Page 21 of Lamb

I was moving through the woods. Somewhere close to home. I could feel that too. No, I was running. Running but standing stillas the ground clawed and swatted at my boots. Those seemed just as heavy as my arms, caked with mud and grass instead of a girl, as I glided one foot in front of the other.

I stopped short when I found myself behind the old well at the back of Prescott Estates. Though I didn’t remember the path I took to get me there. Here. To this spot. Rain was beating against the crumbling stonework, which was cracking with age, cold droplets dripping off my nose and through the thin fabric of my unbuttoned shirt. My chest heaved as I tried to focus on what I was doing and why I was doing it.

And why I was in such a hurry.

I hadn’t been to this spot in years. Since I was little and Tate used to tell me stories about the ghost that haunted these woods and this well and would climb up its walls and grab you if you weren’t careful. But I didn’t believe in ghosts anymore. I didn’t need to. Mankind was much more terrifying.

It didn’t take me more than a few seconds to shove the metal grate aside with one hand before depositing the figure I was holding into the depths of the giant hole in the earth. I watched her fall, that same black hair whipping around her face before revealing two bright-green eyes. Eyes I recognized. Eyes I remembered staring back at me when I ran a blade across her carotid artery. Eyes I watched the life drain out of at the same time her blood coated my hands.

Marisela’s eyes.

Panic had me reaching out an arm, leaning down as far as gravity would let me without toppling after her. One palm gripping the lip of the well, the other swatting at air… and vegetation… before clenching a handful of sheets.

I shot up in bed, throwing on a pair of shoes and shoving my arms through my trench coat before rushing down the hall and out the back entrance. Following the path I’d seen in my dream. Nightmare. Memory? Whatever the fuck it was. Only this time, I couldn’t hear the wind past the beating of my own heart in my chest and nothing clawed at me except from my own conscience.

As soon as I wrapped my fingers around the grate and tossed it aside, I could smell it. The odor of decomposition that wafted up from the depths of the well. It was faint. Barely discernible unless you knew what you were looking for. Bacteria breaking down the tissue on a cellular level. Hydrogen sulfide and methyl mercaptan. Similar to the stench of rotten eggs and wet cabbage if you were to leave it out in the sun for too long.

I twisted around, leaning my back against the side of the well as I sank into the mud. Because all of a sudden, everything was painfully clear as my mind tried to weave through the distortion of the chemicals in my brain and wrap itself around the truth.

There was a body floating in that water. I’d been the one to put it there. And I knew who it belonged to. Even if I didn’t want to accept it. Because I was pretty certain I loved this woman… almost as certain as I was that I’d killed her.

30

MARISELA

SEVERAL HOURS PRIOR

Ididn’t think he’d actually do it…

Not until I saw all the blood. So much blood. Seeping into the sheets and dripping onto the floor. Covering my feet and his hands. He stared back at me over a shoulder, his mask firmly in place but I didn’t need to see his face to know what he was looking for. My approval. He was trying to read me. Figure out if I was disgusted or appeased. If I was gonna scream and go running or if we were about to skip off towards our own version of a happily ever after.

It was no minor ask. Having someone kill for you. But my shadow man never hesitated. Not when he’d followed me out into the hall, my father’s men within shouting distance. Not when I’d used the spare key I made to unlock my mother’s bedroom door. Not when we crept up to theside of the bed or even when we’d found her eyes wide open and staring back at us.

She’d been so still, lifeless but breathing. The same way she’d been since the night my father had her dragged out of the house kicking and cursing. And spitting. I’d never seen my mother spit before that night. Now all she could do was drool.

She hadn’t bothered to fight us off. She’d barely made a sound as he ran the razor-sharp blade across the largest vein in her throat and we watched her bleed out in front of us. Almost like she’d been expecting it. Some lost part of her wanting and waiting for it.

It was the humane thing to do when you saw someone you loved suffering. I also couldn’t leave her behind…with him. I could only imagine what my father would do to her when he found out what I was planning. We’d taken that option from him.

And now that it was done, we could run away together. It seemed like a brilliant idea when you were both drugged out of your mind. Less brilliant when you were sober. But we had a few hours before that would happen.

I nodded once, and my shadow man tucked the blade back into his waistband as he leaned forward and pressed a hand to my mother’s throat and again to her wrist. We had to make sure she was dead if any of this was going to work.

I also didn’t have long before the extra Molly I’d slipped him wore off, and I couldn’t chance him changing his mind. Or me losing my nerve. I could already feel that warm sensation slipping away while my shadow man couldbarely stand upright. It was clear only one of us was a chronic user. It was the same one of us who knew shit about disposing of a body. Which meant I had no choice but to leave my mother lying here.

I knew it was selfish. Everything about tonight was. Because asking this stranger to slit my mother’s throat wasn’t just about putting her out of her misery. It was about ensuring no one could use her against me.

She would have understood, though. If she were in her right mind enough for me to explain it, she would have understood. At least, I hoped she would…

31

MARISELA

Inarrowed my glare at the figure in front of me. I couldn’t see him through the blindfold that covered most of my face and eyes. Couldn’t curse his name through the bite guard that was shoved into my mouth the first time I’d tried to scream out for help. But I could feel him. Looming over me. His shadow blocking the light that was so bright it pierced the thick fabric and heated my skin.

He didn’t speak as he poked at me with the tip of his bony finger. Grazing a hand over my rib cage, circling along the middle of my torso, and stopping just under my breast line. Tentative and curious.Creepy.

I waited for him to touch me again. Instead, he pulled his hand back. I felt the brush of his sleeve retracting as I took a deep, irritated breath through my nose. Everything smelled so clean. So sterile. Like bleach and alcohol and… bubblegum. The fruity pink kind.

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