My head reels as I glance between him and the bloodied corpse on the ground, my stomach churning and too many thoughts flying through my head. I can’t help him hide a dead body, but the thought of turning him in makes my entire body clench.
I can’t do this.
I can’t do any of what he’s asked of me. I have a career to think about, a promise made to my mother on her deathbed. Even being here in this moment is too much. If I’m caught or end up with any evidence on me, everything I’ve worked so hard for will be gone in an instant. Oh, fuck, what if I leave something behind here that can be traced back to me?
I could already be fucked.
I can’t explain why I’m here aside from the fact that I came to help a friend, but if that so-called friend refuses to claim self-defense, I have nothing. I can’t even come up with a good enough lie to make it make sense that Shiloh is here in this dark, hidden corner of the city. The truth will come out eventually, I’m sure.
If I’ve left evidence behind, though, Shiloh definitely has as well. He’s covered in blood, the red staining the green Snakes hoodie he wears. I don’t know how much of it is his and how much belongs to Iggy’s dad. Oh my God, Iggy’s dead dad could be soaked into the green hoodie I was so proud to have him wear, and that can be traced right back to me. I’m well and truly fucked here, and I know it. Reluctantly, I slowly nod at him, understanding what I have to do even though I want no part of this.
“Do you have a plan?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Shiloh says, exhaling the word like he’s relieved that I’m going to help him. “I do.”
“Fine. Let’s get this over with.”
Dead bodies are heavy.
Dead bodies are heavier when the clothing they wear is filled with rocks and stones.
I push Iggy’s dad into the water whole, not in pieces as Shiloh asked of me. There was no way I was about to start carving the man up like a Christmas turkey, but now that he’s sinking to the bottom of the ocean, I wonder if I should have.
We spent the last hour cleaning up the inside of the building, bleaching out the blood stains on the concrete as best we could with some cleaning supplies Shiloh found in a cupboard, andwrapping the body up in a discarded piece of cloth that could have been a car cover at one time. My hands ache from wrapping the fabric tightly around the corpse, making sure that no matter what happens, it won’t float away prematurely and disclose the burial at sea I just performed.
Shiloh said it wasn’t the best job of cleaning up a scene, but promised it would be good enough, drawing even more questions to the forefront of my mind. Now that the gruesome task of disposing of Iggy’s dad is over, I turn to him and find that his eyes are on mine, almost like he knows what he now owes me.
“The truth,” I whisper, my words catching in the cold and lingering between us in a wisp of chilled air.
“Okay,” he whispers back, offering a small nod.
“Is this the first time you killed someone?” I ask, the words trembling out of my mouth.
“No,” he whispers, wrapping his arms around himself like that will protect him from the questions I’ve earned answers to.
I bite back a demand to know exactly what missing people and discovered bodies he’s responsible for. Not because I don’t care to know their stories, but because if this ends with police, the less details I have the better. Still, I want to know something. Anything about how this happened. “How many?”
“Seven.”
I go numb because that isn’t what I expected. Seven people dead at his hands. One or maybe two really shitty people like Iggy’s dad, I could have made some sense of, but seven? “Shiloh…”
“I know.” The words are soft and fragile falling out of his mouth, and I take a small step away from him as I come to the last question that’s biting at my brain. The memory of the knife he had in his hand the night we met rattles me, and I have to know.
I have to ask, but I fear the answer.
“The night we met… Did you mean to hurt me? Kill me?”
“Donovan…”
“The truth,” I demand as my gut swoops and curls in on itself, because I already know.
“Yes,” he whispers, the word hardly audible over the rush of blood in my ears and the buzz of fear that creeps into my body.
“I can’t do this,” I say, taking a step away. “I’m done.”
“But I didn’t. You were beautiful and I couldn’t and now… I can’t. I don’t want to,” he murmurs, looking at me. Pleading with his eyes that I listen to him as he steps close to me.
I step away, crossing my arms as his face falls. “No. I’m done. I can’t do this, Shiloh. This? This is insane.”
