Near You (Montana Series #2) - Mary Burton Page 0,1

palm it, keeping it close to my thigh as she steps toward the rocks and the setting sun’s opulent red-gold light. “Let’s do a selfie with my camera.”

“I don’t like them.”

“Please.”

“Just the one.” She slides close to me, glancing over her shoulder at the rugged landscape and then back at the lens. Sometimes, it feels like I am leading lambs to the slaughter.

As she stares upward, angling her chin into the most flattering angle, my blade flicks open with a well-oiled whoosh as I click the camera button. The distraction holds her attention for a split second before her gaze drops to the glittering blade. Confusion creates a quick disconnect, and then the first flickers of alarm or panic on her face.

“What’s with the knife?” she asks, nervously pushing hair away from her face.

My reassuring smile buys me a few more seconds before I thrust the knife, and the blade catches her directly in her midsection. We stare at each other, inches separating our faces, and time, which is always rushing, decelerates to a stop. Her smile falters. Her breath turns hot and labored. Adrenaline animates her gaze as it dips to the first sticky, warm droplets of blood dampening her shirt. Shock blossoms into panic.

Time starts moving again. I let her phone fall to the ground, pull the knife out, and jab it upward several times. More blood warms my hand and makes the knife handle slick. Readjusting my grip, I shove the blade in to the hilt.

The woman grips my shoulder and tries to push away, but the tip is buried so deep it scrapes the underside of her sternum. “Why?”

“You’re on the list,” I say in a voice husky with emotion.

It is not my intention to be cruel, so I twist the blade swiftly, carving through all the critical vessels and arteries in her gut. I help her step backward toward a sun-bleached orange rock. Her knees bow, and I keep twisting as I support her weight with my other hand. Deadweight or dying weight is heavy, and by the time her bottom grazes the rock on its way toward the dirt, I am breathless.

The rosy glow drains from her face, and blood soaks her Big Sky Country sweatshirt. The internal bleeding is weakening her fast, and soon her eyes will roll back in her head.

“Shh,” I whisper. “It’s almost over.”

When bubbles of blood gurgle from her lips, I know she has crossed over the line, and there is no turning back. Even a medical team could not save her now.

I try to pull the knife from her body but find it is stuck. Removal requires several back-and-forth wiggles and then a hard yank. Finally, the blade slides free.

The sun’s waning glow glistens off the knife’s edge. After swiping the blade on her shoulder until it is clean, I close it up and tuck it in my pocket. I wipe my hands on a clean portion of her shirt and make sure I have not accidentally cut myself and left droplets of my own blood behind.

Flexing my fingers and working the cramping from the muscles, I imagine the next steps as I hurry to the car, open the trunk, and reach for the gas can and green trash bags.

We are alone on the trail, but this area is chock-full of hikers and cyclists, and it is still possible for us to be interrupted. I rush back to her, gasoline sloshing in the can and releasing an invigorating scent.

Kneeling beside her, I check her pulse. Her heartbeat still taps faintly, as if vainly pumping like the Little Engine That Could.

In the distance I hear the crunch of a mountain biker’s wheels against the dirt path fifty feet below. As a precaution, I place my hand over her mouth and still my body, hoping the vanishing light hides all traces of us.

“Shh,” I whisper. “It’s okay.”

Finally, the mountain bike wheels roll away down the mountainside. As if she understands all hope is truly lost, her heart stops, and the faint puffs from her nostrils cease.

I pull her away from the rock, lay her flat, and quickly strip the blood-soaked Big Sky Country sweatshirt from her and then unsnap her jeans and pull them off. Next, off comes her underwear. Mind you, all this is done in a professional manner and not in a sexual-deviant kind of way. There are killers who enjoy humiliating their victims pre- and postmortem, but I am not like that. I am not sick. I