Page 15 of What’s Left of Us (What Left #3)

“No,” he says quickly, pointing to the pages again. “Just think about it. These go away before the FBI comes in. It’s none of their business if you have your affairs in order or not. But seeing as you have nothing, I’m going to guess no one ever went over this with you.”

I stare at him. “No, not really.”

I was arrested days after graduating high school. Of course I don’t have my fucking affairs in order. He’s supposed to be here representing me for a criminal case, not bringing up extra nonsense to distract me.

Looking away, I shake my head. “Put them away.”

“You should look-”

“Not right now,” I spit out. If I’m going to be badgered with questions about the case, this isn’t what I want to focus on. What is he up to?

“Very well.”

I hear his briefcase open again and turn, watching as he slides the papers back in place before he focuses on other things in there. He starts taking out notes, then photographs, and I sit and watch patiently. “Do you know who Beverly Heather is?”

“No.”

“She did a horrid news report on you immediately after your arrest,” he explains, and I try to figure out how long ago that was.

I believe it’s the second week in June but…

things blur together in here. “She wants attention. I think there’s an ulterior motive.

She skewed facts and made national news. But we’re going to use that.”

I stare at him blankly. “What?”

“You might not like it, but you have a fanbase. A large fanbase, which I can’t say I agree with,” McKinney says, wrinkling his nose.

“The Slayers are all over social media right now talking about you. It’s all a little skewed, and if you aren’t following serial killers, national news, things like that, your re-emergence is going under the radar.

But there does seem to be an uptick in people claiming to be fans of yours. ”

I frown. My chat with Sterling was brief at the hospital, but no one has mentioned anything like this to me. He couldn’t have given me a hint?

The last thing I need is a bunch of whack jobs trying to idolize my prior kills. I know there are more bodies, I’ve had the information relayed to me several times. But I don’t know if Porscha did or did not kill more people than she let on.

“The Slayers are divided on who the true CGS is,” Tobias goes on. “Many supporters are on your side, saying this is the legacy you’ve left behind. Others want it to be all on Porscha, claiming you were manipulated by a person in power at a young age.”

I squirm at that, memories threaten to resurface. I’m not sure if I like that angle. “How does this help me?”

“Porscha is going to be convicted of the five copycat murders that took place while you were in prison,” Tobias explains, folding his hands.

“My understanding is the FBI is still investigating the three additional deaths that took place since your disappearance, and they will question you about Kyle Wallsburg again.”

“I didn’t kill him,” I say automatically. “It’s part of the written statement I gave.”

He nods. I gave Sterling’s team what I could under advisement, and my attorney ensured that I only gave information pertinent to the location I was trapped in. The only other thing they asked about was which bodies I was responsible for.

I wasn’t supposed to answer in the statement, but I did it anyway.

I can’t remember the names of any of these new victims, because I didn’t kill them.

But I remember Wallsburg and his abrupt end.

Now that there’s evidence I didn’t willingly work with Porscha after she dragged me out of prison, they should believe me when I say I didn’t kill Kyle either.

“There were things about your original case that didn’t make sense,’ McKinney says, and I know what he’s hinting at. My spine stiffens, and my hands flex on the table. “The first victim, Natasha Odell, you weren’t even in Citrus Grove when she died.”

“I visited the Franks briefly,” I comment.

“For my foster care relocation. Tallahassee wasn’t working out so I came to Citrus Grove for a few days.

The Franks were nice enough, but I had my case worker with me and we were here to enroll in school and everything else before they moved me. It was in time with her death.”

McKinney scoffs. “Alastair, be straight with me. My job is to get you a fair sentencing, not to roll over while they talk about adding years to your sentence. You don’t have to continue to take on whatever horrors you were hiding from that girl.

Her mother isn’t dead, so she will eventually discover all the lies. ”

“Jo,” I say tightly. “Her name is Jo. You should know that.”

He sighs but nods. “Right, Jo. Just think about that when you speak with the agents. If you can share more details, it will challenge anything Porscha tells them. She has an attorney representing her as well, and although she has at least five additional cases unrelated to you, there’s still the question of how many of those girls you actually killed. ”

I lick my lips, turning to glare at the wall across from us. “What else do you need to tell me?”

“Professor Artemis was let go from the university the day you were found,” he continues, and that does surprise me.

“She’s tangled into the case, but I’m not sure how much.

Her program won’t continue. But if you perhaps had a rapport built with any of the students who came to see you over these past years, we could possibly use their testimony when we go to trial-”

“When?” I interrupt, turning to glare at him again. “I don’t want to repeat the past. I’m at fault for those deaths-”

“I don’t think you are,” McKinney challenges, raising an eyebrow at me.

“So I’m going to ask, one more time, before those agents come in, what really happened the night that Porscha supposedly died?

If you can tell me a seamless story, with every detail, I’ll believe you’re at fault for those fourteen deaths. ”

My jaw ticks even thinking about it. I have half a mind to just tell him to fuck off and leave me to deal with the FBI agents on my own, but his question reminds me too much of that fateful night.

“We both know that’s a lie.”

The words have barely left my lips when Porscha stabs something into my arm. Not something… the same thing she gives me over and over. It gives me a high, better than smoking weed, and causes me to disassociate.

Whenever I float like this, I always picture my mom. My mom, who died too young and left me all alone.

The homes that didn’t want me.

The foster siblings who didn’t care.

The schools that maybe saw issues but did nothing to intervene.

The families who let me down.

The friends I didn’t connect to because it’s better to be alone than be forgotten the moment I’m no longer there.

All the people who couldn’t give me the time of day…

I stumble into the wall, and vaguely I realize Porscha is shutting us in again. I can see the person across the room, hair hanging past the dingy sheet, the dim lighting in here…

“You can’t make me do this again,” I say, blinking over and over. I’m used to this by now, it shouldn’t affect me so much. It’s easier to slip into the high than fight it, but if I don’t fight it right now I’ll do something I seriously regret.

Porscha is busy dragging something across the room.

It’s a bag, and she struggles and sweats as she moves it around.

Every time I’ve come down to the cellar with Porscha, she already has someone in the basement.

I don’t pick the people, I can’t. But she reminds me how lonely I am, how no one listens like she can…

I take a step back and smack my head on the low ceiling. I should go find Jo. Or Vinny. Something feels wrong.

“Come on,” Porscha taunts, dropping the bag. I shake my head, afraid to know what’s inside it. “Let’s do one more since you interrupted me. You’re leaving soon. Leaving with my daughter of all people. This can be our last fling together. Our thing . Just you and me.”

I blink, trying to focus on the words. She’s right, when I move with Jo and Vinny this sick game ends. I won’t have her encouragement or her know-how, or the drugs to get me going enough to hurt another person. This ends the day I lease Citrus Grove.

Porscha’s become dependent on me, like I am on her. If she continues after I move, it’ll be with someone else. I don’t think she can handle doing this alone again when she always has my help.

Except this time.

“Who is she?”

Porscha waves a hand, gripping my elbow to drag me closer. “Come see! Come see, and then you’ll know. You’ll see why I had to.”

Unease creeps through the high. Her drugs are good, and I know I have an addiction to what she gives me, but I can fight it if I must. “Who?”

She pulls me across the room and I let her, glancing at the bag. It’s unzipped, and there’s a body -

Porscha is shoving the blade into my hand. The weight is familiar; this one is mine. We have the same blade, two copies, and usually we each use our own. The main difference is the color of the handle, but they inflict the same amount of damage. “Come on, just one cut…”

I’m stronger than Porscha physically, we both know it. I don’t resist as much when she positions the blade near the girl's arm, my eyes catching on her hair. Blonde. It’s always blondes with Porscha.

The girl doesn’t make a noise when Porscha guides my hand, digging into the flesh and drawing blood as we cut her together. It leaves the familiar, long gash, and as Porscha causes her to bleed I realize something about the sheet.

It’s sticky. This isn’t the first mark. She’s been down here for a while slicing her, and it doesn’t matter if it’s my blade or hers that she’s using; she was going to kill someone else once again. I interrupted it.

I need to see her. I always see the victims' faces; it’s something I need. I need to see who they were in life before I welcome their death.

Her attention is on my hand, guiding the movements, and she’s standing closer to the girl’s head instead of over here by the rest of her body. Using my other hand, I grab the sheet and toss it away so I can see her.

All at once, my interest in this dies. Something inside me breaks, and the person laying on the table, cut apart and bleeding to death is the last person I ever wanted to see here in the cellar. Her name is a whisper on my breath. “Joelle.”

“I picked her,” Porscha growls, and I feel her pushing the blade deeper. “She’s in this now. We have to finish or we’ll be found out!”

Rage builds in my chest, clouding out the hazy high, and my voice is firm when I speak, fighting her grip on my hand. She’s using both of hers now. “Don’t go any deeper.”

Joelle twitches and moans, and I realize she’s waking. I tear my grip away from Porscha, who looks at me with wide eyes. I don’t defy her, not down here in the basement when we have a victim.

She doesn’t usually have to guide my hand. I don’t resist the twisted side of me that wants someone else to suffer and writhe in pain. But that doesn’t include Jo. It never did.

Porscha sneers, and then her blade is in her hand. I don’t know if she had it tucked into a pocket or what but she has her own now. She twists, and it puts her further into the light.

She’s… red. When did she become red? There’s blood on her clothing and across her hands, and when I look down at my hands there’s blood on the backs where she held me, cutting Jo with the knife I held. She’s not just covered in a little blood… she’s soaked in it.

That anger that I work to suppress surges up, and I snarl at her. “How could you?”

Porscha just grins, and she lunges at Jo again. Her blade sinks into her arm and drags downward, deeper than before when I resisted her, and Jo’s eyes flutter open as she screams.

Grabbing Porscha, I tear her and the blade away from Jo. Mine falls to the floor someplace, but it doesn’t matter as I shove her as far as I can and step between them.

Her daughter. She brought her daughter here. My Killer. She doesn’t belong in this hell.

Porscha grins, kicking the bag. There’s definitely a body in there. Before I can go for Porscha, Jo’s speaking.

“A-Alastair?” Terror and guilt claw at me as I turn, her confused and horrified blue eyes peering up at me. I can see the pain in her gaze, the betrayal.

It’s because of me. I didn’t protect her, even when I thought she could be safe. My girlfriend, Porscha’s daughter… why did she have to become a victim?

“Jo-”

“Get away from my daughter!”

Turning, I meet Porscha’s wild gaze again. I can’t follow her train of thought, and I don’t know if this is part of her plan or if she’s just running with it. There’s a wildness to her eyes in the shadows, and I can already see where this is going.

Jo, me, Porscha, we’re not all meant to leave here alive. That would shatter the Citrus Grove Slayer facade. But now that I know it’s Jo, there is absolutely no way I can kill her.

I’ll do my best to protect her from the nightmare that is her mother, even if it’s the last thing that I do.

“Constantine.”

I snap my gaze around, glaring at McKinney. I didn’t mean to get lost in my thoughts, but the moment I betrayed Jo was the moment I decided to protect her from the monster lurking beneath her mother’s fake persona. I just didn’t know how far the ruse would go.

The door closes, and I tear my gaze from him to the other side of the visitation room. Sterling and Tyler are standing on the other side of the table, staring at me like they’ve never even seen me before.

I frown, shaking my head. Then I sniffle, and what the fuck is that? I don’t show weakness like that. Not before prison, not in here, and not right now in front of the goddamn FBI.

Something soft touches my cheek, and I jerk away at the touch to glare at McKinney. He has a tissue in his hand, and there’s something smug in his expression as he turns his gaze to our visitors.

“I believe that psychopaths don’t generally cry?” McKinney asks, tossing the tissue on the table. “They are incapable of genuine emotions, right? Well, as you can see, my client is genuinely distressed. Are you certain, after all this time, that you’re condemning the right criminal?”

Sterling and Tyler exchange a glance, and I wish I knew what was going on in their heads. More than that though, I need to know what’s going on in mine. I don’t cry. Not anymore.

But when it comes to Jo, all rules are off the table. There’s only three people left in the world that I would cry for, and one of them is standing in this room.