“Liam,” Gabriel says as he sets a hand on my shoulder. “Stop.”
Jesse seems to think Gabriel is telling me to stop pestering him, but I know Gabriel is telling me to stop fixating on these darker thoughts. What does he think I’m going to do if I find out Jesse was secretly killing humans? Off him myself?
Nah, I wouldn’t take away Gabriel’s precious friend just like that.
A phone starts ringing, tearing me away from those thoughts when my eyes drop down to the box where the ringing is coming from. Just as I thought, he wants to make contact with Jesse.
“Do you have a sharp knife?” I ask while Jesse stands, fixated on that box.
He’s so fixated on it that he doesn’t even hear me.
“Jesse!”
His attention snaps over to me. “Yes,” he replies before hurrying deeper into the house.
“You’re not opening that box. You don’t know what’s in it,” Gabriel says, sounding concerned.
“Think about it logically. If he wanted to kill Jesse, he—or whoever was here—would have killed him while he slept. Whitaker doesn’t want to kill him. He wants to manipulate him. He wants to prove that Jesse is like him.”
Gabriel looks toward the kitchen where Jesse had disappeared. “You think Jesse killed for him?” he whispers.
“I think he killedsomeone. I don’t know that he killed more than one,” I say quietly. “He’s not telling us everything.”
“Do you think Whitaker has something on him? Is that why he’s so adamant about keeping this between us?”
“I do,” I respond as Jesse rushes up just in time for the phone to stop ringing. I’m not concerned; it’ll begin ringing again soon.
“I’ll do it,” Jesse says, pulling on some gloves before shoving some at us. “This is my fucking mess.”
“Avoid the tape. Cut right down the middle and we’ll peel the paper off.”
Jesse glances at me. “You think they touched this without gloves on?”
“Imagine trying to peel up tape without tearing wrapping paper while wearing gloves. They were meticulous, trying to make the present appear as normal as it could. They wanted it tolook normal enough that you’d think nothing of it as you took it to Lacey.”
“Why would he call, then? It would give it all away.”
“Because he’s watching us,” Gabriel says as he begins looking around. “And knows we found it. Why else would it start ringing the second we noticed the box?”
Jesse whirls around, a look of rage on his face. “Why the fuck does he think he can control me? Why does he think he can tear his way into my life? I will never fucking go with him.”
“Shut down your Wi-Fi,” Gabriel orders. “If he was able to connect it to your Wi-Fi, simply shutting it down will stop him from being able to see us.”
Jesse quickly does so, but when he returns from unplugging the router, he looks close to crying. Gabriel pulls him in and gives him a squeeze, trying to comfort him as his world spirals out of control.
I can’t comfort him, but I don’t need to if I destroy the root of his problem. I run the knife along the top of the box, carefully cutting the paper away from it before handing it to Gabriel for safekeeping. Then I cut the box open and look in at two glassy eyes staring back at me.
The head sits on a bed of red and green tissue paper. In the man’s mouth is a cell phone that sticks out just enough that I could pull it out if I’d like.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck,” Jesse whispers.
“Do you know him?” Gabriel asks, voice quiet.
“Yeah… that’s Lacey’s boyfriend. Fuck.” Jesse seems nearly hysterical. I wonder if Whitaker is still watching and loving everything he’s putting Jesse through.
The phone starts ringing again so I reach for it, but Jesse’s hand stills mine. “I don’t want to talk to him. I don’t want to hear his voice.”
“Then leave the room,” I say as I pull the phone out and stare at Jesse, giving him enough time to flee, but he doesn’t. I accept the call and put it on speaker, not wanting to put the bloody phone anywhere near my face.
