Page 14 of He Sees You

But on the man who's been watching her father's house for three weeks.

A drifter who's been asking questions about when the sheriff's daughter visits.

He thinks she'd make a pretty victim.

He has no idea he's already dead, that his body just hasn't figured it out yet.

This is what I do for her.

What I've been doing for two years.

Removing threats before they even know she exists.

The men who would hurt her, use her, diminish her light.

They disappear into these mountains, and the snow covers their screams, and the earth swallows their bones, and the only trace they leave is another skull for my collection.

The scanner comes alive once more.

Sheriff Sterling's voice, tight with something that might be fear: "I want a protective detail on my house starting tonight. Discreet. And someone find out if Celeste has arrived yet. Don't tell her why, just... make sure she's safe."

Oh, Sheriff.

Your daughter is safe.

Safer than she's ever been.

Because I've been removing threats for two years, clearing the path, making sure that when she finally came home, there would be nothing left that could hurt her.

Except me.

And I'm not going to hurt her.

I'm going to hollow her out and fill her with something better.

Something darker. Something true.

I set the doe skull on the porch, positioned so it faces the road.

Not for her—she won't see it today, but for him. For Sterling.

When he drives past later, checking the hermit's property like he always does when he's scared, he'll see it.

He'll know something's different.

He'll feel the change in the air, the shift in the hunt.

His daughter is home.

And so is the thing he's been hunting.

CHAPTER TWO

Celeste

The gravel driveway crunches under my tires, a sound that throws me back to seventeen years old, sneaking in past curfew.

Same sound, same house, same trees pressing in from all sides like they're trying to reclaim the property.