The Drifter

C H A P T E R 6 7

C H A P T E R S I X T Y – S E V E N
Sleep with One Eye Open

I bolted.

Right across the road, I bolted, oblivious to the car that was cruising along. I didn't even respond when the driver honked at me for my sheer idiocy. Instead, I raced up to Aidan's front door and hammered my fist against the wood until he answered. He appeared perplexed and almost alarmed. Did he know something I didn't?

"Arianna," I breathed, realising just how unfit I was as I panted. "She's the – next – victim. Her house – now."

He stilled for a moment before grabbing his Audi R8 keys and unlocking the car from the front door. He threw himself into his car and reversed off the driveway immediately. He sped down the road as I fed him instructions to Arianna's house. He asked if we should call Detective Larkins and I told him, "not yet". She might have been okay. She might have just fallen asleep... had a nap...

But she hadn't replied for hours.

But the first letter of every name of the victims had spelt out my name. Perhaps it was coincidental, or it had been planned. After all, lots of students in school knew my past and the fate of my parents. I'm sure Delia must have told her friends everything she knew when she first discovered what happened with my parents. But Delia had been the targeted one. Maybe the truth had been staring at me the entire time if I had been smart enough to figure it out earlier.

Or Max was methodical and pedantic enough to ruminate and calculate every minor detail. It was disturbing how he'd risen to such a high level of calculation.

It was quiet between Aidan and I, both of us unsure of what to say to one another, except for the instructions to Arianna's house and Aidan's murmurs of responses. As we drifted through a road, I found myself thinking back to our conversation and I found some flaws and discrepancies throughout everything that had happened.

If Stephenson's murder was connected to the ones this summer...

"Do the police know it was Max behind Stephenson's murder?" I asked abruptly, my knee bouncing due to the trepidation that was coursing through my body. I needed to know Arianna was okay. The desperation rocketing through my veins was crippling. "You need to turn right."

Once upon a time Stephenson had been my boyfriend. Once upon a time I had cared for him like I did for Aidan and possibly loved him, though it was nothing compared to my feelings now. Once upon a time I had been there for him. Once upon a time Stephenson was alive with a full life ahead of him to do as he wanted.

"Yes."

"But Stephenson died due to blunt force trauma to the head... why differ tactics this year?" I hated the way I had said "tactics" to kill the victims... my friends... but I was having a hard-enough time sitting next to Aidan and not wanting to resent him considering he was the twin brother of a serial killer.

Good and bad. They say everyone is a concoction of both – that you can't just be wholly good or wholly bad. Everyone possessed a devil on their shoulder, but more people have the control to turn their head away and block out the demands. Everyone had their own morals they lived by. Everyone had their own thoughts and feelings, fantasies and secrets, darkness and happiness.

"I'd like to believe he didn't mean to kill Stephenson that day. That it was purely an accident. But I don't know. It's safe to say everything this summer has been planned down to the minute about what should happen. He can be intent when he wants to." He cleared his throat. "So, Addison-"

Planned down to the minute. Planned down to the minute. Remember that, okay?

Or do you already remember?