Page 74 of I Will Ruin You

Chairs turned over, the sofa pulled away from the wall. The stereo cabinet open, CDs and DVDs scattered.

“Billy?” she called out, unable to keep the fear out of her voice.

All the kitchen cupboards were open, dishes scattered about, broken. Boxes of cereal emptied onto the floor. A canister of flour upended. The oven door wide open. The lower freezer compartment of the refrigerator pulled out.

“Billy!” she screamed again.

She ran toward the back of the house to their bedroom. Dresser drawers yanked out, dumped. The closet open, the top shelf emptied. The mattress on its side up against the wall.

Lucy went to the top of the stairs that led down to Billy’s man cave. Her voice softer now, but still shaky. “Billy? You down there?”

Slowly, she descended the steps until she could take in the room. The tornado had been through here, too.

Still no Billy.

There was only the garage left to check out.

Lucy went out the back door, crossed the yard to the garage. Her hand still shaking, she turned the handle and entered.

Things were torn apart in here, too, but not to the same degree. The locker was wide open. What Lucy knew to be the most important item that should have been in there was gone.

“Billy?” she whispered.

There was a smell in the air. And not just one thing. There was a whiff of something unpleasant, almost... septic? But that was mixed with a more familiar aroma, something spicy. There was a closed take-out food box on the roof of the Camaro. Lucy lifted the lid an inch. Chicken wings slathered with orange hot sauce.

And then she spotted what had to be the source of the other smell.

Billy lay facedown, his head turned only slightly, his nose jammed into the concrete floor. His arms were splayed out at awkward angles, and a large puddle of blood spread out from under his torso.

Lucy screamed until she brought her own hand to her mouth to stifle it.

“Billy?” she said a few seconds later after taking her hand from her mouth and kneeling next to him. She touched his back lightly, gave him the slightest shove, as though trying to wake him from a nap.

“Billy?” she said again.

The toe of her shoe touched the slowly expanding blood pool. She stood, backed away, turned, and ran from the garage as though it were on fire.

Thirty-Five

Richard

Bonnie’s car was in the driveway when I got home, so I was betting she had already been to Mrs. Tibaldi’s and picked up Rachel, having seen my text.

I took a couple of deep breaths before I got out of the car and slipped quietly into the house. I did not announce my arrival. It was nearly ten. Maybe Bonnie’d gone to bed. Rachel would surely be asleep by now.

I gently set my keys into the decorative bowl on the table by the front door, slipped off my jacket, and hung it over the bottom post on the stairs.

When I went into the kitchen, I found Bonnie sitting there.

Looking at me.

“Oh hey,” I said. “I thought maybe you’d already gone up.”

“No,” she said flatly.

She had a coffee mug on the table in front of her, her finger looped into the handle. Bonnie didn’t usually drink coffee this late at night. But then I saw the empty wine bottle on the counter by the sink.

“Where were you?” she asked. It wasn’t a casual question. It carried an accusing tone.