The blood-stained fingers could barely grasp the pencil stub, but he scrawled some hen scratches. Willa leaned over Mama’s shoulder to read them: 7-9-3-7-4-2-0. Then Mister Ray dropped the pencil and grabbed Mama’s hand, willing her with his eyes to bend down closer. Serena Jo did, tucking an errant strand of hair behind her ear so she could hear the whispered words.
Willa didn’t know what the man said, but she saw Mama give one of her curt head shakes, the one that said, No way in hell is that happening. Mister Ray let out a small groan, lifted his other hand, and cupped the back of Mama’s head, forcing her ear right up against his lips.
A full minute passed. To her left, Otis shuffled his feet, eager to get back to witch-tracking. Willa turned the other way, only to see tears gliding down Cricket’s face. She wanted to ask him in the superior voice she used for cry-baby behavior if his tears were for the dying man or for the loss of future candy deliveries. She wanted to, but she couldn’t because of the painful lump in her throat. Harlan stood apart, silent and enigmatic. Nobody could do silent and enigmatic like Harlan.
Finally Mama leaned back. Mister Ray’s chest had stopped rising and falling. She closed his eyelids, placed both hands on his motionless ribcage, then stood and faced the group. She wasn’t crying, but her eyes looked as hard and bright as polished marbles.
Willa knew what those marbles meant: the witch was in for a world of hurt.
Otis reached down for the rifle next to the dead man, then handed it to Willa, watching Serena Jo’s face the entire time. “This is similar to the one she’s used on the range. Not much of a kick. She can handle it, and she’s less likely to kill one of us with it than with a handgun.”
Surprisingly, Mama didn’t argue. She gave him a nod, then said, “Willa, if I see you pointing that thing within a ten-foot radius of your brother, I’ll wear out your backside. I mean it, too.”
Willa swallowed, hard. Mama had never spanked her in her life. “I won’t.”
“Let’s go, then. Otis, you first, then Willa, Harlan, and Cricket. I’ll bring up the rear. Ears and hands from now on.”
That was Mama-speak for no talking, which was fine with Willa. She still had that painful lump in her throat after glancing back at Mister Ray.
Chapter 23
Fergus
“Ah, clever,” Fergus whispered. The basement door had slammed open again, and just before Lizzy shut it, he’d caught a glimpse of something on the stairs.
A motorcycle helmet.
That’s why his scythen hadn’t been pinging just before her basement entrances. She’d figured out a rudimentary barrier. Whether it actually had any effect, which seemed unlikely, or her belief in it created a placebo, was a mystery he would ponder and perhaps test later. At the moment, he must focus on the dangerous woman on the other side of the cage.
“You seem perkier than the last time I saw you,” Fergus said, noting the tiny black dots of her pupils, the opposite of how they normally appeared.
“Ray is dead,” she said in a deadpan voice.
Fergus ignored the sudden lack of oxygen in his lungs. “He was a good man, Lizzy. Shame on you.”
“A good man wouldn’t have kept me caged for months. A good man would have either killed me or freed me. Instead, he condemned me to purgatory.”
“And yet you figured out a way to roam about the warehouse whenever you liked. You could have left, but you didn’t. In the meantime, he kept you safe, clean, and fed. Yes, an absolute monster, that Ray.”
“Why would a creature such as myself worry about the nature of my victims? You think I care whether he was a good man or a bad man?”
“Actually, I do,” Fergus replied, warming to the notion that had been flitting about in his brain for a while now. “I think that’s why you didn’t kill him all those times you had the chance. I think that’s why you chose only certain victims from the village. Skeeter, elucidate us on the nature of the two people Lizzy crucified. What were they like? Good folks or bad folks, would you say?”
Skeeter fixed him with an unblinking stare — an unspoken message. The old man had caught on to the stalling ploy. “Oh, tweren’t much good about either of ‘em. Everett was useful, in his own way. Strong, good hunter, but a rascal. Liked to force himself on the young women when he thought nobody was looking. Get ‘em up against a tree or in a dark corner and rub his crotch against ‘em. Everett the Perverett. That’s what people called him when him or his brother weren’t around.”
“And what about the young woman?” Fergus prompted, with a quick glance at Lizzy. She seemed captivated by the conversation. Had she not realized she’d been selecting victims who may have deserved punishment? The notion was intriguing. She’d probably been using her inherent, untrained scythen for years to sort the wheat from the chaff.
“Adelaide? She weren’t no peach. Willa told me she caught her torturing animals in the woods. Didn’t have no friends. Kept to herself. A real smart-aleck even when folks’d try to be nice to her. Sorry to say, I don’t think a single tear was shed when we found her in the tree.”
“See, Lizzy? You targeted victims worthy of your particular brand of justice. That’s why killing Ray bothers you. I can see it in your face, and I can sense it too.”
“Shut up,”
