An hour later, I’m pulling into Hope Springs Medical Institute. Since I can’t be in two places at once, I have to make sure to establish an alibi, a reason for my trip across the state line.

Nurse Pam greets me at the welcome desk as I sign in.

“She’s having a good day, Jack.” Her smile is an adept mix of hope and pity. “Glad you came today, though it’s a little unexpected.”

“I’ll be taking an extended trip soon,” I say in way of explanation for the deviation in my routine. I don’t stray from the design. Even the smallest departure from the norm attracts notice, and it’s why I strive to never make this mistake.

With a practiced smile, I stick the visitor tag on my suit blazer, then I’m led to the room I visit twice a year. Today is not one of those scheduled days.

I place the potted flowers—her favorite; lilacs—on the windowsill, right next to the others from over the years. A mentally healthy person would feel a measure of guilt over using their loved one as an alibi.

“Those are lovely,” Nurse Pam says. “Aren’t they, Charlene?” She gives me a bright smile. “So lovely, Jack.”

I nod solemnly. “I’ll be in Canada for her birthday. Figured I should bring them now.”

As I stand over the woman in a bed with paper-thin skin and take her hand, I gaze into the steely, vacant eyes, a reflection of my own. “Hello, mother.”

Charlene Sorensen says nothing in reply. She’s nonresponsive. Her eyes blink out of reflex, her hand flinches in mine, but it’s not a sign of life. Her gaze doesn’t latch on to me; she’s not aware that I’m here, or that she’s even here.

For two years, my mother was in a fully vegetative state. Then Charlene made a small recovery into a minimally conscious state, where her progress stalled. She’s been in this fixed state since I was sixteen.

She knew from the very first second she looked into my cold, unfeeling eyes that I was off. Different.

Her husband knew it, too. Though she took the brunt of the beatings for my anomaly. The more my behavior disturbed my father, the harder he hit her. Blaming her for the reason his son was a “fucking psycho”. The night he caused her traumatic brain injury, the one which put her in a vegetative state for the next two years, was the night he drew his very last breath.

At the hands of his psycho son.

But that night, the hits stopped.

I wish I could feel a deeper level of remorse that it came too late to ultimately protect her. The truth is, for a mother with only one child to love, who saw through the mask I wear for the rest of the world, not being aware of the killer her son grew up to be is almost merciful.

She at least doesn’t have to suffer that pain.

I lean down and kiss her cool cheek. After I adjust the thermostat in her room, I seat myself on the chair across from her bed, where she stares absently at the ceiling.

The doctors and nurses all claim talking to a person in this state is beneficial. It won’t bring them back, but they say their subconscious hears our words, our voice, to make a connection to our emotions, that it helps them endure.

I’ve never spoken at length to my mother in this state. One, there’s no inflection in my tone of voice to convey any sentiment. And two, the hobby I fill my days with isn’t one I can whisper to the walls.

Today, however, I reach into the satchel at my feet and produce my sketchbook. I flip through the pages until I come to a recent one of Kyrie.

“This is the woman I’m…seeing,” I say, finding it difficult to define the depth of what Kyrie means to me, to put a label on our relationship.

I flip to the next image, the one I sketched while stalking her outside a bar while she was stalking her victim. “She’s a brilliant wildlife biologist,” I say. “Intelligent, cunning, enchanting.” I chuckle. “Very sociable. Very…demanding. The exact opposite of me, actually. She’s the light to my dark.” I trace the pad of my finger along the shaded curve of her cheek. “And I don’t think I can do any of this without her now.”

Closing the sketchbook, I look up at the woman who raised me, who did her very best despite the monster she was given in place of a son. I take her hand again to try to warm her fingers, but I have little warmth to share.

What I was able to give her was a dead husband with a life insurance policy to ensure she’d have the best care. I made sure of that by staging the aftermath of that night as a home invasion, one where the thieves stole more than meaningless objects.

For me, I became a ward of the state. In compliance to the will, I was placed in boarding school, a neglectful grandmother on my mother’s side put in place as more of a fixture for legal appearances. At sixteen, I graduated early and emancipated myself. A steep inheritance provided for my college education.

I’ve been on my own ever since.

“I have to leave here soon,” I say to her, giving her hand a reassuring squeeze. “I’ve been in this area too long. Too much has happened, so I may not be able to visit for a while, but I’ll make sure you’re taken care of. Always.” I place a tender kiss to her forehead as I stand. “I just have one last decision to make first.”

I’ve never been undecided on anything in my life. I make choices based on survival, not want or desire. By the time I make it through the front door of my house, I’m decided on at least one thing.

First thing Monday morning, as I stare down at the cream Berber carpet, I call a local contractor. When the guy on the line says replacing my carpet can’t happen due to the demanding schedule and material shortage, I let the line go deathly silent.

After I struck Jack Sorensen Senior over the head with his whisky bottle, wasting his drink and turning his rage on me, I waited in a snowbank for him, then I painted the snow red with his blood—the same blood that courses my veins.

If anyone is to blame for the genes that spawned a monster, it’s the man who I was named after.

This is who I am.

“I’ll pay triple your estimate,” I say to the guy. “I want it done today. Key’s under the mat at the front door.” I give him the address, then: “Today, or I call your competitor on the list and offer him four times the amount.”

There’s an extended pause. “What color carpet do you want installed, sir?”

“Anything but white or cream.”

I end the call and bring up my security app on my phone, making sure my secrets stay secret. My trophy room is safely hidden, but I still don’t relish the thought of strangers roaming the interior of my house while I’m not here.

For reassurance, I reach into my pocket to grasp the cool steel of the Zippo, only to come up emptyhanded once again. I shake my head with a hard chuckle.

“My wicked lille mejer. This needs to be remedied.”

I have killed for my mother. I’ve killed for survival, out of compulsion, to sate cravings, and even, at times, fun.

But the decisive difference is that I wouldn’t just kill for Kyrie—I would give my life. Hell, I’d even let her take it.

Once the spare key is in place beneath the mat, I lock up. Then I head out on a mission to retrieve my trophy.

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FOURTEEN

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CARTILAGE

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JACK

“Jack, do you have a minute?”

Dr. Cannon stands in the open doorway of my office. The creased skin around his dark eyes lends to his worried expression. I nod and stand, buttoning my suit jacket as he enters. He closes the door behind him to seal us in privacy.

“Is there anything wrong?” I ask, prompting him.

He swipes a hand down the lower half of his face. “I don’t mean to alarm you. Especially with all that’s happened lately. It’s been…stressful, to say the least. With the investigation and Mason and—” he drops his head “—Dr. Thompson. Christ.” He mutters a curse beneath his breath. “I still don’t understand what happened with Brad.”