Chapter 1
Over the past month, children in town had been disappearing one after another, leaving everyone terrified.
When the police showed up at my door, I was at home eating a popsicle.
“Oh, you mean Logan and those kids? They’re neighbors, but I don’t really know them,” I said lazily, licking my popsicle.
The lead officer, Detective Blake, walked around the room a few times and breathed out a cloud of warm air.
“Looks like you’re the only one home, right? I heard your electric bill last month was almost a hundred thousand dollars, several times more than what a normal household uses in a whole year.”
I smiled.
“So what, Detective Blake? Is using too much electricity illegal?”
He walked over to me and picked up the air conditioner remote.
“Eating popsicles in the middle of winter, with the AC set to sixty degrees. Ethan Carter, you really are something.”
I sucked hard on the popsicle a few times, rolled up my sleeve, and scratched my arm until blood streamed down.
“Can’t help it. It’s too itchy.”
When he saw the hideous scars on my arm, Detective Blake frowned hard, his pupils widening as he rushed forward to stop me.
“Don’t move! What happened?”
“Hmph, it’s all because of that bitch. Good thing she’s dead. Otherwise, even if she were alive, I’d kill her myself.”
When I said that, my emotions surged before I could stop them, and my eyes turned vicious.
Detective Blake coughed dryly, his voice stern.
“Ethan Carter, watch what you say.”
I curled my lips in disdain, threw away the popsicle, collapsed onto the couch, and crossed one leg over the other.
“You seem to hate your sister,” he said.
“She was just a useless burden. I wouldn’t call it hate. I just couldn’t stand her.”
“Couldn’t stand what?” he pressed.
There were many things about her I couldn’t stand.
She was twelve years younger than me, not smart, not pretty, timid in everything she did, and had a stupidly soft heart.
In this whole town, anyone could mess with her and bully her.
She was as useless as my mom.
Even when she was buried alive, she didn’t resist at all.
When I came back to my senses, I only answered with three words.
“Hard to explain.”
“Detective Blake, I assume you didn’t come here today just to chat with me about a dead person,” I continued.
His expression shifted slightly.
“We just want to know where all that electricity in your house went. A hundred thousand in one month can hardly be called normal use.”
I waved my hand.
“As you can see, I have a lot of appliances, and they all use a ton of power. So the bill is high. Abnormal, but normal in its own way.”
Obviously, he didn’t believe me.
Blake took two officers and searched around, their leather shoes stepping across the floor, and with every step, my heart pounded nonstop.
When they came back around, I was reading the newspaper with great interest.
“Ethan Carter, why is one bedroom locked?” Blake narrowed his eyes and studied me closely.
I put down the newspaper and picked up my glass of water, the ice cubes knocking against my teeth and making me shiver.
“That was my sister’s room. It’s bad luck, so I locked it.”
“Open it.”
“Bad luck,” I stalled.
“Open it,” he said, not giving an inch.
With no choice, I opened the door and took a few steps back.
“See? I told you there’s nothing in there. It’s just a regular storage room.”
Blake walked around inside a few times and muttered to himself.
“This is really damn strange. Where did a hundred thousand dollars of electricity go?”
As he said that, his gaze stayed locked on me.
“Boss! Found something!” one officer shouted as he crawled out from the pile of junk, holding up a pair of high heels.
Blake took the heels and held them in front of my eyes.
“Size ten. Ethan Carter, you’re more than a little unique.”
“Explain.”
I let out a low laugh.
“Detective Blake, there’s no law saying men can’t wear high heels, is there?”
Blake’s face darkened.
“Then how do you explain the blood on the heel?”