Page 132 of Wicked Little Secret
26
NYSSA
LOSE MYSELF - REYKO
My favorite holiday is Christmas.
We never had much growing up, but on Christmas, it was like we had everything. Mom did her best to make sure there was always a small collection of presents under the tree. She made hot cocoa and snowflake-shaped pancakes and took me around the neighborhood to see the Christmas lights.
It was often just the two of us, but I hadn’t needed anything else.
Even as I returned to school and was forced to listen to the extravagant holidays the likes of Heather Driscoll and Macey Eurwen had had.
When I arrive two hours away in Roseburg, the first snowflakes of the holiday are falling. Mom’s waiting at the train station to pick me up and drive me home. I step into the entrance hall of her modest townhouse and smile at the strung up lights and little Christmas tree she’s set up.
“Sorry it’s not bigger, Nys,” she says. “I know you love seeing all the lights on the tree.”
“Mom, this is great. Thank you.”
And I mean it.
But as I shrug off my puffer coat and unwind the scarf from my neck, the vibe feels off in more ways than one.
I’ve been unable to eat more than a bite or two of food since the Fairchild’s winter solstice party. My appetite’s nonexistent since I left the party and made one of the grimmest discoveries of my life.
As I sit down on Mom’s sofa and she happily boasts about the hot cocoa she’s making, I can’t help feeling like my visit evokes the same feeling out of me.
Some kind of bottomless feeling in my stomach, like I’m in a permanent state of free fall. She brings me steaming hot cocoa in my favorite cracked mug—the one with the tiny cartoon Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeers imprinted on the sides—and I force another smile to my face.
“What’s the matter, baby girl? You’re too quiet.”
“Am I? I guess I’m just…”
Tired is the word I mean to use but find that it wouldn’t be the whole truth. There are other emotions welled up inside me that refuse to be ignored. Emotions that would probably trouble Mom as much as they’re troubling me.
Confusion.
Guilt.
Dread.
The lack of triumph I thought I’d have this deep into my mission.
No more than twenty-four hours ago, I watched the man I’ve been seeing be hauled off by the police. I could’ve stopped it from happening; I could’ve warned him, yet I’d retreated into the darkness and let the police lights flood him.
In the moment, I was defiant. I was certain it was the right move tomake.
All the signs were there. All the clues.
The anonymous text told me where to go to find what I was looking for. A second text told me that the police would be on the way.
I had been drawing the Valentine Killer out for months, hoping I would incite him enough to reveal his identity.
Theron had been on my radar from the beginning.
He was on the short list of suspects, but if I was going to carry out the rest of my plan, I had to be sure. I had to get close to him.
I was pretending until I wasn’t.