Page 2 of Lady Killer

“I’m sorry, I’m not quite sure what you’re asking,” I said, not sorry at all.

He started to stomp toward me, only to be immediately restrained by the other men.

“Touch her and lose a finger,” hissed the newcomer.

“Excuse me, Everest, is it?” I said, trying to buy some time to organize my thoughts. My voice snapped his attention away from the now-cursing Nixon, and I swore I could feel his smile beaming at me from across the distance.

“Everest Collins, but call me Ever, please,” he purred, dropping his hold on Nixon and taking another couple of steps toward me.

“Stay away from her,” Alister commanded in a low tone.

Everest, or Ever, ignored him, sliding his hands into his jacket pockets and tilting his head to the side as he looked me over . . .

And Aaron’s messy corpse.

He let out an easy whistle. “Bolt cutters, nice. I was wondering how you managed to crack open the rib cage, but those would do it. Very DIY. I like it.” And then, with the same nonchalance as if he were simply inquiring about my plans for the weekend, he asked, “Do you know what you’re going to do with the body or are you winging it?”

“Jesus, Everest, this isn’t a fucking Murder 101 meetup,” said Nixon.

I ignored him.

He was obviously still pissy about getting stabbed in the hand.

I dropped Aaron’s heart on the plastic tarp I’d laid down, and it landed with a satisfyingly moistsquelch, sending a splatter of blood across the body and my shoes.

“I have a plan,” I began, looking again at Everest and trying to get a read on his intentions.

The man’s madness made him utterly indecipherable and unpredictable. Something to consider in the future, if I made it through tonight alive.

“Although the snow is a complication,” I admitted.

“Ooo, let me take a guess!” he replied as he squatted next to the tarp, placing his elbows on his knees as he continued to inspect the body with a keen eye.

My eyes darted from Everest to the twins.

Alister’s grip on Nixon relaxed as they watched their . . . friend? associate? . . . with varying expressions. Alister looked almost wary while the other wore his trademark perpetual scorn.

“The jaggedness of the split along the sternum is a result of using the bolt cutters. The breaks in the bodies found so far were much cleaner, along with the removal of the heart itself. Whoever killed the others likely had access to propersurgical tools, which means you probably aren’t our serial killer,” he began.

“However,” he continued, “I suspect that if we were to test this piece of shit’s blood, we’d find traces of the same drugs that were present in one of the victims . . .”

Surprise shot through me. The GHB I’d found in Aaron’s stash had been damning enough for him to die. Learning that one of the victims had been drugged with it before her death only confirmed that my decision to kill my “friend” had been the right one.

“But something tells me that has more to do with poetic justice than anything else,” Ever wheedled as he looked at me.

“He deserved to die.”

“No doubt, no doubt,” he murmured, bringing his hands up to steeple his fingers under his chin.

“This is bullshit,” Nixon began to argue before the other man snapped a single hand up in the air, effectively silencing him.

“You aren’t the one sacrificing the virgins,” Everest started, “but this is an undeniable response to their deaths. If you were a copycat killer, you would’ve picked another girl, another virgin, which this asshole was decidedly not. Not only would it have been an homage to the originalkiller, but it would have been much easier for you to overwhelm and kill another woman.

“Clearly, you wanted to make some sort of statement with what’s-his-face here, so I’m guessing you planned to move him to a more visible area? Leave his body to be found there, just like the others?”

I shrugged. That had been my plan, but I hadn’t counted on the snow creating tracks.

“Did he hurt you?” interrupted Alister with a growl.

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