up and little pinpricks of blood appearing, like condensation on a glass. He sucked at the wound, tasting his own salty blood. It was beginning to itch.
Instead of going up to Corbin’s apartment, Henry went up the stairs that led to Audrey Marshall’s place. He hadn’t been there since the night he’d killed her. He picked the lock of the door and entered. The curtains of the apartment were open and the night was light enough that he could maneuver through the apartment. There were marks on the floor from the crime scene investigators, taped areas on the kitchen tile where he’d left Audrey’s body. Had they noticed how her hand had been positioned, pointing with an index finger toward Corbin’s apartment? Henry smiled at the memory. Arranging Audrey had been the most fun he’d had in years, the most fun he’d had since Corbin and he had killed Claire in the cemetery. After Audrey was dead, and he was free to arrange her as he wanted to, he’d contemplated trying to actually cut her in half, find a way to saw through her spine, but decided against it. Still, the image of it, the thought of her actually in two pieces—a perfect half of her for each of them—almost made him giddy. One day he could do it, but he didn’t think he could do it alone.
He wandered the apartment. In the bedroom, some of Audrey’s things—clothes, books—had been boxed up and left. Maybe the family had begun the process, then got overwhelmed and quit. Henry wondered what would happen if he died. Would his parents come to reclaim his things? Of course they wouldn’t. They were never going to leave Stark, except maybe if Mary reared her ugly head, but not for him. They were a little scared of him, he knew that. He could hear it in their voices on the few occasions when he called home, that slight vocal hitch in the “Hello, Henry” after they’d picked up the phone, expecting nothing more than a call from their church deacon to let them know that the bake sale was going to be understaffed this year, and could they help.
In the living room, Henry stared down at the empty courtyard, then across into the opposite apartment. There was movement, a light on in an alcove kitchen. Henry watched. It was a man and a woman, the man crossing the dimly lit living room toward a woman with dark blond hair in the kitchen. Henry stared, and began to think that it was Kate that he was looking at, although he couldn’t be sure. The man was in the kitchen again, a tall man with messy black hair who could have been the man that Henry had bumped into on the street, the man Kate had drawn in her sketchbook. That would make sense. Somehow they had met, and now Kate was fucking this guy. When had she got here? Three days ago? She’d wasted no time.
He watched for about twenty minutes. He couldn’t see all the way into the kitchen, but it looked like they were eating around an island. The man came into the living room again, crouched in a corner—getting more alcohol, maybe—then returned to the kitchen. The light caught his profile, the blade of his nose. Jewish, Henry thought. He started to get bored, and the boredom made him a little angry. He wanted Kate back in their apartment, curled up and asleep in her nest of blankets on the couch. He wanted to watch her twitching face, and listen to her breathe, and know that somehow, some part of her, the animal part, would know she was being watched. They always do.
But at least now he had the place to himself for the night. He returned to Corbin’s apartment, going straight to Kate’s bedroom to look for the sketchbook. It was under the bed again, and he opened it to that first picture, confirming that it was the same man across the courtyard. He took his index finger and pressed hard against both of the eyes in the picture, trying not to overly smudge them. It felt good, and he liked the effect. The eyes looked different, but subtly different, just enough to make Kate wonder.
He used the bathroom, then went to his bedroom. He stared out the window, toward the river. The night sky was clear, a scattering of stars visible, a rarity for the city. He lay down on top of