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“Yeah, I just can’t…”
The sound of a piercing scream shattered the peace, driving a wedge in their conversation. Adrenalinerushed through Ella’s veins like an electric current. Ripley’s face contorted in surprise.
“What the…?” asked Ripley. “You hear that?”
Another shrill scream echoed through the corridor. A woman’s voice, the sound of pure terror. It lingered for seconds after it had passed.
“Down here,” Ella said, hurrying down the hallway, round the corner. Nervous energy rippled through her like a million pin pricks, blowing up her heart rate, rousing a hundred thoughts at once.Please be our killer,she said to herself as the source of the scream came into view. Ripley caught up behind, crashing into her partner as they halted to a stop.
It was the housemaid, backed up against the wall, shaking like a weak branch in a force ten gale. The distressed woman eyed the new arrivals, then pointed across the hallway into one of the motel rooms. The one with an open door.
And bloodstains on the carpet.
In a flurry, Ella burst into the motel room and saw an image straight from her nightmare. Only this wasn’t a dream; it was very much real.
The mysterious stranger from the night before, knees on the carpet, elbows on the bed. The same position as the other victims.
“Holy shit,” Ripley said.
Ella’s blood rushed cold. “This is the man from last night.”
Ripley’s hands flew to her face in disbelief, her eyes wide with astonishment. Ella rarely saw the emotion from the woman, but this scene seemed to shake her to her core.
“The angel of death strikes again,” Ripley said.
***
Now, Ella was alone with the dead body. She kept a distance, only treading where she needed to. This was a fresh crime scene, untouched by no one but the killer and the victim, so contaminating it was a very real possibility. Ripley had taken the housemaid downstairs and seen to her well-being, and she told Ella she’d make the arrangements to cordon off the scene. Ella stayed put to keep prying eyes away but so far, not a single soul had passed by.
The ideas raced through her mind like a fierce tornado, whipping up a flurry of emotions and possibilities. First, their killer had been so close to them, literally a few rooms away. But why had he come here? Was it a pure coincidence or was it her and Ripley’s presence that drew him here? Could she or Ripley have been his intended target, but instead settled on easier prey? Or maybe this was an insult, a kind ofyou-can’t-catch-memessage?
If not, why this victim? She had a hundred questions for this man, all now unanswerable. His secrets had accompanied him to the afterlife, so extracting those answers were now a much more difficult task.
She calmed herself, taking a moment to pay her respects to this fallen gentleman. Despite his attitude, he didn’t deserve this, didn’t deserve to be gouged in the stomach and left to bleed out. This punishment did not fit the crime.
Ella removed her emotional hat and put on her rational one. She had an advantage here. She was the first person to lay eyes on this very fresh crime scene. Everything would be exactly as the killer intended, no contamination, nothing nudged out of the place by the law enforcement machine. She consumed the scene with a logical eye, reenacting the killer’s steps from entry to murder to escape.
The bloodstains indicated the killer struck at the door, possibly as he stepped outside. For a more accurate answer, she’d need to gauge the severity of the laceration in the victim’s stomach, but until then she’d have to stick to the most probable answer. Either way, the killer either knocked at the door or waited for the victim to leave. There was a rucksack lying beside the dresser, a few clothes spilling out of the top. As much as Ella wanted to inspect it, she couldn’t yet, but it suggested that this victim was preparing to leave. She looked around and saw zero other possessions, and hadn’t this man told her he’d been staying here for weeks? If this was his semi-permanent home, surely he would have unpacked by now?
Judging by the trail, the killer dragged the victim back inside towards the bed. The majority of the blood had congealed beneath the victim’s torso, that meant he died in the position he was now locked in.
Ella rubbed her face and took a deep breath. She had a problem with this theory, even though all the evidence pointed to it. It went against everything she knew about serial killers and people in the throes of death. Usually, a victim would thrash around until their dying breath, not simply stay locked in a position until they finally passed away.
Unless the killer commanded them to do it, but why bother? More bizarrely, why place – or force – them into this strange position? Because it implied submission? Because the visual of someone on their knees begging for mercy appealed to his sense of power? Perhaps, but if he was truly looking to prove his dominance, he’d spend as much time with the victims as possible and he’d carry out more severe attacks. So far, he’d only lacerated each victim once, and that was at odds with everything Ella knew about power-control serial killers.
Next, Ella went to the window. The curtains were still drawn but the window was slightly open. It only opened a few inches, so the chances of the killer escaping out here were nonexistent. That meant he left the same way he arrived – brazenly. There had to be CCTV cameras in this place or in the surrounding areas, so that would be her first port of call after leaving here.
Was there anything here different to the other crime scenes, or was it another carbon copy? Nothing had been vandalized, and she doubted the killer would bother robbing a man who apparently had nothing left to his name. She stepped back out in the hallway, avoiding the blood, and took in the scene at a single glance. On the surface, it was all very simplistic, but this killer had a twisted vision that he was hellbent on achieving. Everything meant something, she was sure of it.
The whoosh of the breeze coming in through the window made for calming background noise, but Ella jumped in surprise when the victim – this poor man who’d been dead for at least several hours – suddenly moved of his own accord.
“Jesus,” Ella shouted.
The victim, whose head had been propped up on his hands in a begging-for-mercy position, collapsed face-first onto the bed. In death, the body went through several sudden changes, including the rapid withering of skin and the mass release of bodily fluids. He now lay in the same position as Joanne and David, head buried into the mattress.
The corridor reverberated with the sound of shuffling feet, the echoing rhythm like a heartbeat in the otherwise silent passageway. Ripley turned the corner, joining Ella as they both surveyed the scene.
“Can’t believe he struck next door to us,” Ripley said. “That’s some bold shit.”
