I don’t believe in fate.

But I can’t deny the irony.

Blakely stops outside of a three-story building with two-tone bricks and a faded black awning.

The awning reads: Pet Heaven Crematory.

She looks at me expectingly. “I watched Addisyn enter and leave here,” she says, turning toward a lockbox nested alongside the rusted door. “She was never one for discretion.” She starts to punch a code into the keypad, and I grab her wrist.

“Cameras,” I warn.

With a derisive tilt to her head, she says, “You’re not a very diligent stalker,” before she returns to the keypad. “The batteries on the Wi-Fi cams are dead. I checked them the first day while trailing Addisyn.”

The box beeps and she opens the small black door, producing a key.

I glance around the bustling four-lane street. No one is watching, no one cares. Who breaks into an animal crematorium? Still, I can’t ignore the tension knotting my spine.

“This is too exposed,” I say, even as she pushes the door open.

“You’re too accustomed to your habitat. Your private, creepy forest. Well, this city is my forest. I know how to operate below radar.” Leaving the lights off, she uses her phone as a flashlight.

The interior looks like what I’d assume the average pet crematory would look like. Miniature caskets. Bare brick walls with a few display shelves to showcase picture frames and animal toys. A generic desk. The smell of linseed oil used to polish the wood mingles with a dry fragrance of what I presume is ash. Another distinct odor hovers beneath of animal feces. I curl my lips.

The front of the business is set up as a merchant shop, with urns and picture frames, even wooden boxes with inscriptions. I suppose mourning pet owners want to bury their pets like a loved one, with memories and cherished objects, as they place them in comfortable, satin-lined caskets and watch them roll into the cremation unit.

Blakely stands over the desk, her light aimed on the laptop. She slips on a pair of disposable gloves and flips it open. “I’ll check to see when the next cremation is scheduled.”

Which leaves me to explore the unit itself. I take out my phone, making sure it’s on airplane mode so I’m not pinged in this location. As I push through the double doors into the back, the pungent scent of antiseptic stings my nose. My reservations are high for this course of action.

There are ways to produce the degree of heat necessary to incinerate remains rather than taking the risk to transport bones into the city, and then unload them into a building. Where anyone can become a witness. There are too many unknown variables and contingencies; nothing feels within control.

I’m a scientist. Solving problems with science is what I do. Before I even locate the unit, I’m decided against this method and am in the process of turning around when a sound pricks my ears.

The telltale tick of a second-hand reverberates through the dark room.

I stop moving, aware of the unnatural silence, the absolute blackness pushing against me from all corners. Focusing on the sound, I try to decipher if there’s an actual ticking wall clock, or if it’s a manifestation of my anxiety.

My calf suddenly aches. The louder the sound grows, the more intense the pain. Like the phantom pain of a missing limb, the ghost of the antique Rolex reminds me that our time is limited.

The neurotic need to find the source threads my muscles, and I light my phone as I coast farther into the room. I should be attentive to the sounds in the front—Blakely’s movements, the front door, possible trespassers—but I’m attuned to the clean snick slicing the air, drawing me toward the center, where the light catches on the gleam of an object.

I stand frozen.

My lungs burn as I claw for a breath, the pressure damn near cracking my chest.

I’m in the dark room of my cabin again. The walls pitch as coal, the only light source stemming from the mounted pendulum clocks that appear to float all around. There’s a familiar weight in my hand. Not comforting, but habitual, like getting a hit of a drug you can’t bleed out of your system. Toxic, but alleviating the bitter pang of homesickness.

I know what the object is…but I also know it’s impossible.

I destroyed my pocket watch.

I killed the tormenting demon in my head.

But it’s right there before me—hovering mid-air, spinning in slow oscillations to the rhythm of the relentless ticking. I lower my phone as I approach my pocket watch, trepidation slowing my steps until I’m right up on it, the clock face staring into mine.

As I reach for it, a loud clang shatters the trance. I whirl around, my guard shooting up like a high-rise.

Blakely stands in front of me, her hands pressed to the grids of a chain-link door.

She snaps a padlock into place, the harsh click detonating around us as her eyes never leave mine.

Awareness begins to trickle in past my stupor. I watch Blakely turn her back to me, then after a moment, the overhead lights illuminate the space.

I glance around as all five senses absorb my surroundings at once, piecing a very twisted puzzle together.

When I look at the suspended watch again, it’s still there. The timepiece wasn’t a hallucination. With a twinge of apprehension, I grasp the pocket watch with a trembling hand, realizing the hands of the clock aren’t moving. The time is set to the exact moment I struck the watch with a river rock.

Forever stuck.

Just as I’m stuck where Blakely trapped me.

In a cage.

OceanofPDF.com

39

OceanofPDF.com

THE VILLAIN

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BLAKELY

“The watch doesn’t work. It’s still broken,” I tell Alex, answering one of his obvious questions as he reverently touches his pocket watch where I strung it from the top of the crate.

I doubted this would work, luring Alex into a literal trap with a literal dangling carrot. The idea seemed comical to me yesterday. But I knew if there was any carrot tempting enough to transfix him for even a second, it was the pocket watch he destroyed. The one I unearthed at Devil’s Peak.

“I didn’t really have time to have it repaired,” I say. “And really, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to. I always hated the fucking sound of it. So I opted for this instead.” I hold up my phone and point to a small Bluetooth speaker positioned on one of the wall shelves.

I tap a button on the phone screen, and the rhythmic ticking stops.

“Clever,” he says, but he’s only partially invested in my explanation as his fingertips graze the polished pewter. “You did replace the glass face, though.”

Pocketing my new phone, I walk around the cage, giving it a wide berth. “Had to make it enticing.”

Alex suddenly backs away from the watch as if it might explode, his eyes trailing me as I head toward the speaker and pack it in my bag. I can practically hear the gears turning in his big brain as he processes his predicament.

“This isn’t a crematorium,” he says, touching the cage mesh.

I stand on the outside looking in. My hands still gloved, I cross my arms. “No, Addisyn doesn’t work at a crematory. Like you said, that would’ve been just a little too convenient.” I nod to the many crates lining the walls of the room. “She works at a dog kennel. The perfect place for locking up a misbehaving pet.” I slink closer to the cage. “You’re out of control, Alex. You need a timeout.”

His mouth tips into an endearing smile, so out of character for this moment, my hackles raise. “Then what?” he asks.

I pull out my phone and send a text before meeting his penetrating blue eyes. “Then I’ll decide what to do with you.”