Dear Killer (8 page)

As I approached, she looked anxiously around, pale skin glowing ethereally in the lights of streetlamps, as if she were afraid something catastrophic was about to happen. A few people were inside the convenience store, but it was late and they were tired and no one was paying any attention. There were no cameras around. I put my hands in my jacket pockets and was slightly amused by her anxious nervousness.

“Is she dead?” she murmured to me, making sure that no one could hear.

“Of course.” I shrugged.

“No evidence?”

I looked at her and laughed. “You don’t need to be so worried, you know. I’m fine on my own. She was short and thin and no one else was home. No evidence, no traces.”

She looked faintly embarrassed.

“I’m sorry . . . I just worry. It was your first solo kill, after all.”

I hugged her around her waist, and she tucked her arms around my shoulders and closed her eyes.

“I’m fine,” I said.

“I know,” she replied, with the air of a mother.

Then she let me go and held me out at arm’s length and grinned wildly, proud of me, of what I had so professionally done, of what I was becoming for her sake.

I wasn’t done with all my training at that point. I was still taking lessons in our converted bedroom, but it was in that moment, as I watched her joy and realized that it was all inspired by my actions, that she had no direct, violent part in creating it, that I had done it on my own, that the realization first bloomed within me—

I was self-sufficient.

It was an odd feeling, and right then, I remember feeling distinctly uncomfortable with it, because I hadn’t known precisely what it meant.

And then the moment dissolved and I saw other flashes of memory float past me, winding senselessly about as memories in dreams often do—my mother teaching me to ice-skate—my mother laughing joyously across the table from me, crouched in a chair with a sheet around her shoulders, eating a bowl of strawberry ice cream—my mother sitting on the living room floor, drinking homemade lemonade—my mother teaching me how to shove my hands up beneath the chin of a tall opponent to snap the head back and break the neck—my mother, lean and athletic, kissing a strange man on the porch—

And again and again the memory of a photograph, that photograph, the photograph of the dead woman with a heart drawn violently in black on her chest.

Chapter 8

O
n Friday, as Maggie and I ate lunch in our corner of the cafeteria, Michael came over to visit.

It was unexpected. Maggie and I were talking about something fairly innocuous. One moment he wasn’t there and the next he was, hovering over us, hands on the table, glaring at us each in turn with a wicked smile on his attractive face. It made him look ugly.

I sighed. What an idiot. Problems in this school were solved quietly, without anyone noticing. He was being too obvious. When you were in Rome, you did as the Romans did.

“Look at you two,” he sneered. “How cute.”

For a moment I just looked at him, not exactly sure what to say to that. Across from me, Maggie sank down lower in her chair, becoming small, shivering. I glanced at her, then at him, then back to her, and then I set my face in a sarcastic smile.

Fine. If he wanted to play, then I would play his way.

“Almost as cute as your psychotic anger management issues,” I sneered right back.

He was silent, biting his lip angrily. Then he sat down next to me and turned his attention to Maggie, shoving his elbow into my personal space. I frowned at him and nudged at it with my hand—he ignored me.

“I bet you’re regretting leaving us now,” Michael snapped.

“You kicked her out,” I retorted quietly. He ignored me.

Maggie shivered, and for a strange moment I wondered whether that was the truth. Had she been the one to leave them after Michael hurt her, instead of the other way around, as I had always assumed? I didn’t think she had the backbone for that—but maybe she did after all.

“Only one friend? That’s sad, don’t you think?” Michael smirked.

I whacked his elbow with my fist. He ignored me. Maggie, quiet as stone, shrank even further, turned her eyes toward her feet.

“Especially when that friend is a whore like this girl—”

I clenched my fist and hit him in the eye.

He fell to the floor, sprawled out on the linoleum.

I stood over him and looked down at him patronizingly. I shook out my fist. That had hurt. He gasped, staring at the floor, breath heaving, and, when he had collected himself, glared in surprise up at me. He would have a bruise later. I could almost see it, the skin blossoming purple—

Suddenly my eyes narrowed, and I tasted blood in the air, and I realized that I could kill him easily, so easily.

I shook myself out of it. No. No. I couldn’t kill him. Not here, not now. I just stared at him, made my murderous instincts fade away.

His eyes were still angry.

That interested me.

Most people, when I hit them, were upset. They cried, or yelped, or ran, if they weren’t dead by the time they hit the floor. But he didn’t run. He just looked up at me and glared. There was anger in those eyes, like I had seen before, so much anger, and something else. . . .

I sighed. “Look,” I said. “This may seem selfish, but here’s the deal. You say bad stuff about my friends, I’ll be mad. You’ll piss me off. But you say bad stuff about me, I get really mad. Really pissed. That sort of thing doesn’t fly with me. You insult me, you end up on the floor like this.”

I glanced up and realized that the cafeteria in my vicinity had gone silent. People were staring. People were looking.

I felt itchy, uncomfortable. I didn’t regret hitting him. He deserved it. But I didn’t want their attention.

I heard Maggie’s gasping breaths behind me, thick with an emotion close to horror.

“Bitch, I’ll get you,” he spat, and pushed himself into a sitting position.

I quickly crouched, knelt on his chest, and pushed him back to the ground. Around me, I heard a collective gasp. He gasped too, but for a different reason, because the movement had pushed all the air out of his lungs. I grabbed his collar, forced his head up so my mouth was next to his ear. He made a gargling sound.

“Michael Vernon,” I whispered venomously. “Let me make you understand. You won’t get me. No one gets
me
. I get other people. And I’ll get you, just like I get the rest. You mess with me again, Michael, and I’ll kill you, I swear.”

I let go of his collar. His head fell backward and hit the floor again with a dull
thwack
, and this time there was surprise in his eyes. Surprise, but still no fear.

“Hit him again!” someone exclaimed nearby. I breathed in sharply, angrily, staring at Michael.

I stood up and walked away from him, toward the door out of the cafeteria and into the hall. The crowds parted to let me through. By now the whole room was silent and tense. As I walked through, people watched me with stunned surprise and almost terror.

They hadn’t been expecting that from me. Actually, I hadn’t been expecting that from me. That was reckless. Too reckless. I needed to blend in, not gather attention or suspicion. As soon as I walked away and the anger and adrenaline faded, I was mad at myself.

That was stupid.

Stupid.

The hallway was empty. I stalked down it, not really knowing where I was going. And then, footsteps in the hallway.

“Kit.”

I turned to see Maggie. Her eyes were wide and her mouth was open. I was beginning to think that she had only a limited number of facial expressions.

I didn’t say anything, just looked at her expressionlessly.

“That was crazy.” She gaped.

“Yeah, well, I’m crazy, aren’t I?”

“Yeah. You are,” she said admiringly. I laughed, feeling all my muscles tense, trying to relax.

“You like that about me?”

“Well, I’ve never been friends with anyone crazy before. It’s kind of exciting.”

I looked at her darkly.

“Be careful. Crazy can be dangerous,” I muttered.

I heard footsteps from the opposite direction. Dr. Marcell was running down the hallway, a young freshman girl at her heels.

“I heard there was a disturbance in the cafeteria,” Dr. Marcell said urgently, looking from Maggie to me and back again, looking for more information. Her dark hair bobbed, and the hem of her unflattering dress flipped up at the hem.

I raised my hand, inspecting it, shaking it out again. It felt almost like I had broken something. That could be inconvenient. But no, it was okay, the pain was receding now. My hand would be fine. I met Dr. Marcell’s eyes.

“That was me,” I said, nearly whispering. “Sorry.”

She was surprised. Why? She knew that I believed in moral nihilism and other ethically controversial philosophies. Moral nihilists didn’t usually punch people, I supposed. But she
must
have suspected at some point that I was a bit off-kilter.

“Really, Kit?” she asked. It was an honest question.

I shrugged. “Really.”

“Oh, Kit,” she sighed.

She stared into my eyes, no doubt looking for some kind of regret. She wouldn’t find any. I had never been good at faking regret.

She saw my empty eyes, and suddenly I saw a spark, the tiniest sliver of suspicion, kindle in her mind. A traitorous spark, a dangerous ember. She was too smart for her own good.

Chapter 9

I
met Alex for lunch on Saturday at a small bistro near the Brass Feather. I dressed in a smart blue dress and a pair of brown heels that were just a bit too big and made my toes slide down into the front of them and crunch painfully. I had forgotten that they didn’t fit when I put them on, had just remembered that they made my legs look nice, and I was wincing as I walked into the bistro. I was trying to look nice for Alex—oh well. Beauty was pain.

He was already there when I arrived. As I walked through the door, he waved to me from a table near the back of the green-and-blue restaurant. When I saw him, something flared up unexpectedly in my chest, a feeling that could best be described, to my chagrin, as “butterflies”; I quickly forced the feeling away as best I could, though it still lingered. It was useless, and I didn’t have time for it. Wiping away my grimace and replacing it with my nicest smile, I made my way over to him. He was looking at me with his head slightly tilted, resting on interlaced fingers. I felt his gaze on me intensely.

The people in the restaurant were mostly elderly, with a few odd smatterings of younger people—a couple at the window and a man with dark hair and glasses reading in the back, and of course, Alex. The walls were covered in faded wallpaper patterned with small birds, and the tables were made of fraying wicker. He had chosen it. He had told me that the decorating was awful, but the food was incredible. It really did look quite unimpressive, but I trusted him.

“My mom couldn’t make it,” I said as I sat down across from him. “Sorry. I asked her, but she said she had other lunch plans.”

“Oh. Oh well.” He shrugged.

I grinned at him. He was in street clothes today, a black T-shirt and jeans, with a gray sweatshirt draped over the back of his chair. He looked nice like this, less angry, younger. He was wearing glasses, the ones I had seen him in on Tuesday. Through them, I could see his hazel eyes—deep and dreaming, with flecks of blue I hadn’t noticed before.

I gestured to the glasses.

“I like glasses on you. They make you look intelligent.”

“I didn’t look intelligent before?”

“You looked . . . sharp before. Now you look bookish.” I hesitated, then shrugged. “It suits you.”

“Thanks, I suppose.”

“It’s a compliment.”

“Then thanks.”

“Any action from the Perfect Killer? I haven’t seen anything in the papers or anything, and the murders aren’t usually that close together, but . . .”

He shook his head. “No news since that flawless murder you saw on Tuesday.”

“That’s good, then.”

“Yes, but no clues isn’t good. Your idea that the murderer is a student was very clever, but we can’t find any leads to help us investigate that path. Or any path, really.”

No clues is good for me,
I thought wryly.

“I’m sure you’ll find something soon,” I said encouragingly. He shrugged.

“How’s life?” he asked casually, leaning toward me. He didn’t really expect an honest answer.

He absently brushed long fingers across the silverware on the table, straightening the knife and spoon. As I spoke I watched those movements—graceful, captivating. Mesmerizing . . .

For a moment, I felt as if I were being drawn in, as if we were the only two people in the room. I suddenly noticed the lack of distance between us, realized that the tip of my shoe was resting against his left foot, that there were only inches between our hands. His eyes were now looking softly, yet insistently, into mine. After a few seconds, I had to look away.

Alex was unnervingly easy to like. Unnervingly enthralling.

Eventually, I managed to answer his question.

“Fine. Not much is happening. School, home. Not terribly exciting. Your life is more interesting than mine.”

He smiled in a half thank-you—how else exactly could you respond to a statement like that?—then remembered something.

“You’ve been bad!” he exclaimed.

“What?”

“I heard from your mom. You got in trouble at school.”

“Heh. Yeah,” I replied sheepishly.

“You
hit
someone.”

“Yeah.”

“Why? That was a stupid thing to do. If you ever want to become a cop, that’s going to be a bad mark on your record.”

I looked at him and raised my eyebrows.

“A cop?”

He raised his eyebrows too.

“Don’t you want to become a cop? I mean, you spend so much time thinking about the Perfect Killer case and all.”

“Well, I suppose . . . yeah, I might like that.”

“But anyway, why did you hit him?”

“I don’t know! He just was being awful.”

Alex looked at me carefully. I felt a sudden need to defend myself.

“Calling my friend names and such, being nearly psychotic. I swear to God, I didn’t just punch some innocent bystander or anything.”

“Did he deserve it?”

“What?”

“Did he deserve it?”

“Yes . . . yes he did.”

Alex leaned back in his chair and exhaled defeatedly. He looked at the ceiling.

“That’s good, then.”

“What?”

“If you’re going to hit someone, it better be for a good reason.”

I giggled and felt oddly satisfied with him. “You’re funny, you know that? You look like such a straightforward person, but you’re really not that way at all.”

“Yeah, well, I can say the same thing for you.”

“You think so?”

He looked at me strangely. “Obviously.”

I didn’t know quite what to make of this comment and spent the next few seconds mulling over it.

A waitress wandered over to our table, a young girl with short brown hair.

“Do you want anything to drink?” she asked.

“I’ll have ice water, thanks,” I said.

“Pepsi for me.”

“Right.” She nodded. “I’ll be right back with that.”

I unfolded the menu that was on my placemat and looked over my choices of paninis, light pastas, breads, and pastries.

“You’re right, this all looks wonderful,” I said to Alex. But he wasn’t listening. I looked over to see him deep in thought.

“Alex?”

He looked at me and breathed deeply.

“If I say something, will you keep quiet about it?”

I closed my menu and looked at him judiciously.

“Yes,” I said slowly.

He looked down and rested his forehead in his palms, brushing his hair smoothly back to rest in faint waves that curled away from his face. Then he breathed deeply again, put his hands in his lap, leaned back in his chair, and looked at me.

“I’m afraid,” he murmured.

And he was. I could see it. In his eyes, in his posture, in his slightly quivering voice.

“I can’t tell it to anyone else. Everyone else I know is from the Yard. They’d stop trusting me. I’m rising in the ranks. I’m basically in charge of this investigation. I can’t show fear, or weakness.”

“But you’re afraid,” I clarified uncertainly.

“I’m so afraid. So afraid.”

“Why?” I murmured.

“I don’t want to be next. This murderer . . . these murders . . . they’re terrifying. So many . . . perfect murders, perfectly untraceable. London’s first real, famous serial killer since Jack the Ripper. But the murders aren’t even confined to one area of London, like the Whitechapel murders. They’re everywhere and anywhere. And the letters . . . I don’t know where the murderer gets them. I don’t know who writes them and where they’re delivered to.”

So he didn’t know about the mailbox. The neighborhood myth really hadn’t found its way to Scotland Yard yet. That was good. I wouldn’t enlighten him.

“And I’m in charge of the investigation. I’m just afraid, so, so afraid that one day a letter is going to show up with my name on it.”

“Have you done anything wrong?” I asked.

“I’m with the Yard, Kit. Think of all the people I’ve made angry, put in jail. . . .”

It was a decent point. Still . . .

“I don’t think you have to worry so much,” I said gently.

“Why not?”

“Because . . .” I searched for an explanation, one that I could reasonably give to him to make him feel better. After a moment of thought, I realized I could simply tell him the truth.

“Because I think the murderer has a code of ethics.”

“What part of murder is ethical?”

“Think about it,” I said. “By your reasoning, the murderer must get a lot of requests for the deaths of police officers, right? But not one’s been killed yet.”

He looked up.

“That’s right,” he realized. “But I’m different. . . . I’m in charge. What if he gets a letter for me and discards his ethics because I’m in his way?”

“But you’re
not
in his way,” I pointed out.

“What?”

“You are so far away from solving the murder. You are nowhere near being in his way,” I said apologetically. “I’m sorry. But it’s the truth.”

“That’s right,” he said again. “I’m
not
in his way.”

He looked blankly at me for a moment, trying to digest that, to make himself believe that. He sighed and gave up after a few seconds, leaning over the table and scratching the back of his head.

“Thanks,” he said halfheartedly.

“You won’t die,” I told him.

He looked me in the eyes and smiled.

“Thanks.”

“I mean it,” I said, trying to make him understand that that was the truth. I wouldn’t kill him. Not if I got a letter, not ever. He believed in justice, fought for it. I didn’t kill people like him.

“Here’s your drinks,” the perky waitress said, setting them down on the table in front of us. I smiled at her, and Alex forced himself to nod kindly. She smiled at him and walked away.

“You won’t die,” I said one more time. Alex nodded again, at me this time. I smiled slightly, inwardly
begging
him to absorb what I was saying, to truly understand. I thought I saw his eyes warming, his uncertainty fading—but I wasn’t sure. I hoped I saw it. His fear was unnecessary, and it made me feel guilty.

I arrived home later that night with a pair of bloody latex gloves in my front jeans pocket. It was past midnight. The lawyer was dead. I figured that I should probably visit Alex sometime in the next few days, so he didn’t get too anxious over yet another murder. Besides, he was good company, wasn’t he? Just because he was the enemy, it didn’t mean I couldn’t have a little fun. I entered the house quietly, figuring that my mom would already be asleep, and my dad too if he was home. But when I walked inside, a light was on and my mom was sitting at the bottom of the stairs.

As soon as I came through the door, I saw her waiting figure—hair fashionably mussed, a black shawl draped heavily about her shoulders, pearls circling her neck. There was the scent of perfume as well, flowery and thick. Where had she been today—with another man, another affair with someone she would control and discard for the thrill of it? Another party with crystal glasses and gold-plated silverware?

I didn’t know. I didn’t say a word. I didn’t want to know why she was waiting for me, but I was afraid I knew.

I hadn’t seen her yesterday. I had called her about the fiasco in the cafeteria, just to let her know. I had left her a message when she didn’t pick up. She had been out to dinner that night and had come back after I was asleep. I had left before her in the morning. I had managed to escape her until now. But I couldn’t escape any longer.

“Kit,” she said, standing up.

“Hi, Mom,” I murmured, looking at my feet.

“Kit, you
idiot
,” she spat, and stalked toward me. I flinched as she came closer. She swung her arm out and grabbed the nape of my neck tightly, almost suffocatingly. She forced my head up, forced me to look in her eyes. I tried to escape her. But it did no good.

“What were you even
thinking
?” she hissed. I looked helplessly into her eyes, like a trapped animal. She looked unusually disheveled. She was tired. I could see that. Because of me, she probably hadn’t slept much last night. Her eyes were angry, afraid—and they were selfish.

I saw that she was worried about me—she was my mother, after all, that was natural—but the years had weakened her, and at least a significant part of her was now worried about herself. All that traveling, all those parties and affairs—they were something, but they weren’t quite enough for her, and she was losing pieces of herself. Becoming less.

Still, this anger—this was a pure, unrepressed, vital anger, and something about it had echoes of the woman she had once been.

“Mom, let go. It hurts,” I whimpered.

She gritted her teeth, spat, and let me go. She walked backward a few steps, eyeing me with something resembling disgust.

“You
fool
. You complete, utter
idiot
. What were you
thinking
? Getting into a fight—you’re a murderer. You’re well trained. Why in the world would you draw attention to yourself? Look, they might even call both me and your father in for a meeting with the school! We can’t afford that! We can’t afford him being even the least bit worried about you, or else he might start
noticing
!”

“I’m—I’m sorry,” I stammered. I shrank back toward the door. I could feel the tears building. I didn’t want her to hate me. God, no, I didn’t want her to hate me. . . .

“Don’t you realize? Your murders aren’t just your problem. If they find you, they find me. I go to jail. I was a murderer too. Be more damn careful, Kit.”

“I’m sorry,” I sobbed.

Her eyes were fevered and bold.

“I don’t care! I don’t give a shit about being
sorry
. Be careful, not sorry. You’re getting careless, befriending your victims, fighting in school—this isn’t what I taught you! You know why we kill. We kill because there is no justice. And without us, the world is lost—”

And then her voice vanished as she realized, broken, that the correct word was not “we” but “you.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I whined. Hysterical tears dripped down and spilled over my black jacket.

“I don’t care,” she snapped, and walked away, up the stairs, her steps thundering, her silence weighing on me.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, sliding down to the base of the door, burying my head in my knees, crying. I sat there until I fell asleep, wrecked and tired.