CHAPTER 53 HANNAH

53

Hannah

"DO YOU WANT TO hear my idea?" Malcolm asked again, licking his lip. Just the thought of it seemed to excite him. He was growing hard; she could see it through his jeans. Every instinct in her body told her she should tell him no, let him do his worst, because somehow she understood even if he killed her, it would be better than what he was about to propose.

Malcolm tugged out his own phone from his back pocket and tapped through several screens. "Maybe it's better I show you." He found the image he was looking for, studied it intently for a few seconds, then held it out to her. It was a picture of that cheerleader, Marcie Holden. She was sitting in the same spot where Hannah was now. Both her wrists were red. The pieces of two zip ties were on the floor under the table.

Malcolm swiped left and brought up another picture. In this one, Marcie was naked, cowering against the side of the grand-father clock. One arm stretched across her breasts, her other hand covering her crotch. Her face was streaked with tears. A smile spread across Malcolm's face as he brought up the next image; he stared at it for a long moment before showing it to Hannah—Marcie trying not to look at the camera, crying for sure. She was on her back on the dusty hallway floor, touching herself even though she clearly didn't want to.

Hannah tried to turn away, but Malcolm grabbed her by the chin and twisted her head back toward the small screen.

"If you want to live, you'll let me do things to you," Malcolm said in that horrible gravelly voice. "Unspeakable things. I'm going to film it, take pictures. Whatever I want. We don't finish until I say we're finished. When we're done. When I'm done , I'll let you go, just like I did with Marcie Holden. But … and here's the important part, the part you need to completely understand … if you tell a single person about today, if you even hint about it, all the pictures and videos will go online. I'll post them publicly, every social media platform. I'll send copies to your friends, your parents, your teachers—and make sure everyone sees them." He brought the tip of the screwdriver to her face, less than an inch from her eye, and slid it down her cheek. "Aside from me, you're the only person to see those photos of Marcie. I promised her I wouldn't share them, and I kept that promise. You've seen her around school— after she came back —so you know I let her go. You do as I ask, and I'll let you go, too. We'll move forward and pretend today never happened."

It had happened last fall. Marcie Holden vanished for three days. When she appeared again, she told everyone she'd run off with a boy she met online, she'd been in New York. She refused to give anyone his name, not even her parents or the police. When they asked to examine her phone, she handed it over, but not before telling them she had wiped it of all data. The police had dropped it after that, and although Marcie's parents had probably pressed the issue at home, Hannah hadn't heard much else about it. Marcie was back and safe, and that was all anyone really cared about. She'd gotten quiet, though, dropped out of cheerleading and her other after-school activities.

Several of the flies found the icy spot on Malcolm's cheek and appeared to be hungrily lapping at it. The spot had grown larger. Not much, but it had. Malcolm did nothing to drive the flies away. Instead, he raised the screwdriver back to Hannah's eye. "If I have to kill you, I will, but I don't want to. What happens next depends entirely on you. If you're willing to do as I ask, everything I tell you to do , nod your head one time."

Hannah knew she had no choice; she nodded.

"Good." The yellow smile returned to Malcolm's face. "That's my girl. I told you we wouldn't have to kill her."

At first, Hannah wasn't sure she heard that last part correctly. The we again, but then he said—

"I always do … You think I'm some sort of idiot?"

—and Hannah was certain: He was talking to someone else.

Someone who wasn't there.

Malcolm slipped the screwdriver back into his pocket and reached for a drawer in the table at Hannah's side. He took out a small burlap sack and tugged it down over his head. Two eye holes had been cut out, another near his mouth. He twisted the mask around, positioned it so he could see out. "This will all be over soon."