Graveminder

he thought his father might even have some kind of secret life: lock picking, hot-wiring cars, and handgun proficiency were great preparation for a criminal. Byron smiled as he remembered how he used to imagine William as a comic-book villain training his son in his nefarious trade. I never would’ve guessed the truth. Now Byron saw these “hobbies” for what they were: preparation for the life he was now leading. It is a family trade.

The lock gave, and he turned the doorknob. He and Rebekkah stepped into the bloodstained trailer.

The dead girl sat on the end of the sofa where her mother’s corpse had been found. The bloodstained seat cushions had been flipped over, and a blanket was folded over the side where Daisha sat with her feet propped on the coffee table.

She lowered the water-damaged paperback novel she was reading and looked at them. “You could’ve knocked.”

“You knew we were here,” Byron said.

“Stealthy you’re not, Undertaker.” Daisha dog-eared the page she’d been reading, closed the book, and set it to the side.

Rebekkah stepped farther into the room. She didn’t sit, but she was close enough to Daisha that the dead girl could grab her without much effort.

“Troy is gone. He’s been taken to where he needed to go,” Rebekkah said.

“Thanks.” Daisha picked her book back up.

The combination of stress and exhaustion pushed Byron to his limit. “Daisha!”

The book fell, and Daisha lowered her feet to the floor with a thump. She leaned forward. The illusion of a normal, albeit peculiar, teen girl vanished. Her voice dropped to an inhuman gravel-laden tone. “You do not want to yell at me.” She stared directly at Byron. “Troy wasn’t alert yet. He hadn’t eaten enough or the right people. I did.”

Rebekkah started, “The right—”

“Gail. Paul. They made all the difference.” Daisha swept her arms out. “They talked to me. They gave me the food and drink I needed. I am myself, just ... different now.”

Silently, Rebekkah stepped closer to Daisha. She sat on the edge of the chair that was angled to the side of the sofa. “We didn’t come to argue ... or hunt you.”

The tension in the room decreased. Daisha pulled her gaze away from Byron and looked at Rebekkah. “So what do you want?”

Rebekkah smiled at her. “I need to find Cissy ... the woman who killed you.”

“ Troy killed me.”

“Because she made him,” Rebekkah said gently. “I need to find Cissy. I was hoping that you could take us to her, to where you were held.” She spoke to Daisha calmly, just as she had spoken with Troy, as if their acts weren’t deplorable. “I can find you and other dead. I can try that. Feeling for them, if there are others—”

“There are,” Daisha interrupted. Abruptly she stood and walked into the kitchen. She yanked open a drawer, upended it on the counter, and sifted through the tangle of items that fell out. Keys and pencils and papers were knocked to the floor and stuck in the congealed blood as she searched. She kept knocking things to the floor until she found what she apparently sought: a map.

Byron watched with macabre fascination as the dead girl stepped into the blood and tracked it across the floor as she returned to the sofa.

“Here.” Daisha spread out the map and stabbed a finger in an area against the farthest boundary of Claysville. “It was out here.”

“Cissy doesn’t live there,” Byron pointed out.

“I know what I know.” Daisha walked to the door and grabbed the doorknob. “Have a nice night, now.”

“Daisha?” Rebekkah’s voice drew both of their gazes. “My aunt is killing people.”

“So am I.”

“Yes, but you’re doing it because of what she did to you.” Rebekkah walked over and took Daisha’s hand. “I’m not going to lie and say I’m okay with what you did. You killed my grandmother ...”

No one spoke for a moment as Rebekkah’s voice faded; then Daisha whispered, “I didn’t want to. I couldn’t think. I just—” She stopped herself. “I did, though.”

“You did,” Rebekkah agreed. “And now I need you to help me.”

Daisha tilted her head. “Why?”

“Because I don’t know where Cissy is, because she’s already killed two people who then went out doing ... this.” Rebekkah pointed at the sofa where Gail had died. “She did this to you, and now I need your help. You warned me about Troy. I thought you might help me now. Help me find her?”

“And stop her?”

“Yes.” Rebekkah’s lips were pressed in a tight line, but she held the girl’s gaze.

For several moments they simply looked at each other; then Byron pointed at the primer-gray truck parked outside the trailer. “Whose is that?”

Daisha flashed her teeth at him in a feral smile. “Some guy I killed. I think you took him out of here, didn’t you?”

“I can start the truck, so she can ride with us.”

Both Rebekkah and Daisha turned to look at him.

“I can start it, too ... without hot-wiring it.” Daisha scooped up a set of keys from the floor and tossed them at Byron.

As they walked out to the truck and climbed in, Byron hoped they weren’t making a colossal mistake.

Chapter 50

THE RIDE TO THE EDGE OF CLAYSVILLE WAS MOSTLY SILENT. THE TRUCK’S radio was stuck on a radio station that seemed to mostly involve angry preaching, and the only CDs in the vehicle were twangy country albums that Daisha tossed out the window with gleeful yells of “Screw you, Paul.”

Rebekkah vacillated between the desire to protect Daisha and feeling anger toward her. Daisha was a victim, and Rebekkah’s job was to protect the dead. It didn’t matter whether they were in-the-grave dead, Hungry Dead, or those already in the land of the dead: they were hers to mind, to care for, and when necessary to take to the land of the dead.

“That way.” The dead girl’s voice was barely a whisper. “To the right there.”

Rebekkah wasn’t sure if it was fear or anger riding in the girl’s voice, but she reached out and squeezed Daisha’s hand. “What she did was wrong. She will answer for it.”

The look Daisha gave her was too brief to interpret. “Turn onto that road.”

On the other side of Rebekkah, Byron remained silent. He followed Daisha’s directions, but he offered no comments on them—or any response to Rebekkah’s remark.

The hilt of the knife Byron wore on his thigh bumped into her, and she glanced down at the holstered gun that he’d handed her when they slid into the truck. Holding it didn’t make her uncomfortable. The idea of using it on her aunt, however, did.

It’s not the first choice.

Byron pulled the truck off the road and into a cover of trees. Given the wooded area and the hour, they were fairly well hidden.

Byron got out of the truck and held out a hand. “I have a light.”

“I can see fine,” Daisha murmured from right beside him and Rebekkah.

Rebekkah hesitated before admitting, “I can, too, but if you ...”

“No.” Byron’s voice was strained. “I didn’t think about it when we were following Troy, but ... I can see okay without a light.”

Rebekkah glanced at him. To her, his eyes gleamed like an animal’s when any light glanced off them. She