The Rebel of Raleigh High (Raleigh Rebels #1)(2)

It’s the cold. Has to be. There’s no way he’d be so perfectly preserved otherwise. Honestly, I’m a little disappointed. A part of me was looking forward to seeing the bastard’s skin sloughing from his bones.

With quick hands I get to work, first grabbing the Bible and tossing it out of the grave, hissing between my teeth. Gary’s hands are next. I wrench them apart, then hinge his arms down by his sides, giving me room to unbutton his shirt and fold the material back. He’s wearing a vest, but that’s no big deal. I stand briefly so I can get my hand in my pocket, and then the short blade of my flick knife is gleaming brilliantly in the moonlight. The sharpened steel cuts through the thin polyester in two seconds flat.

Gary’s narrow, twisted pigeon chest hasn’t been rouged up like his face, and here I find the evidence of decay I was looking for. His skin’s pale, tinged an unhealthy blue, mottled like a fine-veined marble. And just off center of his torso, a little up and to the right, a small, neat, black hole with puckered edges punctures his skin.

Do morticians charge for sewing gunshot wounds closed? If they do, then Gary’s penny-pinching brother from Mississauga declined to cover the added expense. I never met him—the brother. In the three years I lived under the roof of Gary Quincy’s doublewide trailer, I only ever heard his brother’s voice on the other end of a telephone, and even then I knew I didn’t like the fucker.

“Had to make sure, Gaz,” I say. “Needed to see with my own two eyes. Now. Where’d you put it, hmm?” I pat down the pockets of his cheap suit pants, feeling around carefully…

I didn’t just come here to make sure Gary Quincy was dead, though that was a big part of this. I’ve spent the last two hours laboring in the dirt, digging his ass up, because he has something that belongs to me, something he took from me, and I want it back.

His pockets are empty. Juuuust fucking perfect. I lift his head, checking his throat, just to make sure, but it’s not there, either.

“You swallow it, Gary?” I ask, glancing at the knife I rested on the edge of the coffin. “Wouldn’t put it past you, you fucking psycho.” I take up the knife, dread lacing my bones as I survey the concave shell of his stomach, wondering if I have the stones to even proceed with such a fucking crazy idea. Cutting Gary open, unraveling his intestines, feeling around inside the cavities, nooks and crannies of his insides will not be something I’ll ever be able to forget. Something like that changes a person, I’m betting, and I don’t really feel like undertaking that type of a transformation right now. I like being able to sleep at night.

“Dorme, Passerotto. Shhh. Time to go to sleep.”

Fuck. No, not here. Not now. I push the voice aside, shivering away from the comforting warmth of it, and I’m left chilled to my core, a cold, angry fist closing around my heart.

“Fuck you, Gary,” I growl under my breath. “It wasn’t yours. You should have known I wouldn’t let you keep it.” Steeling myself, I pick up the knife and lower the blade, its shining tip hovering an inch above Gary’s stomach. I’m ready. I can do this. I’ll gut him from stem to sternum if it means I can reclaim what’s mine.

The knife meets Gary’s skin, and…

The moonlight strengthens for a second, the shadows inside the grave peeling back, and I catch an unexpected flash of gold out of the corner of my eye. A brisk gust of wind moans through the trees, and I stop dead.

There…in Gary’s right hand.

“Motherfucker,” I hiss. “I knew it. Couldn’t just leave it for me, could you? Had to make sure I never found it.” Prizing Gary’s fingers open takes work. I don’t even flinch when I feel the snap of his middle finger breaking, though. I actually have to fight the macabre urge to break even more of his bones as I pluck the small gold medallion attached to the delicate gold chain out of his palm and close my own hand around it.

Suddenly, I’m five years old again, watching owl-eyed as a woman with hair the color of sunshine kisses the small, golden medallion and tucks it inside her shirt. “St. Christopher, holy patron of travelers, protect and lead me safely on my journey.”

Jesus, the past is hitting hard tonight. It’s as if my close proximity to Gary’s empty carcass is opening all kinds of doors to the dead, and I can’t fucking take it a moment longer. Standing, freezing cold now that I’ve been still for a while and my sweat has cooled, I adopt a wide stance with my feet still planted on either side of the coffin, and I unzip my fly. “Sorry, Gary. But you and I both know you deserve this.”

Steam rises from the coffin as my piss splashes down onto Gary’s chest. I’ve been waiting for this for a long, long time. It feels…Damn, it feels fucking—

“Hold it right there, kid. Stop what you’re doing this instant!”

Oh, come on.

I tense, freezing in place, every part of me rigid.

The female voice behind me is alive with anger as she repeats her command. “I said stop what you’re doing, asshole!”

I risk a glance over my shoulder and my stomach sinks when I see the uniform. The badge. The gun aimed at the back of my head. “If you’re referring to the fact that I’m still pissing, Officer, then I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do. Stopping mid-flow is bad for the prostate.” I smile to myself, knowing I’m not helping matters. Fuck it though, right? I am going to be arrested. No doubt about it. And if my ass is getting thrown in jail for this, then I’ll be damned if I don’t finish what I started.