Mind Games - Page 232

As he went limp, his hand slid up toward her throat.

He’d kill her. Time to graduate. He wanted her dead so he’d make her dead. Strangle her, beat her bloody. Stuff her in the closet and take off. Paid for two nights, he’d be smoke before anyone found her.

And no one would care.

“I care, Ray.”

Breath fast and short, he scrambled up. “You’re not here.”

“Right here, right inside that sick head of yours. Let’s get you dressed because I really don’t want to look at that pitiful thing.”

She put him back in prison blues because that’s all she’d give him.

Then she bolted out the door. “Come on, Ray, put some life in the game!”

She felt the wind, cold, icy, against her face as she ran. She heard her feet pound on the pavement as she ran for the street.

“I knew you’d be slow.” Timing it, timing it. “Such a loser.”

She dashed across the street. Screaming, he charged after her. The car hit him head-on, sending his body flying up before it hit the ground.

As the cars she’d built in faded away, she crossed back. She walked back to where he lay in a heap, trying to suck in air from lungs collapsed by broken ribs.

“You should look both ways, but you’re so goddamn stupid.”

“This isn’t real.”

Because she needed him to feel rage—helpless rage—as much as the pain, she leaned down close.

“I bet the pain feels real. You’re dying, Ray, right here in front of me. But I’m going to save you because we’re not done. You get another chance.”

She felt him trying to push back, push her out. She wouldn’t have it. “My game, my rules,” she said, and changed the level.

* * *

“They’re sitting there, staring at each other.”

Howard shook his head. “I don’t think so, Phil. Something’s going on. We just can’t see it. Except … he looks shaken.”

“He keeps jerking. I don’t get it. But she’s following the rules. She’s got the rest of the hour.”

* * *

The big house had an alarm system, but Riggs plucked the code right out of slutty trophy wife’s head when she pulled up. She kept saying it over and over—because they’d changed it, and she kept forgetting.

On this moonless night, after he cut through the glass on the atrium doors beyond the pool and outdoor kitchen—like they cooked—and into the big kitchen with its vaulted ceilings, he walked straight to the control panel and coded in.

He thought what he always thought as he walked through the house. How he deserved all this, and they didn’t. How they needed to die so he could have what he deserved.

He walked up the wide, curving stairs, ran his gloved hand over the shining banister, looked up at a big chandelier.

He bet that shined, too, when they turned it on.

He could see it if he wanted, see it shining and sparkling.

But he couldn’t shake the feeling something was off. Just off. How did he know how everything looked before he saw everything?

Because he was special, he reminded himself. He had something no one else had, so he could do whatever he wanted, take whatever he wanted. Kill whoever he wanted.