The killer’s rage was now a living thing. It boiled inside of him, the heat building to a degree that he felt his intestines would burst from his soft belly, a boiling mass of shit and blood exploding from within him. He paced back and forth across the small motel room in Herndon, the pain inside him unable to let him rest. He had emptied his stomach contents completely over the last hour and though he had little left, he felt full of acid and bile. He needed a release.
They were keeping the girl close to their chests, holding and coddling her like a baby. She hadn’t left her house except to visit the boy, who he now knew to be behind the discovery of his cell phone number.
The boy and the hacker.
The hacker and the boy.
The hacker was not a problem any longer, but he still needed to be careful. He had to dispose of the boy. Lucas Neal Harrison had hung on long enough, and since he no longer needed him to entertain the girl and keep her distracted, the time had come, and his boiling rage would cool to a simmer once the boy was eliminated.
But first, he needed to send her a gift. She would be so happy to get it. He could see her face smiling as she held it and he would be in her life. He would know her even more. He moved the hacker’s head to the side of the freezer and grabbed the gift. It would only take a moment to wrap. The busy work cooled his insides and his roiling stomach calmed and grew silent. He sighed and thought only of her.