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* * *
My day was full of work, but the whole time my mind was on Hope. What's she doing? Did she eat? I ended up canceling my last two meetings as Jackson texted me with the time and place and if I stayed at work, then I wouldn't have time to go home.
Entering the house, I look around for her, but I don't see her anywhere. I walk up the stairs and look through the small part of the door that is open, and I see her sitting on the floor reading the newspaper article about her family. She picks up the box; the only thing that she cares about. What's in that box? As I take a step closer, the floorboards creak and Hope quickly puts the box and newspaper away and puts her head down.
Walking into the room, I sit down next to her, and she moves a little further away from me. I look towards the window. "You know that you don't have to look at the floor every time I come close to you," I tell her. I want to make her feel comfortable here. I want her to finally look at me like I'm not about to hurt her. "I went and spoke to your doctor today; I'll be getting your medication for you, so you don't have to worry about that anymore. She told me that you like to go out on a Saturday and that you meet with someone." I stop as I see her body shiver from the corner of my eye.
I turn to face her. "If you don't want to be here, why have you not tried to run?" There's nothing from her. But it's the question I keep asking myself. I haven't locked her in the room or the house. She can walk out whenever she wants, but every day I come back, and she's still here, why?
“Tomorrow I thought we could go out and I could take you to wherever it is you need to be.” Hope’s body tenses for a moment. “Is there anywhere you’d like to go? As I said, I’d be quite happy to take you.”
I look at her massaging her wrists knowing they wouldn't hurt so much if she just had a hot shower. Every day this week she has showered with cold water, and I'm going to stop that. She can hate me for it, I don't care, but she's going to have a warm shower.
She stays quiet, so I tell her, "I have to get going to a meeting, so make yourself some dinner, and I'll see you in the morning." I get up and look down at her as she keeps her head bowed. I want to hug her and tell her that everything will be fine and I'm here to help her and protect her if needed.
* * *
Jackson sends me a message to say that he has everything ready for me. We’ve been doing this long enough for him to know what type of mood I’m in and what I like to do when I have a certain mood like tonight. Tonight, I want it to go slow; I want to watch my victim taking his last breath.
When I arrive, I take a seat and look around the big empty warehouse until my eyes reach my toy for the night, and my lips curl up into a smile; I’m aware this man has done things he knows he shouldn’t. Things that one day would get him in trouble and that trouble now is with me.
Lighting up a cigarette, I lean back and just watch him for a moment. His feet are tied together, and he's hanging upside down from a hook on the ceiling. His mouth taped. It's people like him that made me the way I am. And she might not have told me yet, but I can feel it inside me that it's also people like him that made Hope the way she is and I do this to find one particular man; one man that I plan on hurting in ways that I've never hurt anyone ever before. But Hope is the person I want to help first and I'm going to find every man that hurt her and then I'm going to kill them.
Inhaling the smoke, I walk over to the man, I exhale the grey cloud into his face.
I rip the tape off his mouth, and he yells, "What do you want? I've never seen you before." I smile as I take the small knife out of my pocket and slice his throat by his jugular, just a little, making him scream out. I've always loved the sound of my victims screaming. It's payback for the way the children cried when they begged to be set free, and the sick bastards never let them go. So, I never let my victims go; I make sure that they hurt even more.
I tape his mouth again as his voice is fucking annoying me now and I sit back in my chair smoking the rest of my cigarette. I watch the blood dripping slowly from his neck. Locking my eyes with his, I smile at him. I want to make sure that he knows I’m enjoying this, that I’m the last person he sees.
Lighting another cigarette from the end of the one I’m smoking, I watch as crimson liquid drips from the wound into a pool on the floor.
"Have you heard the name, Jack?” I ask my victim.
Jackson is working hard on finding Hope's uncle, but he's like a fucking ghost. There's a part of me that has to laugh at that. These sick fuckers out there, I've heard what they say. They call me the ghost that kills, so now it's a ghost hunting the ghost.
* * *
I spent two hours at the warehouse last night, it didn't take him long to bleed out, but I just wanted to stay there longer. I wanted to watch him take his last breath. I wanted to see how he felt knowing that he was about to die.
The other reason was that I didn't want to come home. I didn't want to come to my own home because I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep. I would have stood in the doorway of Hope's room and watched her sleep on the floor and that would have made me angrier. For the first time since I've met her, last night watching that man die, I felt relaxed.
Sitting at the dining room table with my coffee, I watch Hope in front of me playing with her food. I light up a cigarette, and I can't take my eyes off her. I know that there's a beautiful girl before me, who is hiding away and I can't wait for her to show herself. I don't even know her, she has spoken very few words to me, and I already want to know everything about her. I want to see her smile, I want to touch her, I want to…
"You'd think married rich men would learn their lesson," I hear Jackson say as he's walking over to me. He pulls me out of my thoughts. "I mean stop getting married to the twenty-something and marry someone that will stay with you." He takes my cigarette and sits on the chair next to me.
Hope walks over to the kitchen counter, and I look over at Jackson. "It's Saturday, why are you here?"
Hope places a coffee mug in front of him and then sits back down. Lighting up another cigarette, I focus back on Jackson.
“I wanted to give you this,” he says sliding an envelope over to me. “I still can’t find him for you, but—”
"Who killed him?" I read through the file. The guy who we're looking for had a nephew, but he's dead.
"The cops. There was an arrest warrant for him for murder. He went down fighting, and before you ask, that's where the line of inquiry goes dead. Fuck knows where he is." Jackson drinks his coffee while I continue to read the file.
His nephew was in Vegas, the police got a tip on where he was, and things went wrong. He was declared dead at the scene. "He's not in Vegas then?"
“No, but I get the feeling he’s changed his name. I mean there’s no trace of him anywhere.”
