I take a step to my side and pivot to face both of them. My father stands just to my right, my sister to my left, each only a couple feet away. The door to the hallway is behind me, painfully distant. The small table holding my phone rests between us. They each look at me with some kind of desire. A desire to control, maybe to harm.

I’m not safe here, but I can’t leave. Things are unfinished.

“What else have you done?” I ask Cora. “Who else have you hurt?”

My father answers before she can. “I knew your sister needed my help after PJ died.”

The words take me a moment to process, but suddenly I’m there, transported back to my ten-year-old self. PJ was our only pet. A black cat, long hair, shy and sweet. He’d come into my lap when I would watch TV. My lap, no one else’s. The preponderance of my PJ memories are of him being old, slow, and unfailingly sweet.

I almost ask What about PJ? But I know better. The urge to throw up hits me hard.

“You said he just died,” I say. “Old age.”

My father shakes his head.

“I wanted to see what it was like,” Cora says. “But I didn’t do a good job cleaning up the mess. Dad found the blood in the garage, made me tell him what I did.”

“You were what…twelve?”

She shrugs.

I take a step back, bumping into my chair. “You’re sick. I can’t believe I let Max go to your house. How could I have ever come back here?”

Everything I’ve ever known about Cora but wouldn’t admit to myself unleashes at me with tsunami force. Am I so stupid or just always hopeful the truth is better than my perception of the world? Just like with Riley. I’d hoped he’d come to his senses. Calm down enough to see things were over and we’d be better off apart. But no. I stayed until it was too late, until the truth revealed itself with tragedy.

And here I am, back in Bury. Back in the very house where I’ve always denied who I suspected my sister really was.

“What about…” I start, then move around my chair until it’s between us.

“Where are you going?” Cora says.

“What about any others?” I ask. “After Caleb. Where there others?”

Cora smiles, no teeth. “Are you asking if, in the last two decades, I’ve somehow managed to completely control the desire that possesses me? Well, sure, Rose. Of course I’ve controlled it. Easier than quitting smoking. Is that what you want to hear?”

That answer is enough for the vomit to finally release from my stomach. I bend over and heave vodka and bile onto the thick and undoubtedly expensive area rug.

“Oh, for chrissakes,” my father says. “You and your puking. Just like when you were a baby.”

I wipe my mouth, rise, and immediately get in his face. “Are you kidding me? Are you even listening to what she’s saying?”