Psycho Killer Read Online Free Page B

Blair was acting sort of sultry and sexy and could it be…
something was about to happen
?
    Oh, something’s
always
about to happen.
    Blair squeezed Nate’s hand and pulled him into the room. They stumbled over each other, falling toward the bed, spilling their drinks and staining the white mohair rug. Blair giggled; the scotch she’d pounded had gone right to her head.
    I’m about to have sex with Nate
, she thought giddily. And then they’d both graduate in June and go to Yale in the fall and have a huge wedding four years later and find a beautiful apartment on Park Avenue and decorate the whole thing in animal skins, with fireplaces in every room, and have rabid animal sex in front of each one on a rotating basis.
    Suddenly Blair’s mother’s voice rang out, loud and clear, down the hallway.
    “Serena van der Woodsen! What a lovely surprise!”
    Nate dropped Blair’s hand and straightened up like a soldier called to attention. Blair sat down hard on the end of her bed, put her drink on the floor, closed her eyes, and grasped the bedspread in tight, white-knuckled fists—exactly how Carrie’s knuckles looked after she was soaked with pig’s blood at the prom.
    She opened her eyes and looked up at Nate.
    But Nate was already turning to go, striding back down the hall to see if it could possibly be true. Had Serena van der Woodsen
really
come back?
    Blair clutched her stomach, ravenous again. She should have gone for that hot dog after all, or a whole string of hot dogs with which to strangle the entire guest list, including Nate and Serena. She’d save them for last and do it slowly, with a flourish.
    And a little mustard?

s is back!
    “Hello, hello, hello!” Blair’s mother crowed, kissing the smooth, hollow cheeks of each van der Woodsen. If there were such a thing as sexy skeletons, they were it.
    Kiss, kiss, kiss, kiss, kiss,
kiss!
    “I know you weren’t expecting Serena, dear,” Mrs. van der Woodsen whispered in a concerned, confidential tone. “I hope it’s all right.”
    “Of course. Yes, it’s fine,” Mrs. Waldorf said. “Did you come home for the weekend, Serena?”
    Serena shook her head and handed her plastic Burberry trench coat to Esther. She pushed a stray blond hair behind her ear and smiled at her hostess.
    When Serena smiled, she used her eyes—those dark, almost navy blue eyes. It was the kind of smile you might try to imitate, posing in the bathroom mirror, the magnetic “you can’t stop looking at me, can you?” smile of a supermodel or a sociopath. Well, Serena smiled that way without even trying.
    “No, I’m here to—” Serena started to say.
    Kill everyone?
    Serena’s mother interrupted hastily. “Serena has decided that boarding school is not for her,” she announced, patting her hair casually, as if it were no big deal.
    Serena’s mother was the middle-aged version of utter coolness. In fact, the whole van der Woodsen clan was like that. They were all tall, blond, thin, and super-poised, and they never did anything—play tennis, hail a cab, eat spaghetti, maim an innocent schoolteacher—without maintaining their cool. Serena especially. She was gifted with the kind of coolness that you can’t acquire by buying the right handbag or the right pair of jeans. She was the girl every boy wants and every girl wants to be.
    Or wants to kill.
    “Serena will be back at Constance tomorrow,” Mr. van der Woodsen said, glancing at his daughter with steely blue eyes and an owl-like mixture of pride and disapproval that made him look scarier than he really was. There was an old rumor that he had killed a man once. But then again, who hasn’t?
    “Well, Serena. You look lovely, dear. Blair will be thrilled to see you,” Blair’s mother trilled.
    “You’re one to talk,” Serena said, hugging her. “Look how skinny you are! And the house looks so fantastic. Wow. You’ve got some awesome new stuff!”
    Mrs. Waldorf smiled, obviously pleased, and wrapped her arm around