Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 54836 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54836 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
“I get that. The buddies I have were from high school, or ones I met on the force. Can’t think of a single friend I’ve made outside of that.”
The conversation was easy and casual then, discussing our various childhoods, and what it was like for him to move to Navesink Bank and learn about all the children of the criminal organizations he went to school with.
Our food was cleared, and we were waiting for a check when a set of teenage girls, all glossy hair and mischievous smiles, came in. Likely playing hooky from school, given the time.
It wasn’t long after they sat that some older dude who’d been sitting at the counter decided to saunter over toward them, his beady eyes moving over their young bodies.
“Hey, absolutely-fucking-not,” a voice called out, making my head jerk to the side to find one of the bikers pointing at the guy. “Get the fuck away from them,” he added, making the man sheepishly pretend like he was heading to the bathroom all along, just taking the long way around.
“Told you,” the detective said when I glanced back at him. “They’re objectively bad guys, but they’re good too,” he said, shrugging, slipping the waitress his card before she could even put the book down on the table.
“No, I should—“
“Not to quote the biker over there, but absolutely-fucking-not,” he said, smirking.
It was completely inappropriate, but there was a little shiver coursing through me at that smile.
“If you need to get back to work,” I said as we slid out of our booths, “I can hail a ride from here,” I said.
“I have time. Let me drop you back at the hotel,” he offered in a way that said arguing about it would be useless and silly.
And, honestly, I was glad not to be shelling out more money on rides if I didn’t have to. It sounded like there’d be a lot of spending coming up. Flood lights, security system, adoption fees, pet supplies, vet stipend.
I would make it work.
But cutting back on the unnecessary stuff would be smart for the time being.
“Let me know when you want to go look at dogs,” he suggested as he walked me to the front doors.
“I definitely will.”
“Or anytime you want to talk,” he said. “It can’t be easy to be going through this alone,” he added.
“It’s not,” I admitted. “But I’ll be alright.”
“I’ll make sure of it,” he said, reaching out toward me, then dropping his hand at the last second. The whole thing made another of those shivers move through me.
“Thank you, Detect—“
“Wells,” he cut me off. “You can call me Wells.”
With that, he reached to open the door to the hotel, and I forced myself to go, even though everything in me wanted to stay closer to him.
I was almost girlishly excited at the prospect of him going with me to pick out a guard dog.
If it was completely insane of me to have… stirrings about the detective investigating my case, well, I was just going to go ahead and give myself some grace, given the circumstances.
I went right up to my room, calling to set up an appointment for security installation at my house, got in contact with work again, had an early dinner, and was about to finally get some sleep when I got an alert for a new email on my phone.
From a local celebrity of sorts.
Wanting to talk to me about being the only survivor of the Silent Sadist…
CHAPTER SIX
—
Crime Time with Poppy
__
“Hello, my beautiful, creepy people. This is Poppy—your friendly, local true crime peddler—and this is Crime Time with Poppy.
“Tonight we are doing a deep dive into an alarming case unfolding in my very neck of the woods.
“This is the story of the man the news has, unfortunately, dubbed the Silent Sadist. Because, you know, we should be sensationalizing these psychos. But, anyway, this isn’t about him.
“As any veterans of this podcast know, we like to focus here on the victims and survivors of crimes, rather than the criminals themselves.
“So tonight, I would like to introduce you to three bright, beautiful women who unfortunately all managed to cross paths with a man who would take two of their lives. And attempt to take a third, until her quick wits and love of all things true crime managed to save her.
“We will be discussing the lives of Ashley Moore, Madison Silvo, and Mari Yates.
“This is gonna be a long one, folks, so grab a coffee and a snack, and buckle in. You might just hear something that will save your life someday too…”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Detective Wells Vaughn
To say I’d been less than professional would be an understatement.
I shouldn’t have taken her to the diner, driven her to her hotel, offered to go and pick out a dog with her, and almost reached out and touched her.