Chap­ter 36 begins with a sud­den and dra­mat­ic shift in the weath­er. By noon, tem­per­a­tures had dropped sharply, and storm clouds massed above the Old Vil­lage like a warn­ing. The wind howled across the bridge, rock­ing cars and mak­ing them weave from one lane to anoth­er. Streets that had ear­li­er echoed with the sounds of chil­dren and chat­ter were now silent, scat­tered with dry leaves tum­bling like for­got­ten mem­o­ries. In Slick­’s hos­pi­tal room, the wind’s force rat­tled the win­dows so fierce­ly it felt like the out­side world might break in at any moment. Inside, the cold set­tled in like an unwant­ed guest, wrap­ping its fin­gers around every­one present.

Patri­cia sat with Kit­ty and Maryellen, each of them try­ing to mask the anx­i­ety tight­en­ing in their chests. Kitty’s paper gown bare­ly cov­ered her sequined sweater, a reminder of how out of place they all were in a room meant for med­ical care, not covert meet­ings. Maryellen fid­get­ed, con­cerned about her daugh­ter’s school project, while Patri­cia focused on the grow­ing ten­sion. When Mrs. Greene entered and took a seat with­out a word, the room seemed to tight­en fur­ther, every­one antic­i­pat­ing what was to come. It was Slick, frail and sunken under her cardi­gan, who had called them togeth­er. And her con­di­tion, obvi­ous and heart­break­ing, gave weight to what they were about to dis­cuss.

Their group was unex­pect­ed­ly joined by Grace, whose arrival briefly upend­ed the mood. Grace’s dis­com­fort was vis­i­ble from the moment she walked in, already inch­ing toward the door before Slick’s plea root­ed her in place. As they all sat encir­cling Slick’s hos­pi­tal bed, it felt like a strange res­ur­rec­tion of their old book club—except this time, no fic­tion would cush­ion the hor­ror. Patri­cia began slow­ly, admit­ting she had been wrong before, not about the dan­ger, but about the form it took. When she final­ly said the word vam­pire, the room held its breath. There were no gasps, only stunned silence and the heavy sound of Slick­’s labored breath­ing.

Slick’s voice trem­bled as she con­firmed Patricia’s account, recount­ing how she had tried to nego­ti­ate with James Har­ris and was met instead with vio­lence and degra­da­tion. The mem­o­ry brought tears, but also resolve. Her vivid descrip­tion of his vio­la­tion, both phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al, left no one untouched. The idea that he had some­how taint­ed her body and left a sick­ness no doc­tor could explain sent a chill through them all. Patri­cia added to the tes­ti­mo­ny with a pho­to show­ing Korey’s injury—proof of the predator’s reach into her own fam­i­ly. The mark, famil­iar from pre­vi­ous unex­plained deaths, con­firmed what they’d all sus­pect­ed: Har­ris was not just a dan­ger. He was an active threat.

As each woman processed the impli­ca­tions, the atmos­phere thick­ened with dread and a dawn­ing sense of duty. Patri­cia insist­ed they could no longer wait, that silence and fear had enabled Har­ris to slip through the cracks. She out­lined his manip­u­la­tion, his groom­ing of Korey, and his grow­ing influ­ence over Blue. What began as sus­pi­cions had evolved into pat­terns, and now, unde­ni­able evi­dence. Kit­ty con­firmed she had seen Francine’s con­tort­ed corpse in Harris’s attic, break­ing the final seal on their shared hor­ror. Grace, how­ev­er, remained cold, even accusato­ry, until Mrs. Greene con­front­ed her with a pow­er­ful reminder: the for­got­ten chil­dren of Six Mile.

Mrs. Greene’s words hit hard­er than any accu­sa­tion. Her qui­et dig­ni­ty, ground­ed in truth and long-held pain, remind­ed them all that this wasn’t about stories—it was about lives. The names of her chil­dren, spo­ken aloud, under­scored the real­i­ty that they had turned away from a com­mu­ni­ty in need. Her chal­lenge was clear: would they do the same again now that the threat had reached their own homes? Grace, unable to face that mir­ror, left in silence. The remain­ing women sat heavy with the weight of her absence.

Slick spoke next, quot­ing Proverbs to reflect on their moral fail­ure. Her words made it clear that their inac­tion had cost lives. Patri­cia then declared that Har­ris, whether vam­pire or mon­ster, would not stop on his own. His sur­vival depend­ed on the suf­fer­ing of oth­ers. If they didn’t act, no one would. They were the last line of defense. It wasn’t just about con­fronting evil. It was about reclaim­ing pow­er from fear.

Maryellen protest­ed that they were not war­riors, but Slick’s response cut deep. South­ern women, she said, were expect­ed to be polite, not pow­er­ful. But the real­i­ty was that beneath the sur­face, there was resilience hard­ened by cen­turies of sur­vival. They were not frag­ile. They were forged in fire, and they could face this threat togeth­er. Patri­cia added that Harris’s soli­tude would be his undo­ing. No one would come look­ing for him. No one would mourn his absence.

Plans began to take shape. They chose the night of the Clem­son-Car­oli­na game, when the town would be dis­tract­ed. Patri­cia had researched leg­ends and super­sti­tions, fil­ter­ing myth from strat­e­gy. They wouldn’t rely on stakes or sun­light. They need­ed a plan ground­ed in log­ic and sur­vival. Har­ris had under­es­ti­mat­ed them before. That would be his mis­take.

By the end of the meet­ing, they had passed an invis­i­ble thresh­old. The deci­sion was made, and no one spoke of turn­ing back. They were no longer a book club. They were a force deter­mined to pro­tect their children—even if it meant con­fronting the unthink­able.