“Cash, I don’t have any proof, and I don’t have any information aside from knowing she’s dead. And, trust me, most people—especially cops—don’t believe in psychics. They’ll blow me off for sure. At least until I have more information or some proof.”
“This is damn frustrating,” he mumbles, rubbing his fingers over his lips. “In the meantime, I’m going to run searches in my database to see if other women with similar descriptions are missing.”
“They do look alike. And they look like someone else,” Daphne says thoughtfully.
“Who?” Millie asks.
“Brielle.”
All eyes turn to me in surprise at Daphne’s statement.
“You’re right,” Millie says. “At least, Tammy does. We don’t know anything about the other girl.”
“She resembles her, too. At least from what I could tell in my dream.” Daphne shakes her head.
I stand to pace. I think better when I’m moving.
“Is that why they’re coming to me? Because they look like me? Maybe they’re trying to warn me or something.”
“It’s possible,” Millie says as I walk past the window and glance outside.
“Shit,” I mutter. “Guys? There are now three girls.”Chapter Six“One side of me says, I’d like to talk to her, date her. The other side of me says, I wonder what her head would look like on a stick?”- Ed Kemper, AKA the Co-ed KillerIt’s possible that he went overboard this past week. But after such a dry spell, and once he got the taste of the woman he took from Brielle’s tour, he just couldn’t help himself.
“Hello, dear,” he says to one of the five girls he currently has tied up in his room of fun. She’s the most recent, and she hasn’t stopped crying since she woke up this morning.
Of course, he doesn’t find the show of emotion attractive in the least.
It’s a weakness.
And that means this one won’t last long once he starts playing with her.
Pity.
“Now, Brielle, there’s no need to cry.”
“I’m not B-B-Brielle,” she whimpers. “I’m Ally.”
He backhands her across the face, making her lip immediately bleed.
“You’ll learn.”
But she doesn’t stop crying. No, she just sobs louder.
If he were a less patient man, he’d just slit her throat right now.
But that won’t do. No, he went through too much trouble bringing her here, taking her out of a bar with plenty of people around to see.
She was too perfect to pass up.
He’ll just have to listen to her cry.
Unless…
“Here, Brielle, this will help.” He grabs a bloody rag from his workbench and stuffs it into her mouth to muffle her cries. “There, now. Much better.”
He ignores the other three tied to their beds, some slipping in and out of consciousness, and one weeping quietly into her bare mattress, and then turns to the girl strapped to his chair. He clicks his tongue when he sees the blood running down her thigh from where the leather has bitten into her innocent flesh.
“Oh, this won’t do. You’ve been trying to get away, haven’t you?”
Her eyes are glassy as she shakes her head, denying her own struggles.
“I’m the only one allowed to make you bleed, Brielle. I told you that before.”
He reaches for the woman’s hair and surprises her when he pours warm water over it, then begins to wash it with shampoo that smells like apples.
“It has to be clean,” he says, his voice soothing and even. “Nice and clean.”
Once the soap is rinsed, he painstakingly braids the long, dark hair, securing it with a black hair tie.
Then, once it’s just the way he likes it, he reaches for the scissors and cuts off the braid at the nape of her neck.
“I’m keeping this,” he says, his face stretching in a sinister smile. “It’s my little trophy. You don’t mind, do you?”
She shakes her head, making him chuckle.
“Of course, you don’t. You’re such a good girl, Brielle. Always so sweet and nice.”
He returns to his workbench and hangs the braid above the window, joining the other twenty-nine plaits.
“Thirty,” he mumbles. “The same as your age!”
He turns to her triumphantly, ignoring the cries and whimpers coming from the others, completely focused on the woman in his chair.
“Oh, that calls for something special. Something very special, indeed.”
He flips on the switch of the car battery charger next to the chair, parts her legs, and reaches for the cord.
“You’re going to love this.”Chapter SevenCash“There have to be more missing persons reports,” I mutter as I power up my laptop. Brielle and her sisters sit nearby, talking about the new girl that’s joined the other two apparitions.
My brother pointed out to me this morning that this could all be a scam. And I can’t exactly say his hypothesis is wrong. Brielle could be making up everything she supposedly sees, all for the sake of being dramatic.
Or, she could just be plain crazy.
And, frankly, I don’t know her well enough to say for certain that he’s not right.