Page 35 of Girl, Unmasked (Ella Dark #28)

When this was all over, Ella vowed never to read another horror novel for as long as she lived. She was poring over the new pages that Ryland had found on the dark web, because even if she couldn’t find the killer, she might be able to keep his next intended victim safe.

The next page – the page that detailed Cain's third murder – began:

Cain crouched behind the wheel of his rusted chariot, watching, waiting. The minutes dripped by like cold molasses, but his motor idled on. Patience was a virtue, and his tank was full.

There. A vision in faded denim and a soccer mom bob.

Penelope. The one who'd nudged the first domino set his life careening off the tracks into the abyss.

Twenty years melted away, and there she was, struggling up her picket-fenced drive, weighed down with groceries, blissfully oblivious to the reckoning idling at the curb.

How easy it would be. To gun the engine, jump the sidewalk, leave her mangled under his balding tires as he made the getaway of the century.

But no. Too quick, too clean. Where was the artistry in blunt force trauma?

Penelope deserved nothing less than his full attention. His most intimate ministrations.

She'd ripped out his heart with her perfectly manicured claws. It was only fair that he return the favor.

Ella could already figure out where this was going.

Cain was carrying twenty years of resentment for the woman, probably his first love, who broke his heart.

And now he was going to make her pay. Typical fragile ego.

Ella had seen toddlers with more emotional maturity, but no one ever said that ‘well-adjusted’ and ‘multiple homicide’ belonged in the same sentence.

And more importantly, who was Penelope's real-life counterpart?

Cain watched as Penelope fumbled her way inside, arms laden with banal sundries, the minutiae of a life lived in willful blindness to the dark engines of fate.

Good. Let her have her organic produce and her two-buck chuck.

Let her sup with the family and snuggle on the couch.

Cain didn't mind waiting. Not when he had the promise of their screams to keep him warm.

The house stood silent, no other cars in the driveway. Penelope was alone. Vulnerable. Perfect. But Cain didn't move. Not yet. The anticipation was a fine wine to be savored.

Cain checked the time on his dashboard. Midday.

Perfect.

But Cain wasn’t about to ambush Penelope like he had the others.

No, he had bigger plans in mind.

Foot on the gas, Cain hurtled toward destiny, to the crumbling palace of pulp where he would claim his third angel. Main Street beckoned and a few minutes later, Cain pulled up outside Timeless Treasures, a vintage clothes store.

‘Huh,’ Ella said. Apparently, Cain wasn't going after his once-love this time. Could the real killer follow the same format?

Cain parked up and went into Timeless Treasures. Empty inside. He turned the sign on the door from OPEN to CLOSED.

From behind the counter, a man looked up. Cain knew him. His name was Patrick.

‘Can I help you?’ Patrick asked, unaware he was addressing his own executioner.

‘You don't remember me, do you?’ Cain asked, his voice deceptively soft. Recognition dawned in Patrick's eyes a moment too late. The knife was already in Cain's hand, glinting in the dusty sunlight filtering through the shop windows.

‘Crap. Third victim isn’t a woman at all. It’s a man.’

Ella raced through the rest of the scene, and sure enough, that was exactly how it played out. Cain ambushed this Patrick character with a knife and left him dead behind the counter in his store.

She jolted back in her chair so hard she nearly hit the ground. If this killer was following Halo of Blood to the letter, then it meant the third victim would be a man.

A man connected to Drago LaChance. Someone who, if the themes here were consistent, had humiliated Drago LaChance in real life. This Patrick character was a surrogate for a real person in this city – but who the hell was it?

Then, a lightning bolt hit her cerebral cortex and sent her vision swimming. Maybe it was the concussion doing the talking, but whatever it was, Ella welcomed it.

Because one name jumped into her head.

William Kane.

Drago or something? Had long black hair, kind of scraggly. Long nose. Dressed in army trousers and a gray jacket.

That description ricocheted around the inside of Ella's skull like a stray bullet in a broom closet. Long black hair. Big nose. Just like the mug shot Ryland had dredged up from the armpit of the dark web.

This fiction scene took place in a vintage clothes store.

William Kane ran a bookstore.

This fictional kill took place in the daytime.

Ella looked over at the clock. It was just before midday.

But perhaps most importantly, Kane was a man who’d embarrassed the author, even by his own admission.

Ella snatched her keys and was out the door in a second. She needed to get to Bookshop Obscura now.