Was there even any point in trying?
Of course there is, he thought, disgusted with himself. This wasn’t like scoffing one too many cookies after dinner. There was only one way to get human meat short of breaking into a morgue or digging bodies outof a cemetery—ideas that unfortunately didn’t appeal at all. How long might they have been sitting there deteriorating? How would they taste, tough and dry and cold against his teeth?
True, he had eaten Jiménez cold. But there was something tasty about having hunted the gym bro himself. Not just for what he’d said at the gym, but for what he represented. Like his death was a bite out of everyone who’d ever made Emmett feel simultaneously less than and too much. Jiménez had deserved to be ingested, digested, rendered down to shit. In his black, corroded stone of a heart, Emmett believed they all did.
It frightened him to think that perhaps more than meat, what he craved was retribution.
You’ve already killed at least one person; what’s one more?
You’re probably going to prison anyway, so why not enjoy your freedom while you can?
Hypothetically, then: Who had hurt him? Whodeservedto be punished?
Emmett’s gut boiled with desire at the thought of the name.
But he didn’t even know where Hank was.
Even if he could track him down, was it smart? All these people in his orbit disappearing? After Georgina Hodge and Myra, a missing family member—a man he’d publicly accused of abusing him—could be an unnecessary risk.
A stranger, then.
Within seconds Emmett had Instagram open on his phone. One by one, he unblocked his trolls, trying to glean whether any of them lived locally.
The handle justintime meant nothing to him, but the profile pic associated with the account trigged something in Emmett’s memory. He opened the profile and understood at once.
J, his first-ever Grindr hookup. Full name Justin Matthews. Emmett opened his Grindr chat log and reminded himself of what Justin had written after they ran into each other at the gym:
I thought you looked familiar (sort of)
Fuck, what happened to you?
Good thing you’re at the gym
Saliva practically dribbled down his chin, his Hunger vengeful and razor-toothed.
Then the status indicator changed, showing Justin was active in the app. Located about a mile away.
Emmett had the urge to send a message, try to get him to bite. But would Justin not just dismiss him the moment he saw who was writing?
Safer perhaps to create a new profile, with more recent photos. He’d be unrecognizable. A wry new handle, too: meateater69.
He tapped out a message and hit send, Hunger drowning out his usual nerves. He was focused, lethal, a carnivore on the prowl.
It was only a matter of time before his prey stuck his head above the grass.
Abrrrrup!heralded his reply.
Hey handsome. Hope you’re hungry, because my meat is all-you-can-eat
CHAPTER 40
Justin would host.
Good—that would make things cleaner.
His apartment wasn’t the same one where they’d done this the first time, but it was in the same area, on the upper floor of a small, two-story building on Kemper Street that looked barely updated since the Johnson era.
Emmett wasn’t the same either. He was no longer twenty-three. He didn’t arrive with a belly roiling with nerves and self-doubt. He didn’t frantically message,I’m here, I’m outside, and when Justin didn’t immediately answer, panic that he’d been ghosted. He knew better than to knock and be scolded for waking Justin’s roommate if he had one. This time, he stood outside and tapped out a single word.
