Page 56 of Executing Malice

I want to. It’s burning at the back of my throat, a lump of hot coal tightening the muscles until I can’t breathe. But if I cry for someone I don’t even know, who I have seen infrequently in the oddest situations, that would only amplify just how pathetic I am. It would seal the coffin on how lonely and love-starved I am to get this emotional over nothing.

Because that’s what he is. He’s nothing. He’s no one. He’s a weirdo in a mask who gets off humiliating women.

Fingers trembling, I reach for the window button and let the glass slide down. With my free hand, I fish between my thighs and gingerly, I pluck the tail and free the toy. The bulbous pink silicone smeared in white release from my body. It dangles between my thumb and index finger like some foreign sea creature.

I momentarily consider slinging shooting it into the bush, but the environment is more important than my rage, not to mention I can’t have Jeremy and Logan finding it and asking their mother what it is.

So, I bring it inside with me. I take it to the trash and release it amongst all the other rubbish.

Then I take a long, hot shower where I lather every inch of me in body wash and scrub until I can no longer feel my skin. Until every tender area is a bright pink and raw.

I don’t feel better after. I don’t feel calm or justified. When I swaddle myself up in a fluffy, purple robe and march into my room, I’m livid. I’m ready to burn his house to the ground. I’m ready to kick him in the balls with steel-toed boots.

But since I don’t know where he lives and I told him to stay away from me, my next best option is calling Reed.

“Hey, you okay?”

I ignore the concern and delve straight into my request.

“I need an alarm.”

There’s a long stretch of silence on the other end that I know is Reed carefully considering my words.

“Is something wrong? Did something happen?”

I don’t think there is a single person in all of Jefferson that has an alarm. We don’t even have an alarm company. I would have to find someone in Mayfield and hope they’ll make the three-hour journey to put one in. but I’m also hoping Reed will have a better solution.

“No. I just ... I would feel safer,” I semi lie.

“Safer?”

Any other day, I would have laughed at the bemused tone. I’m not in a laughing mood.

“Look, I live here alone, and it would make me feel better.”

“You’ve lived there alone for five years. Why all of a sudden?”

Because I let a psychopath get into my head.

“What about a door camera?” I amend. “I just want to be notified if someone comes near the house.”

“Is someone bothering you?”

It’s awful, but I blurt, “The Rowe kids. They’ve been pulling some pranks.”

“Want me to talk to their mom?”

I roll my eyes. “Reed, damn it, I can tattle on my own, okay? I just want to know when they come around the house.”

“I’m not tattling,”he grumbles.“But, yeah, I’ll look into it.”

I thank him and hang up. The phone gets tossed down on my bed and I do the one thing I never thought I would have to do.

I lock every window. Every door. I even go so far as tucking a knife under my pillow just in case he decides to go for another nighttime snack.

The rest of the night is spent making a light supper of turkey sandwich on sourdough bread and thin slices of cheese I know I’m going to regret in the morning. But I don’t have icecream. As someone with an aversion to dairy, my guilty pleasures require moderation.

For tonight, it’s cheese.