“Bad habit.” I turned the cigarette in my hand as he struggled to push himself up. Putting my foot on his chest, I shook my head and took another drag, causing the end to glow orange.
“What happened to Ella’s mother?”
“I don’t know.” He shook his head, and I smiled before pressing the cigarette against his cheek.
“I’ve heard some interesting stories about you.” I raised my voice to be heard over his groans. “Ella told me all about the skeletons in your closet.”
His eyes widened but he didn’t speak.
“She just wants to know what happened to her mother.” Taking another drag, I flicked my ashes onto his shirt. “Fine.” I bent over, poised to burn him again as sweat ran down my forehead.
“She’s dead.” He waved his hands between us to keep me from hurting him again. I closed my eyes, knowing it was going to destroy Ella. “She wanted to go to the police. She didn’t want to be with me.”
“What did you do?”
“I made sure she could never leave me again. She deserved it! She ripped my heart to pieces!”
“Where is she?”
“She’s under the dirt floor of the basement… in pieces.” His mouth twisted in a sick grin. “She can’t ever leave me now.”
“You sick fuck. How could you do that to Ella?”
“Tell Mikaella,” he swallowed hard. “Tell her that her mother begged for her life. Tell her the last thing she heard was me telling her I’d find our daughter and bury her pieces right next to her.”
Most would look at him as a helpless old man, but I could see the darkness in his eyes. I pulled the gun from the back of my jeans and squeezed the trigger, the echo of the shot deafening in the empty space.
I wiped my fingerprints from the gun with my shirt and dropped it beside his body as blood puddled on the steps underneath him. Even if I didn’t find Bryce, Coach’s gun being used as a murder weapon would draw them out like cockroaches. I knew he wasn’t the Dream Killer, but he had destroyed Ella’s dream of a normal life. He deserved his fate.
I glanced around the silent house before hurrying down the steps and looking out the front door for anyone else. I dug my keys from my pocket and got into the SUV, slowly creeping down the dirt road so I wouldn’t cause dust to kick up.
“What did he say?” Ella’s body was vibrating with anxiety. I couldn’t even look at her.
“She’s gone.”
My gaze fell to my bloodied hands on the wheel, my body shaking with unspent energy. It wasn’t enough. He had given up too quickly. It felt like I hadn’t done justice for the nameless woman or for Ella. He should have suffered for every unspeakable act he had committed, but he would play a vital role in a bigger plan that had been set in motion when I was only sixteen years old. Now I would get Bryce.
I wiped my hand over my face as I turned into an old abandoned gas station parking lot to gather my thoughts. I could hear sirens in the distance and adjusted the rearview mirror to see a police car approaching and disappearing past me on the road. My eyes focused on my own reflection, seeing blood smeared over my eye and down my jaw. I took the hat off and tossed it on the passenger seat.
“Fuck.” I grabbed my shirt and pulled it off, using it to rub my face clean and then my hands. Ella grabbed a bottle of water from the floor to make the shirt damp and scrubbed what had begun to dry on my skin.
I had been careless, my feelings for Ella clouding my judgment. I examined my knuckles for cuts or scrapes, but my skin was flawless, and I sighed with relief that I hadn’t left any of my own blood behind. I glanced at my reflection again, and only empty blue eyes stared back at me. I put the car in drive, pulled back onto the road, and headed toward the hotel.
I waited for the lot to be empty before getting out, not wanting to be recognized by someone I knew. Luckily it was hot, and the fact that I was shirtless wouldn’t render me a second glance. I put on a pair of sunglasses and hurried to my room with the shirt and hat, my arm around Ella.
“Relax.” I rubbed my hand over her arm to soothe her. She forced a smile and slowed her pace so she wouldn’t draw any attention to us.
When we got inside the room, I fell back against the door, struggling to catch my breath. Ella’s back was to me, and I couldn’t tell if she was on the verge of breaking down.
“Say something. Anything.”
She turned to me, teary-eyed but smiling. “At least now I know.”
“It’s almost over.”
I ran through the shower quickly, changing into a pair of dark wash jeans and my favorite black Doors shirt. The concert was in two hours, and the guys were already doing sound checks over at Grayson’s Spot, the bar we were playing at that night. As I laced up my black Adidas sneakers, breaking news of a murder came on the news.