You May Now Kill the Bride (Return to Fear Street Book 1)
You May Now Kill the Bride: Part 1 – Chapter 12

Randolph Fear dropped to his knees on the grass. He held his head in both hands. He covered his face and didn’t move. Only his shoulders shivered, revealing that he was sobbing.

The circle around him tightened. No one spoke. The screams had died. The only sounds were the sobs and muffled crying of those who remained on the mesa top.

When Randolph raised his head, he looked for his wife. He saw two women walking with her, holding her arms, helping her to the lodge.

Randolph didn’t bother to wipe away the tears that stained his reddened cheeks. “What did I do?” he said to those standing around him. “What did I do to deserve this?”

His shoulders shook again, and a sound escaped his throat, a choking sound. “I . . . lost two daughters. Two daughters on a day that was supposed to be full of joy. Why? I did nothing. I am innocent.”

A man reached out to help Randolph to his feet. But Randolph shoved his hands away. He gazed around. “Where is Peter Goodman? Where is he? He married my daughter, then threw her away. Where is he?”

“He isn’t here,” a woman called. Her face was tearstained, too. She dabbed at it with a damp lace handkerchief. “I didn’t see him leave.”

Randolph uttered a loud sob that ended in a hiccup. “Peter murdered my daughter. Then he vanished? Can this be happening? Do nightmares really exist in the daytime?”

A shadow fell over Randolph. Still on his knees, he shivered. He raised his eyes to the young man in a dark suit who stood above him. In his grief, it took his mind a few seconds to recognize the man.

“Nelson Swift.”

Nelson nodded solemnly. He held his hat tightly in one hand.

“Mr. Swift.” Randolph squinted up at him. The sun over Nelson’s head cast his face in shadow. “Why are you here?” Randolph’s voice came out in a quavering whisper.

Nelson hesitated. “I . . . came to tell you . . . But . . . I was too late.”

“Tell me? Tell me what?” Randolph Fear demanded.

“It’s about Peter,” Nelson replied. “I learned the truth about him.”

“Truth? Spit it out, Mr. Swift. Tell me what truth.”

“His name isn’t Peter Goodman,” Nelson said. “His name is Peter Goode.”

Randolph gasped and covered his face again. “The curse . . . ,” he murmured. “The curse between our families . . . the Goodes and the Fears . . . It continues.”

Huddled there on the grass, he realized the truth . . . all of it. Peter wasn’t under a spell. Randolph had accused his daughter Ruth-Ann unjustly. No one had cast a spell on Peter to force him to murder Rebecca.

Peter was a Goode. Because of the curse, a Goode and a Fear could never marry. He murdered Rebecca of his own will. Murdered her for revenge against the Fears.

But revenge for what?

Randolph raised his hands and let Nelson help pull him to his feet. “It won’t end today,” Randolph murmured. He leaned heavily on Nelson as they began to walk to the lodge. “Now I will have to take my revenge on the Goodes. It won’t end. Not before I have avenged my daughters.”

Nelson guided him between the tall grass on either side of the carpeted aisle. He didn’t speak. He didn’t know what he could say.

Nelson heard again in his ears the screams of the two girls.

Maybe it will never end, he thought.

A burst of wind carried the girls’ dying screams back to his mind. He shut his eyes and guided Randolph Fear down the mesa to the lodge.