Page 24 of He Sees You

"Wha—" Roy's eyes flutter open, focusing first on the knife, then on me.

Recognition dawns slowly. "You'rehim. The one with the skulls."

I don't respond. Instead, I let him draw his own conclusions.

"We're the same," he says, voice gaining strength as his delusion builds. "Both hunting. Both watching. We could work together. Share her."

The suggestion that we're anything alike makes my stomach turn.

I press the knife against his throat, just enough to draw a single drop of blood.

"You think we're the same?" My voice is calm, conversational. "You take trophies from victims. I take out thetrash. You're not a hunter, Roy. You're just another piece of garbage I need to remove."

"She wants it," he says desperately. "Writing those books, putting those thoughts out there. She's asking for someone like us to?—"

I cut him off by stuffing pages from his notebook into his mouth.

His own sick fantasies, silencing him.

He tries to spit them out, but I hold his jaw closed until he gags on his own depravity.

"Celeste Sterling writes about monsters," I tell him, pulling the pages out so he can breathe. "But you're not a monster. Monsters have purpose. You're just a parasite."

The first cut is shallow, across his chest.

Not enough to kill, just enough to introduce the concept of what's coming.

Roy screams, the sound echoing through the forest.

No one will hear.

We're two miles from the nearest house, and the wind carries sound away from town.

I work carefully, the way my adoptive father taught me to dress deer.

He thought he was teaching me patience, respect for the animal.

He never knew he was teaching me to see the body as a puzzle to be taken apart piece by piece.

The difference is, deer don't deserve what they get.

Roy has earned every second of this.

"Please," he whimpers when I pause to select a different blade. "Please. I haven't touched her. I was just looking."

"Just looking." I test the edge of the skinning knife against my thumb. Perfect. "Is that what you told yourself about the girlin Columbus? The one whose license is in your bag? Were you 'just looking' at her too?"

His eyes widen.

He hadn't expected me to go through his things so thoroughly.

"They were willing," he tries. "They all?—"

The knife parts skin and muscle like butter.

Roy's scream turns into a gurgle as I open him up, careful to avoid the major arteries.

Not yet.