Die for Me (56 page)
Arcadia, Georgia, Present day
Friday, January 26, 1:25
A.M.
He’d chosen her with care. Taken her with relish. Made her scream, long and loud.
It still gave him goosebumps. Still made his blood race and his nostrils flare as he remembered how she’d looked, sounded. Tasted. The taste of pure fear was like nothing else. This he knew.
She’d been his first murder. She would not be his last.
He’d chosen her final resting place with equal care. He let her body roll off his back and drop to the soggy ground with a muted thud. He squatted next to her body and arranged the rough brown blanket to cover her like a shroud, his sense of anticipation growing. Sunday was the annual cross-county bicycle race. One hundred cyclists would be passing this way. He’d placed her so that she’d be visible from the road.
Soon she would be found. Soon
they
would hear of her demise.
They’ll wonder. And they’ll suspect each other. They’ll all be afraid.
He stood, satisfied with his handiwork. He wanted them to be afraid. He wanted them to shake and tremble like girls. He wanted them to know the true taste of fear.
Because he knew that taste, just as he knew hunger and fury. That he knew all those flavors so intimately was their fault.
He looked down at his feet, nudged the brown blanket with his toe. She had paid. Soon, every one of them would suffer and they would pay.
And I will laugh.
Copyright © 2007 by Karen Rose Hafer
Excerpt from
Scream for Me
copyright © 2007 by Karen Rose Hafer
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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First eBook Edition: September 2007
ISBN: 0-446-40549-3