Page 66 of The Hanging Dolls
“What the hell are you doing, Ryan?” Travis muttered, holding his breath.
He leaned forward, trying to see through the rain that blurred everything into a hazy nightmare. He could make out Ryan reaching into his pocket and handing something to the group—money, it had to be. One of the figures reached out, passing something back to Ryan in a swift, subtle motion. But the rain obscured it all, leaving Travis guessing at the exchange. Was it drugs? Weapons?
He scratched through his memories. Was Ryan into drugs? There was no smell of weed in the house. No physical signs of him using anything harder than that. But he rarely saw him anymore. Ryan was always dressed in hoodies and hauled up in his room. He could be using. And Travis was gutted that he didn’t know what was happening in his own home despite being chief of Harborwood PD.
A chill ran down his spine, his worst fears tightening their grip on him. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not to Ryan.
Then, out of nowhere, a familiar, icy voice cut through the sound of the rain, freezing the blood in his veins. “You failed, Travis. And now look where it’s gotten you. Where it’s gotten him.”
Travis’s breath hitched, and he whipped his head to the side. In the passenger seat, where there should have been nothing but empty air, sat his mother. Her eyes were as cold and unyielding as he remembered, her lips curled into a cruel sneer.
“Mom?” The word was a whisper, barely audible over the storm raging outside.
Her expression didn’t change, the venom in her voice unmistakable. “What have you done, boy?”
Travis blinked, his hands trembling on the wheel. This isn’t real. She’s not here.
The vision of his mother leaned closer, her voice a hiss in his ear. “I should have put you all down, like dogs.”
Travis squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block out the voice, the image, the rising tide of panic that threatened to drown him. When he opened them again, the passenger seat was empty, the ghost of his mother gone, leaving only the echo of her words in his mind.
Benny wasn’t answering her messages. She had sent three over the last couple days but had had no reply.
She needed another fight. The rage had been building up inside her like plaque. If she didn’t release it in time, she was going to explode.
And there might be collateral damage.
So for now Zoe moved through the shadows of the dimly lit parking garage, her footsteps silent on the cold concrete. The low hum of fluorescent lights flickered intermittently, casting long, eerie shadows that stretched across the rows of parked cars. Her breath was steady, controlled, as she kept her eyes locked on the man ahead of her.
He was tall and wiry, his gait relaxed, almost too casual for someone who should have known better. He walked with an air of arrogance, like he owned the place, unaware of the predatorstalking him just a few paces behind. Zoe had been tailing him for over an hour, watching as he moved through the city.
The man fumbled with his keys, the metallic jingle echoing through the empty space. He was halfway to his car when Zoe imagined what she would do to him.
There were too many dead girls. Too much going wrong in Zoe’s life and this case. And the grim possibility of something happening to Lucy loomed over her, snuffing out that light and cheer.
She had to get rid of it. She had to fixsomething.
She would strike him like a hammer. She wouldn’t give him a chance to recover. A punch to the gut. She wouldn’t care about his excuses or his pleas. All she saw was a pig in front of her, the man who had treated his elderly father like filth in public.
Another bad, bad person who was walking around freely.
Just like Rachel’s killer.
She imagined what his blood would look like as it sprayed from his mouth, splattering across the concrete.
But she saw someone else. That faceless man who existed in her imagination. The one who had taken everything from her and her sister.
A hand landed on her shoulder, yanking her out of her fantasy. She spun on her heel, a scream of shock stuck in her throat—only to find Aiden.
“What are you doing, Storm?”
Was any of this real? She was still in a daze. The air seemed syrupy around her, rippling the edges of everything and making her vision sloppy. Aiden’s probing eyes followed the man who was getting into his car and driving away. She blinked profusely and turned away from him, waiting for her nerves to stop fraying.
She was ready to snap,soclose to revealing that violence resided inside her as if she had been boiling under the sun for eternity.
A deep breath. Another one.
“Were you following me?” Her voice shook when she faced him again, maintaining her composure.
