“I didn’t ask if you wanted to.”
Ant made a hiccuping sound, then started to cry. He reached for the bottle.
“Don’t, Ant,” I said, frantic. “It’s poison. I’m telling the truth.”
Ant’s weeping grew soggy.
“I’m not a bad guy, I swear,” he said, gripping the bottle.
“I’m not a bad guy, I swear,” Ricky sang, dancing on his toes and mocking Ant. Then he swatted him upside the head. “You weren’t such a crybaby when you were holding Brenda down, were you?”
“Ant,” I said, the air gone heavy. “What’d you do to Brenda?”
Ant was choking on his own snot.
The crunch I’d heard moments ago returned, louder, and I realized it wasn’t coming from outside the cabin. It was coming from underground.
“Ant,” I said, my voice throaty with terror. “Where’s Ed?”
His eyes flicked to the trapdoor, then back to Ricky.
All my spit dried up. Ed was below our feet, would return any second. I couldn’t save both Junie and me, I realized that now. But if I kept talking, I could get her closer to the door, maybe close enough to make a run for it while I held Ricky off.
I began to slowly push her away from me, toward the entrance. “Why’d you change Brenda’s clothes, Ant?”
“Godo said it was the thing to do, no evidence,” Ant said, his voice pleading, his eyes two black quarries in the lost flesh of his face. “Will you tell your dad to help me, Heather? Please? And then we can play in the tunnels, like we used to. Can’t we? Can’t we make it like it used to be?”
“Shut up, man!” Ricky screamed. “You moron!” He snatched the bottle from Ant’s hand and spun around, striding over to shove it in my hand. “You’ve just been promoted. You’re my poison tester. Take it.”
Junie flew forward and tried to grab the Anacin bottle, but Ricky was too quick. He hooked her neck and pulled her to him. His eyes darted to the knife on the floor and then back to me, his message clear: he could cut Junie, or I could swallow a pill.
Those were the only two options.
I took the glass bottle, tipped it. A white tablet landed on my hand. It had numbers on it.
It could be Anacin.
I popped it into my mouth.
BETH
The scrape of him opening her prison door, its middle and bottom hinge pin still in place, was followed by a sliver of light.
Beth stabbed into the center of it.
Her strike came in low, embedding into his shoulder rather than his head. She popped the spike out, disappointed that only the tip had gone in. He shoved her back, flooding the room with the brightness of the flashlight he’d dropped.
He lunged for her while clutching his shoulder. She scooted backward to the far wall. He wasn’t a large man. In fact, he was only a few inches taller and twenty or thirty pounds heavier. That’s part of the reason she’d shushed her instincts when he came into the diner. He’d reminded her of a creepy but harmless Fonzie, ordering a Salisbury steak and his RC cola. Popping those Anacin. He looked like such a toy man, a strutting bantam rooster. She hadn’t taken him seriously even though her skin had clenched each time he walked into the diner.
“Name’s Ed,” he’d said that first day, “and you sure are pretty.”
Did that sound like the kind of guy who would lock a woman in a root cellar?
She’d be surprised to see herself right now, to realize she was grinning like a ghoul as she charged at him, bloody spike in her right hand, hinge pin in her left.
CHAPTER 52
“Chomp it!” Ricky sang. “I want to hear it grind.”
Something was happening underfoot. It was muffled, but it sounded like a fight. There wasn’t much time. I bit down. A bitterness swept my mouth, so strong it numbed my tongue.
“Whoo-ee!” Ricky said, releasing Junie so he could snatch the bottle out of my hand. “Ed was right about wasting people, how killing someone doesn’t change much at all. Your Wheaties taste the same the next morning. People smile back at you, just like always. But he was wrong about one thing. You know what that was?”
I shook my head. I would tackle him at the waist. Would that buy Junie enough time?
“He called me a baby for not going down to visit that girl. Who’s a baby now?” He tipped his head and dropped in an avalanche of pills, so many that some bounced off his teeth and hit the ground. He chewed up what made it inside, foamy flecks dotting his teeth. “Holy hell, now who’s as much of a badass as Ed Godo? Now who’s the goddamned Stearns County Killer? Let’s have some fun!”