“Howdy. Your new girlfriend gone?”
“Oh fuck off.” I lean down and grab a handful of snow in my gloved hand, then toss it at Noah as he approaches.
“Dick.” Noah pulls off his glasses and gives me a dirty look as he cleans the snow splatters off with the front of his hoodie. “I guess that means you scared her off already?”
“She’s not my girlfriend. She’s a client.” But as I say it, I picture her on my guest bed, passed out with her underwear riding up her ass and her nipples pushing against her lace bra. I kept that image in my head last night as I violently jacked off in my bathroom, biting back the moans as I came harder than I had in months.
“Mmkay.” Noah walks past me, bends to scoops up snow, then turns back and presses a handful on my cheek. I yelp. “Come on. We’ve got things to discuss.”
I carefully laystrips of raw dough over the top of the two mini mince pies I’m finishing up. The crust forms the wordno. Once I get the design just right, I lay wax paper on top before wrapping them tightly with red plastic wrap. I slide the mince pies into the freezer.
“I find it funny you always have so many of them on hand.” Noah chuckles and leans down to scoop a giant spoonful of apple pie into his mouth. “It’s not like we use them that often.”
“Gross. Don’t talk with your mouth full.” I scoff as I turn on scalding hot water to rinse the mixing bowl I used to make the poison pies. I use the same bowl every time, and only ever use it for my special mince pies, but I’m extra careful so Sir Fluffy doesn’t get himself into trouble. “And you never know when we’ll need more than one.”
“Whatever, Wes. Come sit.” Noah’s impatient to discuss his top two targets. It’s only been a few days since we talked about the list, but he’s always super eager.
I settle down across from him and glance at the notebook. “You really want to do Chad Smith next?”
“Sure do.” He taps the table in front of me, where his notebook is open to a page in the middle with a list of names, bits of information scribbled around each one. I made Noah promise to never put this on his phone or laptop or anything. No need to make a digital record of all the people we’re planning to target. I’m not the only hacker out there.
Top of the list is Chad Smith, 26, Boston, Massachusetts. Hedge fund manager. Rapist. Likes his girls young. Targets sex workers. Smith graduated college after taking the six-year plan to get his undergraduate degree in Boston and has been working for a hedge fund for two years.
“Scorpion thinks this is the best next target.” Noah taps his fingeron the paper.
I grunt in response. I don’t love that we learn about so many of our targets from a dude on the dark web who calls himself Scorpion. Sure, I vet all the tips, and we make sure we have a good case outside of what information Noah’s anonymous source has given us, but still. For Chad Smith, we know a ton about him. His workplace address, his home address, his net worth, his friends and acquaintances, his social media presence—spoiler alert, he’s an asshole online.
“This fuckwit’s a rapist, and his girlfriend is sixteen years old.” Noah adjusts his glasses.
I grind my teeth together.Sixteen years old.I found that out after I hacked into Smith’s phone and found messages between him and a teenager, plus inappropriate images. Like fucked-up images of her. This guy really is scum. I also went back to his college years and pulled a bunch of sexual assault complaints filed against him. The women—all freshman—eventually dropped the accusations. They must’ve been paid off, threatened, or shamed into submission.
Noah likes to know the dirty details before he goes through with any eliminations. I hate knowing, but at least it gives me a solid justification for what we are doing.
After our family was murdered, and we realized the police weren’t getting anywhere, I managed to get into the police system and pull their list of suspects. The main detective on the case had been keeping case notes in a Google docs file.
Google docs. A kid could hack into it.
We suspected that once they’d figured out that our father was a gambler and he owed a ton of money to a group of not-nice people, they tried a lot less hard to find the murderer.
Dad was an alcoholic and got sober when Sia and I were babies, Noah was a toddler, and Ivy not yet born. But when we were in high school, he fell into gambling. It startedslowly, but eventually escalated until he owed more than he could possibly pay. Our parents had transferred the house into our mother’s name years before, and the loan shark tried to get my father to sell it and hand over the proceeds. He refused, and soon after, someone came in and killed our parents and Ivy. Noah, Sia, and I were all out of the house by then, but Ivy was still there.
The case is still officially unsolved.
It’s okay. We took care of it.
Noah had gotten a taste for justice. And vengeance. Just like my father, he was addicted. But when Sia found out what we were doing, she cut us out of her life.
In the end, it was like she was murdered that day, too.
I got better at hacking and digital detective work. So good that I dropped out of college to freelance.
“This guy in NYC actually kills women. Confirmed.” I tap on the second target on the list, who we call Joe Killer. “I haven’t found nearly as much information on him, but I got the police list of his suspected victims and where their bodies were discovered.”
I’ve become an expert at perusing the dark web to look for information. Chat rooms are a good place to monitor conversations about criminal activity, especially true crime junkies who are trying to solve cases before the cops do. It’s useful. Joe Killer targets homeless women and girls, and he finishes the job. Sometimes he’s not sexually assaulting them, just fucking killing them and dropping their bodies all over the city, making it hard to predict where he’ll hit next.
“Damn, that’s good.” Noah swallows the last bite of his pie and pushes his plate away from him. “Think you’ll beat Ruth this year? If not, we can add her to our list.” Noah tilts his head at me hopefully. “She’s creepy as hell.”
“I can’t believe you’re making a joke about killing an oldlady. She’s legit evil, but still.” I run my hand down my face. “Noah, about Chad?—”
