TESSA
When your life changes forever—fundamentally tumbles off an already-dark cliff into a holy-hell-bottomless pit of destruction—you shouldn’t be wearing a fuzzy bathrobe.
Tessa Gomez snuggled into the plush white fabric, tightening the wrap’s belt as peppermint tea wafted from the mug beside her. It was October, that limbo period when it was too early in the season for her mother to turn on the heat but too cold in the apartment for them not to. Massachusetts was chillier than Philadelphia, somewhat, but that wasn’t the issue; what took getting used to was the length of the cold. Here winter started weeks earlier than it had back home.
Home.
It had been a little over a year since they’d moved to Fall River, and still Tessa had unpacked only her clothes. There was nothing tacked onto her beige bedroom walls, and no photos were shoved into the crease of the mirror above her desk. She hadn’t gone on a single date. And most of the people she hung out with were actually her brother Vik’s friends.
Tessa’s cell phone pinged, and her eyes flicked from the rom-com on her laptop to the photo in the group text. Kids from school were huddled around a bonfire, red Solo cups in hand. Party at Izzy’s!
She ignored it.
Her brother disapproved of the New and Improved Tessa—the girl who stayed home on Friday nights to finish articles for the school newspaper, who deleted her entire social media presence without regret, and who legitimately saw chilling with a movie as a personal reward. It was as if every evening she spent huddled under her down comforter only increased Vik’s worry that he was losing the Tessa he grew up with—only she didn’t know who that was anymore. Or maybe she didn’t want to remember.
Vik would graduate high school this spring. Tessa next spring. And until then, she had to power through.
Tessa focused on the movie as she heard Tía Dolores pull the cork on a bottle of wine in the kitchen. Their apartment, which sat above a laundromat painted obnoxiously pink, had only six rooms—four bedrooms, one bathroom, and a combo living room–kitchen. Tía Dolores and her girlfriend, Frankie, leased the place three years ago, after Frankie graduated from law school. Tía Dolores was Tessa’s godmother, and her mom’s sister, and she had insisted her door was always open—especially after the funeral. It was Tessa who had convinced her mom and her brother that they needed a change, somewhere devoid of memories painfully erupting in twisted masks every time they turned a city block.
Tessa’s cell phone pinged again, and she set her jaw, not even glancing at the screen. Vik, she thought, I already told you I’m not coming.
She and her brother grieved differently. Vik seized onto life, falling in love within weeks of crossing their new high school’s threshold—and not with just any teenage girl. Like many towns in America that had one family who seemed to own everything, Fall River had theirs, and the name was Morse. Their wealth stretched beyond a successful clothing boutique or catering business; no, the Morses owned historic textile mills converted into swanky loft apartments and hip office space. In an otherwise blue-collar town, their mansion took up an entire block.
So it was quite the high school scandal when Mariella ditched her longtime boyfriend, who drove a BMW and played golf with her father, for Tessa’s brother. And with Mariella came a collection of okay acquaintances. Well, maybe one was a little more than okay.
Another ping.
Omigod, I said no! Tessa groaned, eyes stubbornly locked on the YA adaptation she was watching. The book was better.
Another ping. Then another. And another.
Reluctantly, she gave her phone a sideways glance and spied a firework display of bright-blue bubbles.
Text. Text. Text.
Tessa shifted her laptop, its slick surface swishing against her comforter as she reached for her phone.
Text. Text.
Her stomach tightened, bracing for another kick from life.
Text. Text.
She closed her eyes and plucked the device with quivering fingers. She had been here before. Bad news carried a weight that could sink into your gut before your brain fully knew what was happening.
She filled her lungs; then she opened her eyes and took in the words now trembling on her smudged screen.
Is this YOUR Vik?
Did he do it?
Do you know where your brother is?
OMG, poor Mariella!
Seriously, an AXE????
These weren’t messages from the usual group chat. These were texts from random classmates, dozens of them, ones she hardly knew, people she didn’t even think had her number.
Then her eyes caught on a few lines from Phil, her focus sharpening on information from someone she trusted: Did u see the news? There are reporters on Mariella’s lawn. She’s not answering. This has gotta be a mistake. Call me.
There was no link. No details. The news? Tessa flicked on her tiny flat-screen TV. She switched to a local channel. It was midnight, not a news hour, yet as Phil had indicated, the station showed a reporter in a gumball-pink skirt suit standing in front of the iron fence that edged the Morse family home. She was holding a microphone.
Sapphire and ruby lights swirled from cop cars in the background. An ambulance from South Coast Memorial idled in the circular driveway, its back doors swung open, ready to be loaded with whatever newsworthy emergency was about to make itself known. Someone inside that renovated two-hundred-year-old mansion was injured so badly it warranted a TV crew. Lots of them.
Vik had picked up Mariella earlier that night. He had said they were going out, and Tessa figured they’d end up at the party eventually. But what if they’d stayed home? Vik could be in that house. Right now.
“Mom! MOM!” Tessa screeched, her body flinging forward.
Her mother had already said good night; she was likely nestled in bed, directly on the other side of their paper-thin wall. She could probably hear the din of the television. Maybe even Tessa’s breathing.
Still, Tessa screamed until her throat strained. “Ma! Come now! It’s Vik!”
Her pulse chattered her teeth, and her spine shot ramrod straight. Her arm stretched out, pressing the volume up, up, up. Air sputtered from Tessa’s lungs as her eyes caught on the chyron: “Axe Murders in Fall River.”
Murders. Plural.
No, no, no. Tessa blinked, faster and faster, as if she could mentally push the reporter back to the beginning to explain why she was stationed there. Where was Vik?
He can’t be hurt. There was no way. Tessa couldn’t lose him too.
Mom tripped into the doorjamb, a floral robe frayed at the edges covering her baby-blue nightgown. Then Tía Dolores slid in behind her wearing gray fuzzy slippers and a Nirvana T-shirt, a glass of white wine in hand.
“¿Qué pasó?” her mother asked, her voice frantic.
Tessa couldn’t answer. She couldn’t rip her gaze away from the screen. Instead, she pointed.
Show Vik. Show us he’s alive. Tessa desperately prayed, her hands clasped so hard her white knuckles threatened to burst through her skin.
Then her prayer was answered.
The carved wooden double doors to the Morse estate swung open, and the camera pivoted. A shadowy figure emerged in the half-light of the front porch, the silhouette easily recognizable—tall, solid, with wide shoulders and floppy black hair in need of a trim.
Her mother smacked a palm to her chest and stumbled back a step. “¡Ay, Dios mío! He's
okay.”
Tessa’s shoulders relaxed down her back. Her stomach uncoiled, for a moment, maybe not even that. It was just enough time for her eyes to catch on the handcuffs.
Her brother was being steered off the front porch, through the ornately painted Victorian columns belonging to the town’s largest home and its richest family, and his wrists were bound together. A police officer wrenched Vik’s arm, and camera flashes popped, bright bursts that competed with the stars speckling the inky sky. A crescent moon hung low, right above Vik’s head, and below him was a news chyron that read “Suspected Axe Murderer, Victor Gomez, Now in Custody.”
“What is happening?” yelped her mother. Or maybe Tessa. Or her aunt. Or maybe they all said it in unison.
“Why do they have Vik?”
“Is he okay?”
“Who got killed?”
“What is going on?”
Questions slid on top of each other, piling higher and higher as her mom and Tía Dolores dropped onto Tessa’s mattress, one clutching her arm and the other her thigh. That was how Tessa knew she was awake. She could feel them. This was real.
“As we’ve been reporting, local business moguls Catherine and Winthrop Morse were found dead in their home this evening. According to police, the couple were killed by an axe while asleep in their bed. A person of interest has been taken into custody, eighteen-year-old Victor Gomez. He is a Fall River High School senior and reportedly dating the victims’ teenage daughter. She is said to be unharmed. Motive is still unclear. Local residents are likely aware of the town’s dark history, as tonight marks the first axe murders in Fall River since 1892, when Lizzie Borden was charged with murdering her parents.”
The camera panned to her brother, who stepped into the beam of a blazing floodlight, and they all gasped. His dark eyes were wild, darting skittishly, as crimson gore dripped down every speck of his tan skin.
Her mother collapsed, her thin frame slumping against Tessa’s shoulder as though her bones had melted beneath her skin.
“Ma! Ma!” Tessa guided her onto the mattress.
“Rosie!” yelled Tessa’s aunt. “She’s fainted. Omigod! I’ll get some water.” Her aunt raced from the room, her black wavy shag wrapped in a rainbow sleep scarf that seemed too colorful given the circumstances.
Her mom’s eyes fluttered, then gradually cracked open. “A dream,” she murmured. “Dios mío, a nightmare. Just a nightmare.”
Tessa didn’t have the heart to tell her otherwise, so she let her mother bask in a moment of oblivion.
On the tiny screen, the image of her brother stared back, his white T-shirt so saturated in scarlet, it looked as though he’d used it to sop up a spilled can of paint with a cheesy name like Sangria or Ferrari. His hair was soaked, streaking crimson rivulets down his high cheeks.
“The sensational trial of Lizzie Borden, in which she was acquitted, secured one of Fall River’s most notorious residents a place in both infamy and nursery rhymes,” said the white female reporter, with a somber look so forced it edged on gleeful. “Seems like Fall River may have just seen history repeat itself.”
Tessa shook her head, her wavy hair tugging from beneath her bathrobe, her teeth clenched so tight her jaw ached.
Mom pulled herself to a seated position, and Tessa softly rubbed her hunched back. Tía Dolores stumbled into the room, a glass of water in hand.
“Drink, drink,” her aunt ordered, shoving the plastic cup their way.
“That’s not my Victor. Not my Victor. Not my Victor,” Mom sputtered. Again and again.
Over and over.
The words sang. They skipped.
They hummed in rhythmic harmony.
Lizzie Borden took an axe,
And gave her mother forty whacks,
And when she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one.
It had been over a century since the last axe murders in Fall River, Massachusetts, and kids still sang rhymes about it on the playground.
Tessa didn’t know what had happened earlier that night, but she was certain of one thing—she was not going to let them sing about her brother.
CHAPTER TWO
The day of the murders…
MARIELLA
Mariella Morse’s hatred for her father was so ingrained in who she was, it should’ve been listed on her driver’s license: seventeen years old, blond hair, blue eyes, organ donor, despises father.
To be clear, this wasn’t a dramatic-teenage-girl-overreacting type of thing. Her father deserved the flares of revulsion that burned in Mariella’s chest for every swing he took at her mother, every dish he threw at a wall, and every fake smile he beamed at swanky parties. Hey, pal, let’s go smoke a cigar.
For a while, she thought all she needed was to make it to age eighteen. Adulthood. She’d leave Fall River, buy her mom’s freedom, and not glance once in the rearview mirror. New York City was top of her list. Start spreading the news. Then her father changed the parameters of her trust fund, limiting her access until she hit the wrinkle-cream age of thirty. Mariella might as well be dead.
She felt dead already.
No, she just needed to sleep, a full night, without nightmares. Or what she hoped were nightmares, though she was pretty sure dreams weren’t supposed to leave bruises.
“Mari, how do you look this good after a crappy morning of school?” Vik plopped down next to her on a square chunk of granite outside the school’s north entrance. Crudely cut stone benches dotted the perimeter of the newly constructed building, contrasting with walls of shiny glass windows and classic white columns. A paper-bag lunch sat in his lap.
“I always look good.” She forced the smile he expected, and Vik swung a long arm around her shoulders, black hair dripping into his dark eyes.
Mariella rolled the cough drop on her tongue, trying to hit every drip of saliva, the menthol flavor so intense, it cleared her sinuses. But not her mouth. The foul taste of raw sludge still lingered with every breath and swallow.
Outwardly, Mariella Morse looked exactly as she always did. Her lip gloss was perfect—Rose Berry, which she’d reapplied after homeroom, half expecting to see dirt packed between her teeth, matching the taste she couldn’t shake. But when she gazed into the mirror, her smile was as bright as it had ever been. Concealer hid the indigo circles beneath her lashes. Foundation, blush, eyeliner, and mascara made her blue-gray eyes pop and her fair complexion look flawless. She was a walking airbrushed ad for a SoCal cosmetics line. But inside, her soul was at the mercy of a shadow that had teeth.
“Your hair smells so good.” Vik flashed the seductive look he wore well—his grin a little crooked and a twinkle in his eyes that sent a heaviness down low in her belly.
She knew the whispers would be here soon. They always came when he was around.
Vik pressed his lips to hers, not just a peck or a polite PDA. No, Victor Gomez knew how to kiss, for real. And he never held back. Neither did she.
Mariella swallowed the remnants of her lozenge as her mouth tangled with his. How was he not gagging? It had been weeks since she’d ingested whatever that was, and ever since, her nights were long, her skin was itchy, and no amount of toothpaste or Listerine could wash the corrosion from her tongue. But Vik never seemed to notice.
He pulled away, thumb tracing her bottom lip. “Cough drop?”
She examined his eyes. That was really all he tasted, menthol. How could that be?
“Allergies.” She waved at the dead leaves shriveling on their branches awaiting a breeze that would send them spiraling to a decaying pile of mulch.
Kiss him again, a whisper hissed. Inside her ears. Inside her brain.
Ah, there they were, just a little late.
Mariella followed the command, as always, angling her face and pressing her chest against Vik’s. Her lips moved with his, and her fingers wandered down his back, a slow tickly drag.
Vik abruptly stopped, his breath nearly a pant. “Later,” he whispered, steam in his voice suggesting exactly what he meant.
And she would be seeing him later, but for circumstances far graver. Vik just didn’t realize why.
Guilt slid from her heart to her gut, and she shoved another lozenge into her mouth. The menthol traveled down her throat, healing the fireplace poker blistering her esophagus. Lately, her nights were not only sleepless but painful. It was as though during the few hours she’d manage to doze, her jaw was unhinged and hung wide open.
Or it was held open.
She shivered, tucking her hands into her chunky sweater, a frost creeping up her skin in the brittle October air. Vik wrapped his arm tighter around her.
“Want my sweatshirt?” He reached for the hem of his Philadelphia Eagles hoodie, prepared to tug it off. He’d freeze for her. He’d sit in a T-shirt with his teeth chattering, and she wouldn’t even have to ask.
Meanwhile, Zane, her last boyfriend, wouldn’t even lend her his suit jacket after homecoming, because he didn’t want Mariella’s perfume to infect it (his words, not hers). If the whispers plotted against Zane, Mariella would hand him over with an extra scoop of not giving a shit. But that wasn’t the plan.
“I’m good.” Mariella shook off Vik’s gesture.
“I’ll keep you warm.” He pulled her in to his chest and rested his chin atop her head.
She sank into his solid frame, his muscles gained from work, not working out. Vik fixed cars to help his mother pay the bills, which was one of the many reasons Mariella’s father should’ve respected him, if not liked him. But he didn’t, of course. Because that would require Winthrop Morse to accept that his daughter had a life beyond their home, one that he couldn’t control.
Tell him you love him, a whisper commanded; then a force tugged her fingers from her sweater cuff and raked them down Vik’s chiseled jaw. Something, some power that felt outside herself, held her icy hand against his high cheek. She couldn’t resist.
“Love you,” she whispered. Then the compulsion abruptly dissipated, and her hand dropped to her lap.
No. She shook her shoulders. She loved touching Vik. She wanted to do that.
“Love ya too, babe.” Vik kissed her again, and the Sprite on his tongue was so deliciously sweet that Mariella groaned. Vik mistook her response, drawing her closer.
Yesss, a whisper cooed, tingles springing down her arms, only she wasn’t sure if the prickles surged from her own feelings or from somewhere else. Something else.
It had been weeks.
All she’d done was drink a cup of tea. It was supposed to solve everything—make her powerful and give her answers.
But she never expected this.
That first night, in a depthless sleep, Mariella had found herself standing in her bedroom, outside of her own body. The air smelled of a freshly dug grave. Her home was silent, the dull hum of a motor (a bike?) roaring somewhere in the distance. She hovered, floating, and watched a thing, a shadow, with eyes crackling like crimson coals, peer at her exposed flesh. Its forked tongue slurped curiously as it drifted closer with elongated limbs. Her body lay slack on a fluffy queen bed, in a pale-blush nightgown, completely immobile and unable to scream. Or fight. Or run.
The real her, the ethereal her, swatted frantically. She slapped at her sleeping figure, ...
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