Rick swallowed, his throat tight. His stomach churned, and he swallowed again. He waited for panic to swallow him whole, but it didn’t. Instead, something else slid into place. A switch flicked on in his mind. He needed to fix this.
Rick’s gaze flicked around the room, taking everything in. The candles, tablecloth, and wine glasses. The smears of blood. His footprints… He hadn’t stepped in it yet, had he? He looked down, seeing his shoes were clean, and sighed in relief. Good. He had to keep them clean.
He pushed up from the chair and moved carefully around the table to crouch next to Graham. The pool of blood was spreading, darkening the wooden floor. Rick stared at it, then at the wounds, then at Graham’s face.
A wave of nausea rose, and Rick pressed his fist to his mouth until it passed. He couldn’t throw up. Not here. Not now. He needed to keep focus. His mind began stacking problems and solutions, one after another, clean and fast. First was Graham’s phone. It was on the counter. Rick walked over, picked it up with his sleeve over his hand, and stared at the screen. No notifications or missed calls. No messages either.
Rick put it down again. He didn’t know the passcode, not that it mattered. He wasn’t going to use it. He just couldn’t leave it visible. He glanced around the room, then down at his hands.
Gloves. He needed gloves. He walked into the kitchen and opened a drawer, pulled out a pair of yellow dish gloves and slid them on. He looked at the knife with blood still wet on it. He picked it up, carried it to the sink, and rinsed it. The water turned red, then pink, then eventually clear. He scrubbed it again and again and again, still seeing blood even though it had all washed away.
Once he was certain it was clean, he placed it on a towel and stared at it before moving on to the next job. His breathing steadied the longer he worked.
He could do this. He could handle this. People had accidents all the time. People made mistakes. People got away with things as well. He’d seen it in documentaries, in the headlines, in court cases that dragged on for years.
What Rick needed was a story. A great story that was believable.
Rick wiped the counter where water had splashed, then he went back into the dining room. The tablecloth was ruined. He grabbed it and tugged, pulling plates and cutlery into a clatter on the table as the cloth slid free. He bundled it tight, hiding the stains inside the folds.
He shouldn’t touch anything else without thinking. Every movement mattered now, especially if he was to make sure no evidence remained.
He looked down at Graham’s body again. He crouched and pressed two fingers to the side of Graham’s neck, and felt nothing. He didn’t feel relief. He didn’t feel grief. He felt… quiet. He stood and walked to the hallway, grabbed his coat, then stopped.
He was leaving too much evidence. He’d touched too many things. He went back inside and took every item from the table and put it in the dishwasher, then turned it on. He had to make it look as though Graham had still been alive after Rick had left.
Rick moved through the house, switching off lights he didn’t need, checking windows. He didn’t know why, but he did it anyway. Then he stopped in the living room and stared at the framed photos on the mantel.
Graham on a yacht with a woman Rick didn’t recognize. Graham holding a newborn baby. Graham smiling at an awards show beside a singer Rick had once hated for stealing all the attention. Graham had kept living after Rick’s career had stalled. Rick’s hands curled into fists, and he turned away before the anger could rise again.
Back in the dining room, he stood over the body and forced himself to think like Graham would have thought.
If Graham vanished tonight, who would notice? A wife? No ring. Rick didn’t remember Graham ever marrying. A girlfriend?Maybe. Friends? Clients? People in the industry? He would have had plans. Meetings. Someone would call.
But would anyone think to connect it to Rick?
Rick pressed a hand to his forehead, trying to hold onto the thread of logic. He couldn’t stay here all night. He had to move Graham, or he had to make it look like something else.
A break-in? A robbery? A random attack? Graham lived in a safe neighborhood. It would raise questions.
Rick’s eyes dropped to the knife block in the kitchen. To the clean countertops, which were now too clean. He swallowed again. He needed time to plan properly, and that meant one thing. He couldn’t leave Graham where anyone might walk in.
Rick grabbed a second towel and threw it over the blood on the floor, absorbing it and stopping it from spreading. He went to the hall closet and found a roll of black trash bags. He tore off several and set them on the table, hands moving quickly now.
He didn’t know what he was doing, not really. He just knew he couldn’t stop moving, because if he did, he might fall apart, so he crouched again and reached for Graham’s wrists.
Wrapping his fingers around them, Rick could feel Graham’s skin was already cooling. He flinched, then tightened his grip.
“Okay,” Rick murmured. “Okay. Okay.” He dragged the body a few inches, then paused. The sound was worse than the sight. The scrape of cloth against wood. The dead weight of a man who would never move again.
Rick paused, breathing hard and looking away. His mind flashed with a memory of Graham laughing in a studio years ago, clapping Rick on the back, telling him,This is it. This is your moment.
Rick squeezed his eyes shut. That memory didn’t help right then. He opened his eyes and looked down at Graham’s blank face. He expected to feel horror. Instead, a sick, quietsatisfaction slid through him. Graham wouldn’t tell him no ever again.
Rick’s stomach turned at the thought. Not because it was wrong, but because it felt good. He swallowed hard, forcing the feeling down because right then he had to focus on the job at hand. He hauled Graham another foot and then another.
He needed to get him somewhere out of sight, but where? Basement? Garage? Somewhere he could buy time and think. Rick’s gaze flicked toward the back door, toward the dark yard beyond it.
A plan began to form, thin and shaky. He could move him. He could clean more later. He could—
