Page 133 of He Sees You

"You're part of this?"

"Someone needs to prepare the girls. Teach them how to behave, how to please. I specialize in... training."

The rage returns, white-hot.

This woman taught me multiplication.

Read me stories.

Sent home notes about what a good student I was.

"How many?" I ask.

"Does it matter? They were already broken when they arrived."

I empty the rest of the gun into her.

Six shots.

She dies instantly, which feels like mercy she didn't deserve.

Silence falls.

Eight bodies cooling in spreading pools of blood.

My father stands in the corner, splattered but untouched, shaking.

"It's done," he says. "You've destroyed it all. Can I go now?"

"No, Dad. We're just getting started."

Cain retrieves the ledgers, the photos, everything that documents the network.

We'll burn it all, but first my father needs to make some calls.

"Your contacts in Albany, Burlington, Montreal—call them. Tell them the route is closed. Permanently. Tell them Sheriff Sterling is out of business."

"They won't believe?—"

Cain presses his knife to Sterling's throat. "Make them believe you."

He makes seven calls.

Each one burns another bridge, destroys another connection.

By the time he's done, thirty years of network building is ash.

Thalia's vans arrive as promised.

The girls are loaded quickly, the youngest rushed for medical attention.

They'll disappear into safe houses, get new identities, new lives.

We'll never know what becomes of them, and that's how it should be.

When the vans disappear into the darkness, it's just us three and the dead.

"Now?" Sterling asks. "Do you kill me now?"