Autumn hovered the cursor over the video file. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Just get it over with, Taylor.”
She hit the play button when the video app came on the screen. It was a camera she didn’t expect. It was a little further down the hall from her room at Cat Tails. She mused it must be one of those round cameras you wouldn’t expect to find. She could see a little clearer than in the video Navarro had.
Autumn heard the footsteps before she saw Anastasia being led by a man who stood close to the shadows before his pale features came into view.
Autumn’s breath came out in a gasp.
“I like to kill things.”
The unsub had sunglasses on, but she knew him.
He had shaggy red hair. It was different from the boy she remembered. He wasn’t rail thin like before but had a swimmer’s build.
Someone who knew how to wield a weapon.
Anastasia Moretti clung to him, giggled, and nearly fell. To say she was drunk was an understatement. She was completely intoxicated. He said something in Moretti’s ear, which made her smile suggestively.
Then came another pair of footsteps.
And there was Scarlett in her regal glory with that platinum blonde hair. Scarlett didn’t smile. She looked at Moretti with dislike, and the coldness matched her eyes as she opened the door. She walked in first while the killer ushered in Anastasia. He stopped, turned, and looked straight into the camera as if he knew it was there all along.
Did he place it?
She remembered Dune’s sitter saying something about someone coming into her apartment from the cable company.
“Long time no see, Autumn,” she heard his voice.
“Daddy takes the eyes out of the deer he shoots.”
A smirk lifted from his lips as he stared at the camera, waited a beat, walked into the room, and shut the door. She barely made out the sound of the lock as it clicked on the other side of the door.
“You should come with us sometime. Daddy has a crush on you.”
No, it wasn’t the monster from her nightmares.
It was worse.
The Forget Me Not Killer was Fox Winters’ son, Elijah Winters.
Elijah was about five years younger than Autumn. She’d never been comfortable around him. She didn’t know if his clear green eyes always freaked her out or his constant stare.
They forced Autumn to play with him since Fox was best friends with her father. They were always at the estate. When the Winters and Taylors went out for the evening, she was forced to play chess with Elijah. Sometimes she could escape to her room, but he was always at the estate, as if waiting for her.
And now he’d found her again.
Autumn got out of her head and back to the case. Why didn’t Elijah finish the job on DelMonico? Was she a trial run? She assumed he figured out it wasn’t worth his while. There must have been an APB for him since the woman described him to the police.
Autumn knew he could blend in with his surroundings, even with his pale complexion. Elijah knew what he was doing. He knew how to manipulate his victims or at least make them comfortable in his presence. Right before he went in for the kill. The women didn’t realize what was going to happen to them.
Looking at the time on her phone, Autumn saw it was still early. She could catch a train to Boston and be there by late afternoon.
She took her phone out and saw another text message, but it wasn’t from Hererra.
Scala: Call me when you get this.
Autumn sighed and decided to call Hererra first, then Scala.
She cursed when Hererra’s voicemail picked up. “You couldn’t tell me about the video before dropping me off?” She gritted her teeth and continued, “You can’t throw me a bone and forget everything else, Hererra. Tell Newman to take the stick out of his ass. I’m going to Boston, regardless. I hope you have an APB on the guy in the video. His name is Elijah Winters, and he’s highly dangerous. I don’t know how you got the video but thank you.”
