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Jacob Walsh

October 2025

Tuesday — 7:44 am

T he music from the oldies station gradually faded as a news reporter began to update listeners on the months-long search for Jacob Walsh. The announcer’s deep, resonant voice echoed through the chilly wind, reminding listeners of the rampant rumors surrounding Walsh’s presumed death, as his remains had not yet been found. The report addressed the harsh, unforgiving conditions that experts indicated would make survival impossible for anyone seriously injured.

Jacob allowed himself a thin smile despite the lingering pain in his right leg. There was something delicious about listening to one’s own obituary, about the world thinking he was gone while he continued to breathe…to plan.

He shifted his weight on the makeshift cane—just a thick branch stripped of bark—and continued his awkward progress around the side of Mekhi Hale's weathered house.

“—four months have passed since the remains of former Governor Kalluk's daughter were found and laid to rest,” the announcer shared, his voice crackling through what sounded like cheap speakers. "Special Agent Russell Houser was finally released from the hospital last month after suffering a significant setback due to a blood clot in his lungs, but doctors expect him to make a full recovery.”

Jacob’s leg ached as he limped gracelessly around the rundown house. His broken leg hadn’t healed as it should have. With each strained step, the stick cracked the frost covering the blades of grass, creating irregular impressions next to his uneven footprints. After four months, he still struggled to walk without the sensation of nails driving into his femur.

Four months of agony…of hiding…of waiting.

He had survived worse.

The shed came into view around the corner of the house—a squat, gray structure with peeling paint and a door that hung slightly ajar. The radio inside blared at a volume that told him the old man's hearing was failing.

Perfect.

Jacob had learned to exploit other people's weaknesses, slipping into the gaps their deficiencies created. He paused, leaning heavily on the stick as a particularly vicious spasm gripped his leg. His mind flashed back to the moment everything changed—when the ice beneath his feet had gone from solid to nothing in an instant.

There had been a deep, resonant crack that seemed to come from the very heart of the mountain. Brook had alerted them that something wasn’t right. He remembered the brief moment of suspension, when his eyes had locked with hers—both of them understanding what was about to happen but powerless to stop it.

The world had fallen away.

The descent had been both endless and instantaneous. Gravity had claimed him, his arms underneath the blanket tied around his neck. There had been no purchase to be found, nothing for him to grab onto—only a vertical shaft of ancient ice. Houser's shout had bounced off the walls of the narrow chute until the impact had driven the air from his lungs and destroyed the light in the man’s headlamp.

Jacob recalled landing half on ice, half on the federal agent, a tangle of limbs and sharp pain. Something in his leg had snapped with an audible crack, and his ribs had flared with agony as they connected with Houser's service weapon. They had tumbled and skidded across an ice shelf, finally coming to rest in perfect darkness.

Jacob had lain there, struggling to breathe through the pain, waiting until he could stem the nausea to move. The man underneath him hadn’t moved at all. At first, he thought that Houser was dead. It hadn’t been until Jacob dragged himself off the agent and pulled the blanket aside that he could determine a faint pulse.

Not that it had mattered.

Houser had landed on the bag of supplies that he carried with him, so it was only a matter of rolling the agent off the duffel to search the contents. The mere idea of freedom gave Jacob enough adrenaline to retrieve a headlamp and seek the handcuff keys on Houser’s belt.

The memory of dragging himself away from the unconscious agent still made him grimace. Each movement had been a study in controlled agony. His leg had been bent at an unnatural angle, and every breath had sent daggers through his ribcage. But he had persevered, pulling himself along the ice with the bag of supplies.

Fortunately, he had explored the tunnels extensively over the years. Though the vertical shaft had dumped him into unknown territory, he still had a faint idea of the direction needed to gain access to an exit.

Splinting his own leg had been an exercise in torture.

He had bitten through his bottom lip to keep from screaming as he had manipulated the broken bone back into approximate alignment. The taste of blood had filled his mouth, metallic and warm, as he had secured the splint with shaking hands. He had wrapped his ribs as best he could with an elastic bandage, the simple act of raising his arms nearly causing him to black out. The cuts and abrasions that covered his body had seemed trivial by comparison.

It had taken him hours to gather the strength to move again. He had eventually left Houser behind, not caring about the man’s fate. The search team would eventually discover the agent, but by that time, Jacob would be far enough away to evade capture.

He had finally managed to crawl out of the cave.

“—local residents remain unsettled despite federal authorities' assurances that…”

Jacob blinked, returning to the present as the radio announcer's voice rose slightly. The fact that he had been forced to crawl made his gut churn. He tugged the worn jacket he had stolen tighter around his body.

The weeks following his escape had been a haze of pain and careful planning. He had managed to reach an emergency cache he had established years before in a small outbuilding on the edge of the conservation where Nanuq Kalluk had previously been employed. Most of the structure had rotted away in that time, but it still provided a roof over his head and was serviceable enough for him to heal and lie low until the authorities became lax in their duties.

“—S&E Investigations, the private firm founded by Brooklyn Sloane, Walsh's sister, has reportedly taken on several new cases in recent months. Sources close to Sloane indicate that she will continue to search for…”

Jacob came to a stop at the shed’s entrance. The sound of hammering interrupted the radio’s announcement, and Mekhi’s distraction gave Jacob time to recover from such a long walk. The mention of his sister brought back the moment the ice had shattered from beneath his weight.

He had experienced a peculiar sense of acceptance.

He didn't believe in God or divine intervention. Such notions were for people who needed comfort against the void. Yet something about that precise moment had felt like an intervention of Fate, if such a thing existed. He had spent his life creating perfect plans, controlling every variable—and then the earth itself had opened beneath him, a reminder that some things remained beyond his control.

Funny how that thought brought him comfort now.

Jacob wasn't big on spiritual stuff, either. Never had been, but there was something almost elegant about the collapse of his surroundings. Although the so-called experts were making rounds and assuring the people of his demise, his sister would never believe he was dead, not without a body. The thought of Brook constantly looking over her shoulder should have pleased him, should have warmed the cold places inside him, yet he was strangely hollow.

During their final confrontation, something had changed in Brook's eyes. The torment that had always lingered there—that delectable question of whether she might be like him—had diminished. She had stared at him with clarity instead of confusion, with determination instead of doubt.

Her little speeches during their time together had wormed their way into his mind like parasites.

"You’re no different from any other killer out there.”

The words shouldn't have mattered—she had always been so predictably self-righteous—but they echoed in the silence of his hideout, competing with the constant throb of his injuries.

“Every single time you witness a woman believing her world is perfect and full of good, you think of me.”

His fingers itched to hold a knife and slice the blade through the flesh on her face. And what had truly sustained him through the physical pain, what had really driven him to force his broken body to heal, wasn't the thought of Brook's fear.

It was rage, pure and clarifying, that his sister no longer seemed to focus solely on him. Her life had expanded. She had that investigation firm, that team of hers, that boyfriend.

The twisted bond between brother and sister, hunter and hunted, of matching darkness…had been diluted.

Selfish on his part?

Perhaps.

But that was their dynamic.

She was his opposite and his reflection, and no one was going to take that away from him. Not her new friends, not that FBI agent who had fallen with him, not even the mountain that had tried to claim him.

Jacob's lips twitched into a small smile.

For now, he would allow Brook and those currently in her life to become comfortable in their bubbles of safety and normalcy. He needed time, anyway—time to finish recuperating, time to plan.

His leg still wasn't right. The break had been complex, and his amateur medical skills had been insufficient for a perfect repair. He still couldn't put full weight on it without feeling like the bone might snap again.

Alaska had served its purpose, but now it had become a trap.

The authorities might believe him dead, but their presence remained, a lingering reminder of the massive manhunt that had scoured these mountains for months. He needed to disappear completely, and for that, he needed help.

Approaching the shed’s entrance, Jacob realized that he appeared quite different from the man who had faced off with his sister months ago. His face was gaunt, and a new scar cut across his forehead and disappeared into his hairline. His once-precise movements had been replaced by the halting gait of a man still in constant pain.

Nevertheless, Mekhi Hale would recognize him instantly.

Just inside the opening, Jacob found the small space cluttered with fishing gear and tools. The floor was stained with decades of oil and bait. The radio sat on a workbench close to the entrance, its volume disproportionate to its size. On the other side of the shed stood Mekhi, his back to the door as he focused on some small repair job, utterly unaware that someone had just entered his sanctuary.

The old fisherman was Jacob’s ticket out. He was a man with a boat, with knowledge of the coastline, with routes that avoided official channels. A man who, wittingly or not, had aided him before with transportation and information.

And he was also a man whose fear could be leveraged.

Jacob had monitored the police presence around Silverton and noted how it gradually diminished as weeks turned into months, though they still maintained regular patrols. The officer stationed near Mekhi's property had become somewhat of a permanent fixture. Fortunately, the locals had taken control and were quite rigid in their schedules…and breaks.

Another officer would be parked out front in about thirty minutes.

Mekhi continued his work, oblivious to the predator behind him.

Jacob limped forward, each step measured to minimize the sound, until he was standing next to the radio. He reached out and clicked the radio off with a decisive snap.

The sudden silence fell like a physical weight.

Mekhi turned, a question already forming on his lips, but then he froze as the color drained from his weathered face. Recognition dawned well before his emotions shifted from confusion to shock to fear.

The old fisherman’s eyes darted to the opening behind Jacob, seeking the police cruiser that had been his silent guardian for months. The hope in his eyes dimmed as he registered its absence. His apprehensive gaze returned to Jacob, taking in the changes—the gauntness, the new scar, the makeshift cane.

“Hi, old man,” Jacob said with a smile, savoring the moment. “It's been a while.”

~ The End ~

A killer’s calling card resurfaces in the chilling next installment of the Touch of Evil series by USA Today Bestselling Author Kennedy Layne...

Click HERE

When the family of Lila Hartman turns to S&E Investigations, they’re convinced their daughter was the fourth victim of a murderer who was supposed to be long gone. More than a decade ago, the Photograph Killer terrorized Ohio, sending two Polaroids to local newspapers: one capturing his victim alive, the other showing her strangled with a yellow scarf just twenty-four hours later.

Three murders were officially linked to him—until Lila’s body surfaced after the killing spree had seemingly ended. Her case went cold. Forgotten.

Until now.

Hidden among a box of undelivered mail from a shuttered newspaper, a Polaroid of Lila surfaces—proof that the Photograph Killer had claimed at least one more victim. With new evidence in hand, Brooklyn Sloane and her team trace the killer’s dark path back to a small Ohio town where his reign of terror first began. But the town guards its secrets—and its sinners—closely. No one welcomes outsiders, especially those digging into a past they’ve tried to bury.

As Brook unearths the truth, she’s haunted by a deeper, personal mystery: the disappearance of her brother, Jacob Walsh. His body was never recovered. His fate remains unknown. And sometimes, in the quietest moments, she can still feel him watching.