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  He reeled, arms flailing.

  Tessa heard the clatter of the falling knife and the groan of wood as it gave way with a crack.

  She met his gaze one final time. His eyes stretched wide with panic as he sensed the open space behind his back.

  Then all at once, he vanished—the monster who had haunted her, the memory that had held her hostage for so long. He disappeared into the pitch-dark void below. Only a gaping hole remained where he had stood.

  27

  DARKNESS

  “There!”

  Eric leaned forward in his seat as his eyes landed on what looked like a narrow driveway. That had to be it. Sycamore Lane. He hit the gas, and the Ferrari’s engine roared as the car shot around the corner of the unmarked intersection.

  Proceed on the current route. Destination is ahead…

  Well, at least the GPS lady seemed confident. Eric didn’t quite share her enthusiasm. If anything, this road was even darker than the last one. Eric couldn’t see a thing beyond the arc of illumination provided by his headlights. Was this even a real street? The pavement left off after a few feet, and he felt the crunch of loose gravel beneath his tires. No sign of any houses yet. Just a clump of trees off to one side.

  Eric hoped to God that they were sycamores. If this wasn’t Tessa’s street, then he’d have to give in to the thought that made his stomach churn with fear. He might not get to her in time. He was lost.

  • • •

  Blair lay still in the darkness, unwilling to open his eyes for fear that he might lose the warm glow in the pit of his stomach. He’d been having the most satisfying dream.

  What was it about again? The details had already receded. He could only remember the sensation—that delicious prickle of desire, the anticipation of sweet fulfillment. Why did his dreams always end before he got to the good part? It was maddening, really. Just when he had his object within reach…

  He sighed and cracked his eyes open, blinking to clear his vision. He couldn’t see a thing. A cold wind blanketed him as he felt around with his hands. In some dim corner of his mind, he expected to feel the splintery surface of a wooden deck, but his fingers only encountered frozen ground. A few clumps of dried-up grass. Mostly rocks and hard-packed earth.

  Blair propped himself up on his elbows, ignoring the waves of dizziness. He must have hit his head. His eyes adjusted slowly to the dark of the moonless night, and a few indistinct memories filtered through the haze. He’d been on a deck in his dream. A wooden deck. At least, he thought it was a dream. When he looked up now, he could just make out the slats of the deck railing looming overhead. He must have fallen. But why was he up there? He had the vaguest recollection of standing and…swaying. Dancing. Slow dancing. Slow dancing with…

  Tessa.

  Blair sat bolt upright as it hit him. Tessa’s house. Tessa’s deck. Where was Tessa? Had she fallen too? Was she hurt?

  He got to his knees and groped around in a wide circle for any sign of another body. A burst of pain shot from his left shoulder, but he ignored it. “Tessa,” he whispered hoarsely. “Tessa, where are you?”

  He gave up after a moment. If she was down here, he couldn’t find any sign of her. She’d disappeared on him again. Just like the last time.

  Blair let out a yelp—the sound of a wounded animal, sick with rage and pain. Why was she always vanishing on him? Why wouldn’t she ever stay where he put her? He could never seem to keep her still, no matter how he tried. Even with all the pictures, it never felt like enough. Never satisfying. He wanted to freeze-frame more than just her image. He wanted her body and her soul that way—forever fixed in place—so he could enjoy her at his leisure.

  Had she abandoned him again now? If so, he’d make her live to regret it. One mistake he could forgive, but twice? Three times? No. For that she had to pay…

  He stood, swaying unsteadily on the sloped ground as he surveyed his surroundings. No way could he climb back up to the deck from there. Not with a bum shoulder. He’d have to scramble up the slope and go around to the front of the house. Cradling his bad arm to his chest, Blair began the slow trudge uphill.

  • • •

  Eric thought he heard a siren, ever so faint. He slowed the car and rolled down his window to listen. There. He heard the sound again more clearly. His eyes took in a faint glimmer of flashing lights.

  He hit the gas, and the car lurched over a rise in the road. At last the scene came into view below. Three cars? Maybe four? They were arrayed in an arc around a white clapboard house, reflecting pink in the rotating glow of the police cars’ beacons.

  Tessa’s house. It had to be. Had they gotten there in time?

  His eyes were fixed in the distance, straining to make out more details. He didn’t see the dark shape come up before him until it was inches from his front fender.

  “Jesus!” Eric slammed the brakes.

  The figure stood in front of the car, one arm raised against the glare of the headlights. Their eyes locked through the windshield glass—and in that instant, Eric understood.

  Medium height. Hoodie sweatshirt. Spindly arms and legs. It was the same figure that Eric had seen lurking in that wide, empty parking lot. But the eyes that stared back weren’t green.

  Brown eyes. Crooked nose. Sunken cheeks, darkened with five o’clock shadow. Not a fangirl after all.

  Eric’s jaw dropped open. How had he not seen it earlier? Tessa had told him the whole story over DM last night. He knew exactly who stood before him now.

  The other boy’s face registered recognition at the exact same moment. He side-stepped the car and ran.

  “Oh no you don’t!” Eric cut the engine and flung his car door open.

  He nearly made it back to the main road, huffing and puffing with exertion, by the time he finally caught up. If not for the sound of panting, Eric might have run right past the fleeing figure in the pitch-black night. Instead, he took a flying leap and tackled his prey to the ground.

  “Oomph!”

  Eric expected to overpower those toothpick limbs easily, but the other boy surprised him with his wiry strength. No match for Eric’s more muscular frame but enough to give Eric a run for his money. They rolled on the ground, locked together, and Eric gagged slightly at the overpowering stench that emanated from the boy’s clothes: a putrid mixture of sweat and flowery perfume.

  “Over here!” he shouted over his shoulder when he could manage to spare a breath. “Help! Police!”

  Eric turned his head back toward the figure locked in his embrace, and he felt something hard graze his temple. A rock. A glancing blow. One inch to the left, and he might have gotten his skull bashed in. This was getting out of hand. With one final burst of strength, Eric brought his fist down against the center of his adversary’s face. Then he flipped the other body over and caught hold of both wrists.

  “You disgusting piece of shit,” he growled as he pressed his weight down, pinning the bony frame to the ground.

  The boy only moaned in response. He stopped struggling. Had Eric knocked him out cold? Or was he merely playing dead, hoping Eric would relinquish his grasp?

  Eric pressed down on the wrists more firmly and called over his shoulder once again. “Police! Over here!”

  At last he heard their footfalls. He couldn’t see a thing out there in the darkened road, but the two officers came up over the rise with flashlights blazing. The beams swung over his shoulder and illuminated the form that lay on the ground beneath him.

  Eric turned again and met a pair of dazed eyes staring back. The voice began to mumble, half-intelligible. Eric could just make out a few disjointed words:

  “She’s mine… She said it…said the words…said she loved me… Tessa…”

  At the sound of her name, something inside Eric snapped. For a moment, the whole world went black and then bright crimson. The shouts of the police officers barely penetrated from somewhere far away.

  “Tessa…” the voice moaned beneath him. “I’ll never let her
go… I’ll never let her forget…”

  Eric picked up a jagged rock and slowly raised it overhead.

  THE INTERROGATION

  (FRAGMENT 11)

  December 31, 2016, 9:17 p.m.

  Case #: 124.678.21–001

  OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPTION OF POLICE INTERVIEW

  —START PAGE 11—

  HART: Oh God, I’m going to be sick.

  INVESTIGATOR: Tessa, you showed tremendous presence of mind tonight. You should be very proud of how you handled yourself.

  HART: But it was all my fault. I brought the whole thing on myself.

  INVESTIGATOR: Listen to me, Tessa. I hear that kind of nonsense all the time from victims. It’s absolutely not true.

  HART: Yes, it is true! I invited him here! Don’t you understand? I DM’ed with him for months!

  INVESTIGATOR: No, Tessa—

  HART: Months and months! It never even occurred to me that it was him.

  INVESTIGATOR: Tessa, the individual you’ve been talking to on Twitter was not the suspect.

  HART: Yes, it was! I’m sure now. I’m sure it was him!

  INVESTIGATOR: Oh, I don’t doubt that Blair Duncan was the individual who stalked you in New Orleans. He was enrolled in the same summer program, for photography. We found numerous pictures of you on his cell phone camera roll. We’ve got him dead to rights on unlawful surveillance and abduction charges. He should be going to prison for a long time.

  HART: But you just said—

  INVESTIGATOR 2: I don’t think she knows who she was talking to, Chuck.

  INVESTIGATOR: She didn’t see him at the scene?

  INVESTIGATOR 2: I believe the responding officers already had Ms. Hart in the squad car when he arrived. He followed them back to the station in his own vehicle.

  HART: No, no. He came with us in Dr. Regan’s car. He didn’t have a vehicle.

  INVESTIGATOR: No, Tessa, I’m not referring to Blair Duncan. He was arrested at the scene.

  HART: Wait. Then who are you talking about?

  INVESTIGATOR: Tessa, the person you’ve been chatting with on Twitter was not Blair Duncan. We believe that Mr. Duncan began following your Twitter account at some point during the time that he was stalking you. He was still following you when you left New Orleans and changed your username from @TessaHart to @TessaHeartsEric. He changed his own username at one point to @TheRealEricT and tweeted at you repeatedly in an attempt to engage you in conversation.

  HART: I remember that. That weird Eric Thorn impersonator account. I muted it. That was him?

  INVESTIGATOR: From what we can gather, he became frustrated when you didn’t follow him back and then even more enraged when he saw you followed @EricThornSucks. However, he was not the owner of the @EricThornSucks account.

  HART: But he knew everything we talked about. He knew so many details.

  INVESTIGATOR: We believe he became aware of your private messages with @EricThornSucks in September. If you recall, on September 20 at 11:25 p.m., @EricThornSucks tweeted publicly, and I quote: “@TessaHeartsEric I swear I’m not a bad guy. Talk to me? Please?” You then exchanged a few more public tweets, culminating with another tweet from @EricThornSucks stating, and I quote: “@TessaHeartsEric what happened? Follow me back so we can DM.”

  HART: And then I followed him.

  INVESTIGATOR: That public exchange apparently alerted Mr. Duncan to your ongoing private correspondence with @EricThornSucks. Mr. Duncan then hacked into the @EricThornSucks account.

  HART: But wait. Then why…why didn’t he just hack my account to begin with?

  INVESTIGATOR: He was able to guess the password on the @EricThornSucks account. You know, you should really have a talk with your boyfriend about cybersecurity. You would think someone in his position would know better—

  HART: What are you talking about? What boyfriend? Do you mean Scott?

  INVESTIGATOR: I apologize. He described your relationship as romantic in nature.

  HART: Who? Blair? He’s delusional!

  INVESTIGATOR: No, I’m sorry. I meant—

  HART: I’m so confused. You’re telling me there’s actually a Taylor. A real Taylor? You’ve actually talked to him?

  INVESTIGATOR: He’s here in the station. Who do you think alerted the authorities tonight? In fact, we owe him one for intercepting Blair Duncan fleeing the scene. Roughed him up pretty good, probably more than necessary, but—

  HART: Wait. He’s still here? Right now? He’s here in the station?

  INVESTIGATOR: Yes. He gave us a lengthy statement. He’s anxious to speak with you.

  HART: Is his name really Taylor?

  INVESTIGATOR: No.

  INVESTIGATOR 2: Chuck, go easy. She’s had a long day already.

  INVESTIGATOR: Well, this should be interesting.

  HART: What? What should be interesting?

  INVESTIGATOR: Tessa, would you like us to bring him in here to meet you?

  HART: Yes!

  INVESTIGATOR: OK. I’ll go get him. But, Tessa, I think you’d better sit down.

  —END OF TRANSCRIPT—

  28

  FANGIRLING

  Tessa sat alone in the empty interrogation room, her mind whirring with unanswered questions. One of the police officers had given her a scratchy gray wool blanket, and she clutched it tight around her shoulders. How was it possible, she wondered, that she wasn’t completely overcome with panic right now? She’d just stood face-to-face with her predator. How was she not a mass of quivering jelly on the floor?

  Maybe the shock would hit her later. She probably shouldn’t be alone…but she wouldn’t be alone for long. Tessa’s stomach fluttered at the thought. Taylor would be with her soon. Or whatever his name was… It didn’t really matter. What mattered was that he existed.

  Tessa’s leg bounced nervously beneath the table. Something else still niggled at the back of her mind. Some detail didn’t add up in the story the police told her. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but she felt a tingle of misgiving mixed in with the anticipation. They’d overlooked something. She knew they had. But what? What could it be…

  She gasped as it hit her. “They said Taylor sent the police to my house, but he couldn’t have. I never told him where I lived!”

  A voice sounded behind her, and Tessa turned in her chair.

  “Yeah, I think that creep was counting on it that I didn’t have your address.”

  Tessa’s grip on the blanket slackened as her eyes focused on the face that had spoken. Her mouth fell open and then formed soundless words: Oh my God.

  “I got it from my manager. He had your contact info.”

  “You’re Eric Thorn,” she whispered in response.

  He stood uncertainly in the doorway, waiting for her to speak. He had one hand jammed in the pocket of his leather jacket, and he ran the other hand through his shaggy mop of hair, smoothing it away from his forehead. He took a hesitant step in her direction. “Hi, Tessa.”

  “You’re Eric Thorn,” she said again, a little louder.

  “Eric Taylor Thorn,” he corrected with a trace of a cocky grin on his lips. “You’d think a superfan like you would know my middle name.”

  “What… Why…why are you… I don’t understand.”

  He pulled out the metal chair beside her and took a seat at the interrogation table. She watched him, still confused. He fished for something in his jacket pocket. At last he took it out and set it on the table.

  A pink rabbit’s foot.

  At the sight of it, Tessa felt the familiar choke hold of anxiety closing around her throat. She hugged the blanket tighter, her thoughts scattering. Why did he have the rabbit’s foot? Had the police given it to him? Was he here for publicity right now? Still part of the contest?

  “Tessa, don’t you get it?” His hand flitted to her shoulder. “I’m Taylor. I’m the guy you were talking to all this time.”

  “No, you’re not,” she said. “You’re Eric Thorn.”

  “I used my mid
dle name.”

  “No!” She shrugged his hand away. The tight feeling spread to her chest now, and she forced herself to breathe.

  Eric one…Eric two…

  Tessa shook her head. It wasn’t working. “You’re Eric Thorn. You’re not a real person.”

  Eric’s smile faltered. “What does that even mean?”

  “Where’s the real Taylor? They told me there was a real Taylor.”

  She turned toward the entrance of the room, expecting to see someone else, but the doorway stood empty. She cast her eyes wildly about the room, searching for answers to the questions rushing through her head. Had it all just been a game, then? She hadn’t been talking to a real guy after all? A guy who wanted to be with her? Just a pop star who liked to amuse himself by playing tricks on unsuspecting fans?

  “No, Tessa. You’re not hearing me…”

  She stopped listening as her gaze landed on his face. The corners of his mouth kept twitching. Was he laughing?

  “No,” she whispered. “It isn’t true. Please tell me this is a joke.”

  “It’s not a joke,” he said, even as his smile deepened.

  “You’re laughing. You think this is funny?”

  “No!” His lips straightened, but his eyes still danced with amusement. “Well, maybe just a little,” he confessed. “You have to admit, Tessa, it would’ve been the Catfish episode to end all Catfish episodes.”

  She just stared at him, unable to believe what she was hearing. All that time on Twitter…all those months and months…

  As the truth sank in, the panic left her, chased away by the bitter taste of anger.

  “No?” he added, still smirking. “Come on! You have my poster hanging above your bed. You wrote a story about me called ‘Obsessed’! And now it turns out that I’m the one you’ve been talking to?”

  Tessa’s head reared back, and the metal chair screeched against the floor as she sprang abruptly to her feet. She watched in disbelief as he grinned up at her and laughed.