guys and I are there permanently now.” I can’t help the smile. “Amy’s staying with a friend until she figures out what’s next.”
“Wow,” Jamie says. “That’s a quick move. You and five guys really”—he mimes folding his hands together—“merged households?”