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She nods, but her gaze lingers on my phone. “Who were you talking to?”

“No one.”

Her lips tug up. “So, Chase Darington.”

“No? What? I mean, yeah, but why—”

Shit.

I abandon this sinking ship of a denial and stand. “I’m going to make French toast.”

___

It’sevening before I get a chance to get on my phone again. Usually, I’m on it off and on, but since I know the phone brings only misery today, it’s easy to leave it alone.

I have some new notifications, two comments calling me a whore and a slut which I promptly delete, and two new text messages.

I open the one from Dare first. It reads, “What are you doing tonight?”

“Just hanging out at home with Mom,” I answer, even though it has been a couple of hours since he sent it. “You?”

He doesn’t respond right away this time, so I close that message and go to the other one. It’s from a number I don’t have saved in my phone.

There are actually three texts. The first is a link, the second is a message, and the third appears to be a video.

I read the message first. “Hope this doesn’t happen to your mom.”

I frown, then I click the link.

My frown deepens as I read the headline and first few lines of the article to realize it’s a news story about a morgue employee who was discovered having sex with one of the corpses in his care.

Nausea grips me, but I ignore it and the warning not to and click the video.

It shows a man in a white uniform running his hand up the motionless leg of a woman on a metal table, then touching her bare belly. It cuts to a new scene and the sounds of metallic creaking blare out of my phone. Startled and sickened at the same time, I silence my phone, but I can’t look away from the horrifying video of a morgue-worker raping a corpse with my mother’s face photoshopped onto it.

I throw the phone across the counter without thought, just wanting to get it away from me. The video is still playing, so once I’m sure I won’t throw up, I grab my phone and turn it off.

What the actual fuck?

Furious and sick to my stomach, I try to think what to do. I don’t know. My hands are shaking. I don’t want the video in my phone, but I save it and send it to Dare with the message, “Did Anae send this to me?”

I can’t believeanyonewould send that toanybody, but I don’t know who else dislikes me enough to do something not only so cruel, but so fucking disgusting.

I was in the middle of preparing dinner, but I’m no longer hungry. I brace myself on the edge of the counter, closing my eyes and trying to keep down the bile.

I go back to the message and take a screenshot of the number before I block it. It’s not Anae’s number, but when I open the browser on my phone and try to look it up, it registers as a mobile number in Baymont, CA. Not exactly helpful.

On second thought, I unblock the number and call it.

No one answers, and the automated voicemail gives me no clue as to who it is. I leave a voice mail anyway because I’m angry. “You are a sick fuck and you deserve to die alone.”

I end the call and put down the phone, my heart hammering in my chest.

TWENTY-ONE

Dare

“What the fuck is this?”