He kept Violet behind him, which was good, because she needed to use him as her guide. Him and the imprints only she could sense.
The water sound grew clearer, stronger. It drew her as surely as the flashing kaleidoscope that blocked her view.
But as they reached the top of the stairs, Violet knew something was wrong.
Terribly, terribly wrong.
The imprints split there. Right there at the landing.
One imprint—the colors—pulling her one way. The rushing water pulling her the other.
She heard Jay then, above the babbling sound of water. “Which way?”
Vacillating, she turned her head in each direction, trying to make sense of it all.
How could there be two imprints, leading her in two different directions?
“I—I don’t know.” Her words hit the air at the same time they both heard it. The moan. Low and muffled and almost imperceptible, but there all the same.
“This way,” Jay said, dragging Violet along. Dragging her toward the sound of the stream.
SILENCE IS GOLDEN
THEY WERE PRACTICALLY RIGHT OUTSIDE THE door now. Right on top of him.
He glanced around, trying to figure a way out, but he was trapped. If only she’d be quiet. If only she’d lie there and be still.
He thought about dosing her again, but there was no time. Besides, he’d given the rest of his stash to Kisha right before hiding her in the attic.
Better, he’d told her, if they split up. Abercrombie and the girl were looking for him and Colton’s girl, not for her. He’d told her to stay there, no matter what happened, no matter what she heard, until she was sure it was safe to come out again. She could stay quiet as long as she wasn’t dope sick.
Colton’s girl whipped her head to the side, but was still unaware of anything around her. She’d passed out halfway up the stairs.
He heard their voices. And even farther away, much farther, he heard sirens.
And then she moaned.
Damn! Damn, damn, damn! He dropped to his knees and covered her mouth with his hand but it was already too late. He could hear their footsteps now too, and it was only a matter of seconds before they busted down the door. Before they found their way inside.
Before they caught him.
He bent forward, pressing a gentle kiss on the girl’s cheek. “I’m sorry,” he said almost sadly as he released the blade on the knife in his hand.
And then plunged it into her gut.
CHAPTER 21
WHEN JAY HIT THE DOOR WITH HIS SHOULDER, it didn’t splinter beneath his weight or anything quite so dramatic. The handle, which was probably old and in disrepair anyway, fell apart on impact, and the door shot open, banging against the wall on the other side. The crashing noise filled the house, echoing off the walls.
The sound of rushing water was stronger in here, as was the urine smell. Violet recoiled, again covering her face. She could see fragments of the space around her, tiny pieces of the room: an old bureau with a cracked mirror, its jagged shards catching bits of light from outside and reflecting it around them; a window with dingy-looking curtains billowing in on either side of it; a mound in the center of the floor that could only be one thing.
“Chelsea,” Violet whimpered, falling to her knees at the same time she caught a glimpse of another person—the killer—emerging from the darkened corner. Above his head there was something glowing, a blur of light that Violet couldn’t make out . . . he was moving far too quickly now.
“Jay,” she tried to warn, but it wasn’t necessary.
Whoever he was, he was already launching himself toward the open window, throwing himself over the sill just as Jay was about to reach him. And with him went both the trickling of water and the stench of old urine.
Two of his imprints.
“We did it,” Violet breathed. “We found her.” Outside, the shrill sound of sirens came closer, and she no longer cared about anything except that she’d found Chelsea.
And then, before she could stop him, before she could even shout his name, she watched as Jay, too, hurled himself over the window’s ledge.
She started to get up, to go to the window to see if he was okay. To see if he’d landed safely, but a hand stopped her. Chelsea’s hand.
Relief rippled within her and spread outward.
“It’s okay, Chels, I’m here now. I’m here.”
She heard it then, a wheezing sound, and she felt frantically for Chelsea’s face, her hands stroking her friend’s cheeks. “It’s okay,” she repeated, but this time she was no longer sure. Something was wrong.
She kept going, her hands searching the girl beneath her as the sirens outside grew nearer and nearer. When her hands reached Chelsea’s belly, she felt something warm and sticky and wet.
Her first instinct was to draw away. She didn’t want to touch it. Not this. Not Chelsea’s blood.
But that moment passed quickly, and then Violet was screaming as she heard the commotion below her, just outside the window. “Help! We need help in here!”
She pressed her hands as hard as she could to the wound, it was all she could remember from the abbreviated first aid course they’d had in PE. She thought that maybe she should do something more, but she wasn’t sure what that something might be.
And then Chelsea went still beneath her.
Not the kind of still that happens when someone falls asleep, when you continue to feel their breaths, when you know their blood is coursing within them.
No, this was a different kind of still. The kind that Violet had only seen in death.