And yet, as he knew that, he couldn’t find himself attracted to her. Something about her flawlessness was off-putting to him, but it was more than that. Even subtracting the fact that she was evil, and counting only on physical appearance, he still found something lacking.
It was like she wasn’t really there. Penn hit all the right notes, but they all rang false. She was merely the fa?ade of a human being, with nothing behind it.
“I was taking a walk around town and I spotted you working, so I thought I would say hello,” Penn said.
“Hello, Penn.” He smiled at her. “Satisfied?”
“Hardly.” She laughed. “You never leave me satisfied. Although I know a trick or two I’m sure you’d love.”
Daniel rolled his eyes and turned away from her. “Charming.”
“You say that like you don’t mean it, but I think you do.” Penn hopped on the sawhorse next to him as he bent over to write on the blueprints.
“Do you really?” He glanced up at her in disbelief. “What have I done to give you that impression? Was it that time I punched you in the jaw? Or when you were kicking me repeatedly in the ribs?”
He was referencing their encounter on the Fourth of July, the one and only time he’d ever hit a woman. Though he wasn’t completely certain that Penn could count as a real woman. After all, she was a man-eating monster.
Penn waved it off. “That was just a little fun and games. Nobody got hurt.”
“So you’ve forgotten how Lexi murdered your boyfriend?” Daniel asked her absently as he made a mark on his papers.
“Gemma told you about that?” Penn clicked her tongue. “I thought she kept murder a secret. Especially after what she did.”
For a minute Daniel tried to ignore her. He finished checking his measurements against the blueprints, so all he had left to do was the actual sawing. He stood up and looked over at Penn, who’d been watching him with a smirk on her face.
“Okay. I’ll bite,” he said, tapping his pencil against the palm of his hand. “What did Gemma do?”
“She didn’t tell you?” Penn asked with faux surprise. “I thought there weren’t secrets between you and your girlfriend’s kid sister. It’s a bit strange how much time you spend with her, isn’t it?”
“No. But it is a bit strange how much I spend with you.” He walked a few steps away from her to put the blueprints under a heavy chunk of wood so they wouldn’t blow away as he worked.
“You do have a point there,” Penn said. She hopped off the sawhorse, but she didn’t follow him.
“So … did Gemma do something?” He faced her. “Or was that all a lie to get my attention?”
“Oh, no, she did something.” Penn smiled widely. “She killed and fed on a young man when we were staying in the beach house. I can’t remember his name, but I probably never knew it. Gemma did it on her own.”
Daniel shoved his pencil behind his ear and tried to remember what he’d heard about that. It had been over a month ago, and Gemma had never really spoken much about it, at least not to him.
The only thing he really knew was what he read in the paper. There had been something about a guy named Jason Way, who was in his thirties and had been convicted of rape and domestic assault. That was how Daniel and Harper had been able to find Gemma after she’d run off with the sirens. They’d been staying in a beach house about an hour from Myrtle Beach. Harper had been searching everywhere for Gemma, until Daniel found the article about Jason Way’s murder.
He’d been eviscerated the same way the other sirens’ victims had been, so Daniel and Harper assumed that Penn or Lexi or Thea had done it. But now Penn was implying Gemma had.
“The body they found?” Daniel asked. “The rapist?”
“Maybe.” She lowered her eyes, seeming disappointed by Daniel’s calm reaction. “I don’t know the details.”
“Well, whatever Gemma did, if she even did anything, I’m sure she did it to protect herself,” he said.
Penn scoffed. “So that’s it? She gets away with murder, literally? But I endure the cold shoulder?”
“I give you the warmest shoulder I can, Penn,” Daniel said honestly.
He went on to continue what he’d been working on. He brushed past her to get his tools together.
“What is it that you’re doing?” Penn asked as he made sure the extension cord was plugged into the back of the theater.
“Building the sets for the play. Thea must’ve told you something about it.”
“She’s told me too much about it.” Penn groaned. “She won’t stop quoting Shakespeare. It’s obnoxious.”
“I thought you would like that kinda thing. Isn’t it from your heyday?” He came back to where she stood, since she was standing next to his saw. He crouched down next to the machine, checking the cords and blades.
“It’s still my heyday. I’ll never go out of style,” she told him confidently.
He smirked at that. “I stand corrected.”
“What’s on your back?”
“My tattoo?”