ribs.
“Josh!” he yelled, though it came out as more of a croak.
Then he heard something else moving in the woods.
Sal Morton hadn’t cried in more than thirty years, but he was crying now. The shapeless, bleeding thing that his wife had become continued to twitch and gasp on the bed beside him, and rather than allow him to end her agony, the intruder forced Sal to answer a series of inane questions.
“I don’t know.”
“When was it?” The man’s foreign accent was heavy, his voice breathy and almost feminine.
“A long time ago. Years.”
“Where?”
Sal eyed his wife, watched her undulate. How could she even still be conscious?
“Please. Just kill her. Kill us both.”
“Where were you?”
“In town. At the hardware store. Jesus, please, can’t you let her die?”
The man did something with his knife, and the thing that was Maggie mewled like a sick kitten.
Sal reached for her, touched her, and this prompted more screams. He pulled back his hands and clenched his fists, shaking so badly he almost fell off the edge of the bed.
The man appeared amused.
“Will killing her help you focus?”
“Yes. Dear God, yes.”
“Then go ahead.”
The man offered Sal a pillow. Sal stared at it and wondered for the hundredth time if this was really happening, if this was real. Only a few minutes ago he was fishing, pondering the activities for the upcoming holiday weekend. Perhaps they would eat out, then see a scary movie to celebrate Halloween. But life changed when he walked into that bedroom. The whole world changed. He wasn’t ever going to a movie with Maggie again. Instead, he was going to murder her. Could he do it? Did he have the strength?
Sal closed his eyes, tried to picture Maggie the first time he saw her. A blind date. Sal could no longer remember who had set it up, but he remembered every second of their evening together. Maggie had worn a pink dress, her hair all styled up, and she giggled when she met him, obviously as pleased with his appearance as he’d been with hers. They’d gone bowling and had a wonderful time, even though neither of them possessed any skill or even particularly liked the game. Every year since then, on their anniversary, they’d go bowling. November fifteenth. Just a few weeks away.
“I can’t.” Sal dropped the pillow.
“You love her.”
“Yes.”
“She’s suffering. See?”
The man did something unspeakable to Maggie, and he kept doing it. Sal tried to shove him away, but the intruder had muscles like brick. Maggie made a sound that didn’t sound human, a gurgling moan of pure agony.
“Stop it! Please stop it!”
The man didn’t stop. He smiled.
“Only you can stop it, Sal.”
Crying out, Sal took the pillow and pressed it hard against what was left of Maggie’s mouth, putting his weight on it, trying to drown out her screams, her pain, her life.
She twitched under him, an oddly intimate sensation that reminded Sal of lovemaking. He sobbed and sobbed, and the twitching went on and on, and Sal couldn’t tell if it was her or him anymore, but he wasn’t going to stop, wasn’t going to check to see, had to make sure that she was safe, make absolutely sure that she didn’t hurt anymore.
“You killed her,” the man said. “You can get off her corpse now.”
Sal didn’t move. He felt a piercing grip on his shoulder and was tugged backward, the bloody pillow still held tight in his old hands.
Maggie’s ruined face was still, her remaining eye staring dully at Sal.
Then her chest shuddered and she gasped, sucking in air.
“Well,” the intruder said. “She’s a tough one.”
Sal squeezed his eyes closed, clamped his hands tight over his ears. He couldn’t take anymore. This wasn’t supposed to be happening. This isn’t how their lives together were supposed to end. He’d always pictured a quiet, peaceful death for them. Going to sleep and never waking up. Slipping in the shower and a quick bump on the head. Dying in a hospital bed, the morphine drowning out whatever killer lurked in their elderly bodies. Not like this. Not awful like this.
“Here.” The man handed Sal his knife. “Put it in her heart.”
Sal held the knife like he’d never seen one before. Maggie’s chest rose and fell, accompanied by a wet, rattling sound. He reached out tentatively, gently laying his fingers on her breastbone.
“Right there. Press down hard, so you get through the ribcage.”
Sal focused on the spot, trying to block out the reality of the act. This wasn’t his wife. He wasn’t killing her. This was a normal, routine task, like filleting a fish. A job that needed to get done. Unpleasant, but necessary.
Sal pushed down on the knife, forcing it in to the hilt, making himself stone for her sake. He held it until Maggie’s heart ceased to beat, until the vibrations in the knife’s handle stopped.
“That did the trick.” The intruder clapped him on the shoulder. “Congratulations, killer.”
The moment descended on Sal, pierced him. He cried out, an ineffectual curse at the universe for letting this happen, and then tried to pull the knife from his wife’s chest so he could plunge it into the monster who caused this. Sal tugged, but the knife stayed put.
“This knife is meant for more delicate work and has no blood groove,” the intruder said. “You have to twist it to break the suction.”
He demonstrated. There was a sound like an infant suckling. The man freed the blade and then wiped it clean on the bedsheets.
“Now let’s try to concentrate on answering my questions.”
Sal’s body shook, but he thrust out his chin at his tormentor.
“No. I won’t do it.”
Darkness seemed to spill out of the intruder’s eyes.
“Yes, you will. You think you know pain, old man? You know nothing of pain. You’ll answer every question I have and beg me to ask more of them.”
“No,” Sal said, folding his frail arms, silently swearing on Maggie’s head to not give this bastard the satisfaction. “You won’t get anything out of me.”
It took less than three minutes for the intruder to prove Sal wrong.
• • •
Fran Stauffer dumped the used coffee grounds into the garbage can beneath the cash register and wondered—not for the first time that night—why she had traded shifts with Jessie Lee.
Merv, whose name graced the marquee of the diner, had hired Jessie Lee back at the beginning of summer.
“She’s a kid, needs to work to help pay for her wedding,” Merv had said, winking in a way he thought was charming but Fran considered condescending. “Besides, it’ll give you some time off. You’ve been running this place solo for seven years.”
Fran could have objected, and Merv probably would have listened. But badly as Fran needed the money—and everyone in Safe Haven seemed to need money these days—fewer hours at Merv’s meant more time with Duncan. So Merv hired Jessie Lee, but more often than not Fran wound up working her shifts anyway.
Al, one of their regulars, had grown roots on the last counter stool. He held out an empty cup of coffee as if begging for change. Al was sixtyish, fat, and sported a walrus mustache that was waxed to little curls on either
