Norah looks unhappy. “You got a package in the mail,” she says.
“Front desk intercepted it,” the guy says.
Norah glances at him. “This is Dave, he’s the manager here.”
Dave holds up a boring brown box. It’s covered in tape all around but it doesn’t have an address on it, just my name and room number. “It was left downstairs late last night. Nobody saw who put it there.”
I reach for the box. “Well, give it over.”
He hesitates. Norah shakes her head. “You need to see it all,” she says.
Dave hesitates but holds the box up. On the bottom, two words are written in red.
“Fucking Slut.”
I blink, unable to really understand what I’m seeing. Norah sighs as Dave lowers the box, looking embarrassed.
“We should get Graham,” she says.
“Graham?” I perk up at that. “Why do we need him?”
“This could be your stalker,” she says, glancing at Dave. He doesn’t react one way or the other. “It could be dangerous.”
“So, I mean, uh,” I stutter. “We don’t need him.”
Norah frowns. “It’s why we hired him, remember?”
I don’t want them to go looking for Graham. They won’t find him in his room and I’m not about to admit that he’s lying naked in my bed right now.
Fucking hell, I don’t know what to do. I rack my brain, trying to come up with a solution that won’t get either of us in trouble, but I can’t think of anything.
“Are you sure we even need to open it?” I ask. “We could just, you know, throw it out.”
Norah looks thoughtfully at the box. “Maybe. But we’re trying to figure out who this person is, and whatever’s in there could help.”
She makes a good point. “I don’t want to know,” I say quickly.
“Fine, we can open it without you.” Norah turns to go.
“Wait, hold on.”
She turns back to me. Dave’s frowning, looking between us, not sure what to do.
“I’m not sure what you’re doing here,” Norah says. “But we should get Graham and open this thing up. You can come if you want.”
I open my mouth to argue but slowly shut it again. I don’t have anything to say that’ll help fix this situation.
Shit, this is bad. I don’t want Graham to get in trouble but…
Norah turns away and walks toward his room. Dave follows her slowly, glancing back at me with a frown.
I follow them, heart hammering. They’re going to knock and he won’t be there and he’ll get in trouble. I don’t know what to do.
They get to his door. I’m so nervous I’m starting to sweat. Norah knocks and we all wait.
I expect nothing, and when the door opens, I nearly scream.
Graham looks out at us with a frown. “What?” he grunts.
“We got a package,” she says.
“Good for you.” He goes to slam the door.
She puts her hand up. “It was left for Katie.”
I stare at Graham. He glances at me and I swear to freaking god, he grins and winks before looking back at Norah.
“Let’s see it then,” he grunts.
Dave hands it over. Graham gestures for everyone to follow him into his room.
It’s a nice room, smaller than mine, but still plenty big enough for all of us. He sits down at the table and rummages around in a little bag he has there before pulling out a knife.
With quick strokes, he rips the box open. He stares inside before grunting a little bit.
“Someone has a sense of humor,” he says, reaching inside and taking out a horse’s head.
It’s not a real head. It was a stuffed animal, the head ripped off the body. Something red stains the bottom where the stuffing is partially pulled out, like guts or like a spine.
I shudder a little bit at the thought.
Graham frowns at the head as everyone stares at him. He rubs his fingers along the red stuff at the base of the doll’s neck and, before we can stop him, he puts his fingers in his mouth.
I stare, absolutely horrified.
“Mmm,” he says. “Ketchup.”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I ask him.
He shrugs. “Nothing.”
“That could’ve been anything!”
He shrugs again, digging through the box. “There’s a note.”
Norah steps up and he hands it off to her. She unfolds the paper and reads it quietly to herself as Graham tosses the horse head up into the air, catching it as it drops back down.
Norah looks at me. “It’s the same person,” she says softly.
“How do you know?”
“It’s obvious.”
I clench my jaw. “Okay, this is too much. A horse head?”
“Like in The Godfather,” Dave offers.
“Helpful,” Graham grunts. “What are you doing here, anyway?”
Norah glances at Dave. “Thank you, but you can go now.”
He hesitates, clearly wanting to stay, but turns and leaves. Once he’s gone, Norah turns back to Graham.
“What do you think?”
“I think whoever sent this has a sick sense of humor,” he says, tossing the head back into the box carelessly. “Still kind of funny though.”