Page 34 of What We Bury

I swipe some foundation across Brock’s jaw, rubbing it into the flaccid skin. The car hits a pothole and his head lolls sideways, his left cheek smearing across the headrest of Holden’s Audi.

Oops.

“Milo,” Holden glances back at me from the driver’s seat. “I swear to god if you get corpse juice or makeup on my leather?—”

“Relax, I brought a drop cloth.”

“You brought a—Milo!”

“I’m not an animal, Holden. I plan ahead.” I smooth the sponge across the dead rapist’s cheekbone, blending downward toward the jaw. He’s cold. Not room-temperature cold—freezing cold.

He spent the day in a meat locker, courtesy of Hank, a guy I know who doesn’t ask questions about what goes in next to the brisket. Micah and I prepped him there—wrapped his middle in plastic so he wouldn’t leak on the move, dressed him in a freshoutfit and cut his tongue out since it wouldn’t stay in his mouth after the noose.

Hours of work leading to this moment. He’s held the chill nicely.

It’s kind of like taking a steak from the fridge, except this steak used to have fucked-up opinions on his right to a woman’s body.

“Sage might not have been your first, but she certainly made sure she was your last.” I tsk at him as I apply more makeup. “You got all you deserved and more, you evil motherfucker.” I boop him on the nose with my index finger.

The tricky part of making a dead man with strangulation face appear human isn’t the foundation. I matched his skin tone from photos, corrected the blue around his lips, and did what I do best: made a nightmare look like a bad decision.

I call this the “basic bro complexion” and it’s a goddamn work of art.

The real tricky part is the neck. The deeply bruised rope marks don’t want to blend. They sit in the skin like a signature, and no amount of full-coverage concealer is going to make them disappear. So I’ve wrapped a charcoal cashmere scarf around his throat and paired it with one of those god-awful hipster beanies that makes a man look like he owns three vinyl records and calls it a personality.

He’s exactly that kind of guy.

Sorry,was.

“You know I gave up watching Sage to be here tonight. She’s currently alone and terrified and?—”

“Knox is watching her.”

“Like I said, alone and terrified. How much longer?” Holden asks. “I’d like to at least be back on watch by the time she wakes up.”

“Be there? Holden. My dude. Your version of ‘being there’ is sitting in your car with binoculars trained on her windows.”

“I’m giving her time to get used to me. Now answer the fucking question—how long?”

“Three minutes. I need to get this boob tape to stick between his lips.”

Dead silence from the driver’s seat while I attach one side of the tape to his teeth. “Boob tape?”

“Yeah. Girls use it to avoid the dreaded nip-slip with certain outfits. My sisters use it all the time.”

“And why are you using it on his lips?”

“Because they’re blue and limp, Holden. He looks like a gaping fish.” I peel the film away and pat his lips in place, happy when they secure nicely. “I’m also putting on a tinted lip balm. It’s very subtle. Very masculine. Very ‘I definitely didn’t die twenty-one hours ago.’”

Holden’s blue eyes stare at me in the rearview mirror.

“Plus,” I add, “I need him smiling for the photos.”

“Do I even want to know how you’ll achieve that?”

“Facelift tape. Mom swears by it.” I waggle a strip of transparent tape between two fingers like a magician showing the card before the trick. “Two behind his ears, pulls the skin up and back. Instant grin. Not a natural one—more ‘guy who’s off his face’—but for a photo at arm’s length? Sold.”

“How is facelift tape different from boob tape?”