Page 25 of He Sees You

He needs to be conscious for this.

Needs to understand that every choice has consequences, and choosing to hunt Celeste was the last choice he got to make.

I hang him from the tree like the hunters do with deer, using the same rope that bound him.

Upside down, blood rushing to his head, keeping him conscious even as his life leaks out onto the platform.

The symbolism isn't lost on me—prey animals strung up for processing, returned to the food chain.

Except no animal will eat what's left of Roy.

Even scavengers have standards.

"You know what she wrote in her first book?" I ask conversationally as I work. Roy can't answer—shock has stolen his voice—but his eyes track me. "She wrote that monsters don't choose to be monsters. They're made. Shaped by trauma, by pain, by the failures of a system that should have protected the innocent."

I pull out her book, the prison library copy with his notes. "But you chose this, Roy. Every time you hurt someone, youchose. Every photo you took, every woman you followed, every sick fantasy you wrote—all choices."

The deer skull fits perfectly in his chest cavity once I've made enough room.

The ten-point buck I killed three days ago, cleaned and bleached, antlers spreading like a crown from the gore.

I position it carefully, making sure the empty eye sockets face outward.

Anyone who finds this will understand the message: the hunter became the hunted.

But I'm not done with the artistry.

Using Roy's blood, I write across the platform in careful letters.

A quote from Celeste's second book: "The difference between justice and revenge is who tells the story."

Let Sterling puzzle over that.

Let him wonder why the killer knows his daughter's work well enough to quote it from memory.

Roy's intestines unspool like rope, and I weave them through the branches in intricate patterns.

By the time the sun rises, they'll be frozen in place, a grotesque art installation that won't be found for weeks.

The snow that's starting to fall will cover any tracks, any evidence of my presence.

Roy will become another cautionary tale, another reason for people to lock their doors at night.

He's still breathing when I finish, though barely.

His eyes find mine one last time, and I see something that might be understanding.

Or maybe just the random firing of dying synapses.

Either way, his story is over.

I collect what I need—the single photo of Celeste at her window where she looks most like herself, lost in thought, surrounded by her childhood room, but somehow above it all.

The rest of his collection goes into a pile at the base of the tree.

I pour the accelerant from his own camping supplies over it, then light it with his matches.

The photos curl and blacken, Celeste's image consumed by flames over and over until nothing remains but ash.