Page 17 of Deep Feelings & Shallow Graves

I flip through the report, eyes skimming faster now.

Then I see it.

Line item buried under a data pull from his burner phone:

Last outgoing contact:

April 24th, 7:03 PM.

Text message to “J-Lane (App):

“On my way. Wine good?”

My gut knots like it knows something I don’t.

No fucking way. No way she’s been doing this that long, and getting away with it.

I read through the app log print out. Sure enough, there it is, some beta-dating platform that shut down after a privacy scandal. Pulled archives say he matched with a Jennifer Lane a few weeks before he vanished. Messaged back and forth.

Typical shit: ur hot, what u into, dinner plans.

And then this:

“You cook?”

“Sure. Come hungry.”

And that was the last anyone ever heard from Hank Johnson.

I stare at the screen, heart pounding in a way I don’t like.

Jennifer Lane. Her goddamn name, right there, five years before Tramble. Same house. Same zip code. Same type of man,violent history, known misogynist, the kind of bastard who thinks a slap means affection.

I lean back, slowly.

At first, I think I’m imagining it. Maybe it’s a common name. Maybe it’s not her.

She was it. The last woman that bastard ever laid eyes on. And somehow, that makes sense.

And now Tramble, too.

Fuck.

My mouth is dry. I glare at the page like it might take it back, like maybe if I blink hard enough it’ll all rearrange into something that doesn’t make my dick go soft with dread.

Jennifer Lane. Sugar sweet. Cookie crumbed. Soft-spoken, head-tilting, dangerous.

Not in the way women usually are. Not careless. Not emotional. Methodical. Like a butcher in a ballgown and mercy never even entered the equation.

I should feel sick. But there’s a part of me, twisted, buried, and ugly, that doesn’t.

Because I remember Hank Johnson. I remember the busted eye socket on his ex. I remember the way he laughed when I threatened to press charges. I remember thinking, Someone ought to put this bastard down. And now maybe someone did. Maybe she did.

But even now, even staring at what could be evidence, I’m not reaching for the phone. Not calling it in.

I’m sitting here thinking about how soft she would feel against me. How easily I could’ve wrapped my arms around her and kept her there, protected her from the world.

From men like Hank. Like Tramble. Like whoever the fuck is next.

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