Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 97364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 389(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 389(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
I tiptoe toward it, making sure I don’t step on any of the tiles he has strategically placed in their spot. No luck. It’s just a tool belt and several boxes of tile. I slowly make my way to the en suite bathroom. My curiosity is getting the best of me right now. He has everything moved out for the renovation, so I don’t know what I expect to find. There’s a sink, nothing on the worktop, a toilet with the lid up, and a bath-shower combination. I’m a little surprised the shower curtain is still up.
With a quick tug like I’m doing a big reveal, I slide the shower curtain to the side. Inside the bath is a black footlocker trunk with a heavy padlock on the front.
Close the curtain and walk away, Scarlet. My brain knows the right thing to do.
Not my room.
Not my trunk.
Not my business.
Maybe it’s where he plans to keep my body when he cuts me up into six manageable pieces: legs, arms, torso, head.
“You’re losing it,” I say, rolling my eyes as I slide the curtain closed. “Don’t cross that line.” Vocalizing my voice of reason seems to help. I’ve made it back downstairs. It’s time for my walk so I’m not late to Yimin’s.
I mist a few of my plants by the window and think about the trunk.
I shove my feet into my trainers and think about the trunk.
I grab a bottled water and think about the trunk.
“Fuck it.”
My name is Scarlet Stone and I would stick my hand in a biscuit barrel of poisonous snakes on the off chance that there might be one biscuit left.
Before reason has a chance to slay my deadly curiosity, I’m already ten seconds away from having the padlock removed. Daniel used to call me a thief. I preferred philanthropist. Perspective is a funny thing.
“Theo, if you don’t want me to get into here, then you really should invest in something more secure than a discount shop padlock.” I can talk to myself all I want, make excuses for my really bad behavior—even if justifying breaking the rules is ingrained in my DNA—but it still doesn’t make this right. If I’m completely honest, short a lock triggering a bomb, there is nothing he could use to keep me out of this trunk.
The good news? As I ease open the lid, I don’t find a cut-up body. However, as I sift through the content, I wonder if the former would be less disturbing.
“Oh my god, Theo …” I whisper.
Guns.
Knives.
Photos.
Newspaper articles.
“What. Are. You. Doing?”
University Of Kentucky’s Professor Kathryn Reed Found Dead in Her Home
I skim over the words. Murder. Survived by a son, Theodore Reed.
Another article.
Brian Reed Dies of Self-inflicted Gunshot Wound
His parents died. Suicide. Survived by a son, Theodore Reed.
Emotion hardens like a golf ball lodged in my throat. My hands feather over each sentence. I can’t believe the words jumping off the page.
Braxton Ames arrested in the murder of Kathryn Reed.
Another article.
Anonymous donor pays for University of Kentucky Professor, Kathryn Reed’s Funeral and donates two million dollars to memorial fund …
I need to walk away. In another life, one where I didn’t have a closely-estimated date with death, one where I still had internet access, one where I felt invested in the outcome of whatever this is … in that life, Theodore Reed’s secrets would consume me.
I need to walk away.
“There’s always your next life,” I mutter to myself as I close and lock the lid of the trunk as well as my painful curiosity.
OH MY GOD!
I’m dead. There is a hand over my mouth, my chest feels like a grenade just exploded, and a large arm wrapped around my waist has my back pinned to a solid body. My cancer must be pissed off it’s not going to get the chance to steal my life.
“Why are you in here?” The whisper at my ear is the Theodore Reed from my first day on Tybee Island. It’s the spawn of revenge and murder. This embrace holds no passion and even less of a promise that my lungs will ever receive oxygen again.
The calloused paw over my mouth prevents me from answering as my tears spring free. He’s going to kill me. My instincts were right.
“Are you going to scream?” The edge to his voice makes my knees tremble.
I shake my head.
His hand slides from my mouth. “Did you open it?”
I swallow back wave after wave of fear as he keeps my back pinned to his chest. “No,” I whisper, unable to find my true voice. “It’s locked.”
“You’re lying.”
“Everything is a lie.” My voice of reason is so much slower than my vocal impulsiveness.
“Open it.”
“I don’t have the—”
“OPEN THE FUCKING LOCK!”
Normal people who live sheltered lives would convince themselves that they could never die at the hands of a lover. I’ve known men who have killed their wives, mothers of their children, because they opened the wrong drawer in a wardrobe or arrived home from the supermarket thirty minutes too early. I hold no illusions that Theodore Reed won’t kill me.