I clear my throat, ridding it of protests and confessions, giving Irene a weak smile. “Thanks for the code,” I say, nodding toward the paper before I turn away and head back to my room.
By the time I’m inside, the reality has truly sunk in. There’s no way my book is going to be sitting in that safe, particularly not when all my weapons are gone. I head to where it sits on the shelf, mocking me, and punch in the master code. Zero, nine, two, three.
The mechanism unlocks and the door swings open.
Just as I suspected, my book is nowhere to be seen. But, to my surprise, there’s something left in its place. I pull out a folded note, turning away from the shelves as I unfurl the torn paper to read the curling, precise script of an unfamiliar hand.
Hello, Ballmeat. I have your little art project. Maybe you should just fuck off out of town while you still can.
Sincerely,
Your bitter enemy
PS How’s this for communication, asshole?
I catch my reflection when I turn my attention away from the paper in my hands. It’s not just fury I see. It’s the thrill of a chase. The challenge of someone who isn’t just prey, but another predator, perhaps one who is not all that different from me. I saved Harper Starling for last because I knew she would be the best prize. I just didn’t realize how right I would be. How worthy she would be of destruction.
“I cannot wait to kill Harper Starling,” I say to the man in the mirror, every word a deliberate, decisive vow.
I fold the paper along the creases she left and place it on my nightstand, then grab my car keys and leave.
Or, I try to.
There’s only my vehicle and an Escalade in the parking lot when I get there, and I don’t even make it halfway to the road before I realize there’s a critical problem with my SUV. I throw it into park across two empty spaces and slam the door shut behind me before walking around to the passenger side.
My knife is lodged to the hilt in the flat tire.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I snarl as I pull the blade free, the last of the air hissing through the slit left behind. My knee protests in the brace as I scan the space around me. There’s no other option. I can’t really call an Uber to take me to the home of someone I might possibly murder with my bare fucking hands.
With a heavy sigh, I hide the blade beneath the cuff of my sleeve, and then I start a painful jog toward Lancaster Manor. I stay off the main roads. Stick to the quiet side streets with their mix of Victorian houses and wartime bungalows and the occasional new build that’s always too modern for its surroundings yet somehow seems to work as a contrast to its more colorful neighbors.
The fog is so thick that I can only see a few feet in any direction. There’s no one on the roads, but I hear things in the gloom. A door slamming shut. Children’s hushed whispers, one of them starting a countdown as they take up a game of hide-and-seek. My haunted surroundings do little to dilute my obsession, Harper taking up all the space in my thoughts, so much so that I make a wrong turn and end up on a dead-end road. My knee throbs. My neck aches. My back hums with the threat of pain, a drum that echoes every footfall it took to get here. But I don’t stop. I just grip the knife tighter, imagining the moment I can hold it to Harper’s throat, when I can feel her heartbeat through the polished steel. I push myself to keep going, not letting myself slow to a walk until I get to the secluded side street where Lancaster Manor looms on the hill, staring down at the town shrouded in fog.
But when I finally arrive at my destination, I find that I’m not alone.
Sam Porter stands across the street from the main entrance of Lancaster Manor, his camera mounted on a tripod, panning across the estate as he makes notes into a voice recorder. It’s not until I get a little closer that I catch the occasional word. Serial killer … Murder at the cottage … Never the same …
“Maybe La Plume was here all along. And maybe he never left,” he says, giving me a dark smile as I draw to a halt a few steps away. He turns off the camera and pockets the voice recorder, pushing the hood of his raincoat off his Porter Productions ball cap. “Hey, man. Great day for some atmospheric shots, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, sure is. Not such a great day for a jog, though. Think I’ll head back to the inn soon,” I say, the lie rolling off my tongue with ease as I cast my gaze up the hill to the foreboding home, a sentry lurking in the oppressive mist. “How’s your film coming together?”
“Good, thanks.” When I nod and make no move to ask prying questions, he says, “I’ll start interviewing some of the townsfolk this week, actually.”
“Oh, yeah?” I jerk my head in the direction of the manor house. “Lookin’ to start with whoever lives there?”
Sam’s cheeks puff out as he blows a long breath through pursed lips. “I wish. Somehow, I don’t think the old man is going to give me an interview, all things considered.” I tilt my head, my brows furrowed, and Sam smirks. He knows he’s piqued my interest, and I’ve given him just enough of a reaction to warrant the crumb of a reward. “You really don’t know the story about that place?”
I shake my head. This time, my reply is honest. I swallow the swell of anger I feel at myself for being so focused on hunting Harper that I didn’t research the town’s ancient history, and now I have to defer to this frat boy–looking prick with his polo shirt and his stupid bleached teeth and country club–bland yet conventionally “good” looks. I grind my teeth in irritation before I paste on a lazy smile and say, “I heard it won a gardening competition or two, but beyond that, no.”
“Lancaster Manor is as old as Cape Carnage. The Lancaster family owns half of the businesses in and around town. A silver mine, back in the early days. A distillery. The general store. The list goes on. Problem is, when you’re looming over a town like this one for generations, it might give you wealth and success, but it makes you a target, too.” Sam stares up at the house for a long moment before turning his attention to his equipment, pulling the camera off the tripod, then removing the plastic cover protecting it from the rain.
“You mean for that Plume guy?” I ask, purposely flubbing the name even though I remember it with clarity from the last time we spoke.
“La Plume, yeah. Have you ever heard of Sleuthseekers?” When I shake my head, a thread of disappointment weaves itself through Sam’s expression. He straightens his cap and places the camera into its padded bag before starting to dismantle the tripod. “I’m one of the founding members. It’s an online amateur investigative group. We’ve solved two murder cases already. You really not into true crime stuff, huh?”
“I mean, it sounds pretty cool,” is all I can manage with a shrug. I guess he’s not that different from me, in a way, considering I hunt down criminals in my spare time, too. But I don’t relish the thought that Sam Porter and I might share similar pastimes. I don’t know why that bothers me. Maybe it’s an aura about him, something I can’t see or hear, but something I feel. Or maybe it’s just the fucking hat. “So what, you’re after La Plume now?”
“You could say that. We’ve been trying to track down his real history for the last five years.” Sam huffs a laugh. Shakes his head, then jerks it in the direction of the estate. “As far as anyone knows, this place is the location of the last kill by La Plume. Poppy Lancaster was the woman’s name. He killed her right there on the property, in the little stone cottage where she lived with her son. As the story goes, her father was the one who found her body. He ended up raising his grandson on his own.”
My first thought is Harper, alone in that same stone cottage with a man outside her window, watching her intimate moments from the shadows of her garden. My fingers tighten around the handle of the knife, the quiver of Jake Hornell’s final breaths a memory imprinted into my skin. I would kill him again, if I could.
