Page 42

She doesn't move, but it takes her minutes to die, and by the time they're finished chanting, blood drips from the troughs cut into that slab. They remove their masks and approach with golden chalices, filling them with warm, fresh blood and walking away with blood-stained lips and teeth, blood dripping from corners of their mouths and chins.

And once they've all finished, the pews are removed from the room, and they resume their cocktail party around the dead girl's body like it's any other Wednesday night.

"It's eerie," I say. Bone Saw wipes his wet, gloved fingers on the front of my pants.

"That's a good word for it, I guess," he says. "These are the kind of people who really rule the world—the ones who tell us all to behave, to be obedient and work hard, not to hurt each other, and that those kinds of things matter. They don't matter at all."

"Declan said the only thing that really matters is power, and they have so much of it that they've just gotten bored."

"He isn't wrong."

"Why do you do this then? Do they care about you? Is this your family?"

"No," he says. "I was raised for this, and I enjoy it. And there's no other life for me. I told you—monsters can't exist in suburbia." His phone vibrates in his pocket, and he pulls it out.

I didn't even know he had a phone. He answers but doesn't speak from the time he brings it to his ear to when he puts it back in his pocket.

"Clean up on aisle five," he says. "Follow me. Don't lower your gaze the way you did when you were here with the De Rossis. Look at them. And don't speak."

"If you're not allowed to talk, why do you talk to me?"

"It's not that we're not allowed to talk. We don't talk or use names because then we'd learn to tell each other apart. They'd learn to tell us apart, too. Both could be problematic on both sides."

I follow him through the room toward another staircase leading to the upper floor, looking at them all as I pass, trying to catch their eye. They won't let me—not even for a second. Their own eyes drop to the ground as I pass.

They're afraid of me.

These people with blood-stained teeth, who, moments ago, were stabbing a young girl to death on a marble slab, are afraid…of me. Of what I am.

And it feels good.

Once upstairs, we make our way down the hall, past closed doors with screaming and moaning coming from inside until we reach one left open.

A woman, cuffed to the bed and ball-gagged, lies dead and bloody atop the sheets. In one corner of the room, the man who led the ritual earlier berates an older, heavier naked man.

"This is the third one, Senator," he says. "I'm having a hard time believing this is unintentional."

"I got carried away, Lawrence," the man replies. "I guess I don't know my own strength."

"Well, know mine," the man called Lawrence says. He looks at Bone Saw and nods, who, in one smooth motion, pulls a knife from his pocket and flips it open.

All color drains from the man's face, who hadn't noticed they weren't alone in the room until now.

"No!" the man screams. "No, no, don't! You wouldn't!"

But he will and he does. Lawrence steps aside and Bone Saw crosses the room in three strides and then drags the blade across his neck.Hegoes deep enough—so deep I see the bone when he steps to the side and the man crumples to the floor, his eyes as wide as saucers. Blood sprays from the wound, almost like in a fucking Quentin Tarantino movie.

"We won't tolerate sloppiness and impetuousness in this organization any longer, Senator. Sorry you had to learn the hard way." I watch the light in his eyes go out as he collapses into a bloody heap of flesh on the floor. "I'll send some others to help you take care of these two," he says to Bone Saw. "It doesn't look like your friend is much for heavy lifting."

EIGHT

"What'd you think?" Bone Saw asks. It's hours later when we're finally back in the car, leaving the complex.

"I didn't like it," I tell him, pulling off my mask.

"What specifically didn't you like?"

"I liked it when you slit that man's throat—he deserved it. And I liked the blood. But I didn't like what happened to the girls; I know I wouldn't like however they ended up there, and I didn't like putting them in barrels after they were drained. I don't want to play this game again."