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The heavy, old door groaned, and I had to give it a good shove before it latched. I turned as Xander kicked his desk chair back before collapsing onto it.
“Jeez, calm yourself, Xand.” I rolled my eyes and took a seat on the wobbly wooden chair opposite the desk.
Xander ran a hand over his clenched jaw. “He knows something.”
“I agree, but breaking your only desk chair isn’t going to get him to talk.” I tilted my head to the side. “Or don’t you care about your silly little detective’s office when you’re running for sheriff?”
Xander scoffed. “Shut the hell up, Ramsey. You know me better than that.”
I did, which was why it surprised me when news came out that he was running for the office his father had held for so many years. Sheriff Cohen retired shortly after the murders of my sister and her roommate, but he had been well respected throughout the town. The Cohen family was basically town royalty.
Though Xander had dated my sister, we didn’t become close until the police academy. Working and training with each other, and the shared grief of losing Thea, naturally drew us together.
Xander had struggled to carry the weight of the expectation of his last name. He had learned to resent it, even. I didn’t know becoming the next sheriff was something he ever aspired to. But family pressure could influence so much, I supposed.
When I didn’t answer right away, Xander grunted. “We have a missing woman. I’m not focused on anything right now but that.”
I nodded. That cold shiver shot down my spine like it had the first time I’d heard the news. Lily Baker. Twenty-one. Her family had reported her missing yesterday when she didn’t come home. She had recently moved back in with her parents while she worked on her master’s degree at Ember Hollow College. According to her mother, it was not like Lily to disappear without a word.
“There’s still a chance she could turn up.” Even as I said it, my gut twisted at the lie masquerading as hope.
Xander’s frown deepened. “And she simply went off somewhere without her car, phone, or wallet?”
This morning, Callie had found Lily’s vehicle in the parking lot of her tavern. Lily’s purse and phone were inside. It was the main reason the police jumped on her case. No twenty-something woman was walking away from her vehicle, phone, and wallet willingly.
Shifting in my seat, my eyes homed in on Xander’s dark-gray ones. “Do you think this had anything to do with…him?”
I stifled another shiver, bothered by the fact that the mere mention of him got a physical reaction from me.
Xander’s expression darkened; a mask of iron slipped over his face as he tried to hide the shadows that haunted him. The shadows that haunted me, too.
“I don’t want to jump to any conclusions, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t cross my mind.”
“Similar MO.”
Xander gave a stiff nod. “But he’s broken his modus operandi before.”
My muscles tensed. Yes, he had. “It’s been nine years since he’s killed. That’s a long time to go without getting a fix…”
We had hoped—the entire town had hoped—that the notorious serial killer who had plagued the surrounding area had simply disappeared. Maybe he’d died. Maybe he’d been arrested for something else and was behind bars.
“Sure is.” Xander paled, but his expression remained hard. “But guys like that don’t just stop. Not if they have any say in it.”
Twelve years ago, the killings started. Ember Hollow wasn’t his first stomping grounds, but it had been his last. At least, that was the theory.
For three years before my sister’s murder, five girls from small colleges in southern Ohio had gone missing—only to later turn up dead. All the girls were college age, Caucasian, with dark-brown hair. There was evidence they had been held and kept alive somewhere for a period of time before their deaths. All were stabbed, sexually assaulted, and had a unique mark carved into their skin. A calling card. The killer, who had been deemed the Shadow Stalker by the media, thought it important to brand each of his victims by carving a symbol into their skin. I didn’t even know what the symbol was, it had never been made public, but it was the same on each victim. Including my sister.
I swallowed back the bile burning my throat, shaking the unwanted thoughts of what that sick man did. My eyes watered, and I glanced up at the ceiling.
“You good?” Xander asked.
I cleared my throat. “Yeah.”
We sat for a beat of silence as I pulled myself together and pushed away the horror of what had happened in this town. What had happened to my own flesh and blood.
“Anyway, I’m not focusing on him until I have more evidence that points me in his direction. Right now, I’m focused on the information I have in front of me.”
“Which isn’t a lot.”
