“They were this amazing team. Dad worked a thankless job as a janitor—the true reason I pieced together the Boogeyman’s cleaning background—and Mom was a coroner. She was such a perky person for someone who dealt with death every day, and I was a little too comfortable around dead people, since she often had to take me to work with her. They took turns cooking, and they cleaned together. No one was ever more important than the other.”
Her eyes grow distant, as though she’s recalling a memory, and I watch her, unable to tear my own eyes away from her face. I’ve never seen such a serene look on her.
“They’d dance,” she says, her eyes sparking back to life as she meets my gaze again and smiles.
“Dance?”
“Every night after we went to bed, they’d stand in the living room, put on a slow song, and dance.” She clears her throat as her eyes water. “Mom would always have her head on Dad’s chest, and he’d be holding her to him with his eyes shut as they swayed off-rhythm to the music. Mom could sing so well, and she’d often sing as they danced.”
I brush a tear from her cheek with my thumb, and she leans into the touch.
“I would sneak out just to watch them dance. Sometimes Dad would catch me, but instead of scolding me, they’d have me dance with them. Same for Marcus. Even Jake was invited into the dancing ring on the nights he stayed over. It was a time so perfect that it eventually had to end in tragedy. Good things have a lesser reign than the bad.”
She exhales heavily, and she offers me a tight, less genuine smile.
“They were really in love. That must have been nice to grow up in,” I say, trying to encourage her to continue.
Her spark fades again as a coldness surfaces, confusing me.
“You see something for so long, and you take it for granted. In our minds, Marcus and I believed a love like that was common, easy to find, and effortless. In our minds, falling in love with someone had to be the simplest thing in the world.”
She presses her hand to my chest, holding it against my heart, and her eyes stay fixed there.
“We didn’t know how messy love could be or how jealous people would lash out.”
“Jealous people?”
Her eyes come up, and she releases her hand from my heart. “Everyone was envious of what my parents had. My father was a lowly janitor, but he was handsome. My mother was beautiful, and her smile could save the lives of the almost-dead. She radiated purity and warmth. Everything the opposite of me.”
“I’m sure there’s a little girl living with Lindy Wheeler who would object to that,” I remind her.
Her eyes harden again, and I decide not speaking would be a good idea. I have no idea what to say that won’t drive her farther into her own head.
“Lindy suffered. She knows how to offer comfort to another. The little girl is in good hands. I made sure of that. One good deed doesn’t make me the angel she accuses me of being. And I’m not even bothered by it. I don’t want to be an angel. I was like my mother, only a little more hotheaded and ready to defend myself. I was just like her other than that. I saw the good in everyone, and I smiled even when someone was trying to break me down. I thought I was so strong and so smart. The problem is, I saw good where no good even existed.”
“Like with Kyle?” I ask, an edge to my tone. Just knowing he touched her…
“Like with Kyle,” she repeats, her tone flat and emotionless. “I trusted him even after he’d proven himself to be a jackass. I never saw the pure evil in him until that night. And my brother was just as naïve. The two of us walked directly into that trap, unprepared and outmatched, with no chance of walking away. And we never saw it coming, because we never thought people could be that cruel.”
She blows out a breath, as though she’s keeping herself in check. I don’t press the issue or say anything, allowing her to tell the story however she wants to.
But if I hear the details from her mouth, I may end up joining her on her killing spree. I just don’t think I’m strong enough to hear her break down and tell me what they did without killing everyone else involved in all of it.
“We learned differently, and I shed the coat of naivety once I managed to survive. I made a promise to my brother that I intend to keep. A promise he knew I would be able to make. Now I only see the good when it’s there to see. I’m smarter. They made me smarter. They also made me what I am today—lethal and merciless. I have to believe there was a reason for that, and each time I save someone else from the same possible fate I suffered, I feel a bit closer to Marcus.”
My mind is fucked. All she has to do is ask me to join her, and I’ll be at her side. So I’m grateful that she doesn’t, because I’m not even sure what to feel about this.
“When the lights go off and the music is playing, I often think back to my mother dancing with my father. I was so young. My younger self didn’t understand how important it was to treasure and soak in all those memories. But the ones I have stay with me. Those memories kept me alive and helped drown out some of the nightmares.”
My thumb traces over her lip as I study her.
“Come on,” I say, rolling off her and standing up.
She looks at me like I’ve lost my mind until I flip on my phone and the music starts streaming through. Her eyes glisten almost instantly, and she smiles as I tug her hand, urging her to join me.
Naked in the middle of the bedroom, I pull her to me. Her head falls to my chest, and my lips press against the top of her head as I hold her as close as possible.
And we dance.