Page 19

CHAPTER

EIGHTEEN

I adjusted the temperature control again, checking the digital readout.

Sixty-eight degrees exactly. It was the perfect environment for both my subject and the photographic chemicals.

I tugged on my mask and hat—I wasn’t ready for her to know my true identity. Then I started down the stairs to the basement.

To Morgan.

I’d been at work earlier. If only I could stay here all day. But alas, I could not. I had to keep my schedule. Otherwise, people might become concerned—or even worse, get nosy.

I couldn’t let that happen.

At least during my first break I’d had the chance to watch the video of Logan discovering the photo I left on his SUV. Then during lunch, I’d crept into the woods. It had been risky, but I couldn’t help myself. I wanted to see the moment they discovered my masterpiece.

It had been worth it.

It was all good. I hadn’t slept in days, but I didn’t need to. My body and mind were different, and I could go weeks without getting any rest.

It allowed me to get done what I needed to get done. It was a blessing really.

Renovating the basement had cost me dearly, but proper conditions were essential for my work.

For my art.

For my new dark room.

Morgan had been difficult again this morning. She’d lashed out at me, telling me I’d never get away with this. Then she’d fought against her restraints.

I’d had no choice but to hold her down and give her more sedatives. I’d watched as her muscles relaxed and her eyes closed. Then she looked like an angel again in her dazed state.

I glanced at her on the bed where I’d left her restrained. She was now awake but docile. The calculated mix of sedatives kept her coherent enough to function but not enough to resist.

Finding the right balance had taken careful research and several failed attempts. But I’d persisted, learning the perfect combination in preparation for Morgan.

Morgan was special. Morgan deserved my best work.

“The light will be right in about twenty minutes.” I checked my watch as I walked across the room, flipping on the regular lights. The black light disappeared. “That gives me just enough time to prepare.”

Morgan’s eyes tracked my movement across the room, her pupils dilated from the drugs but still alert. Still seeing.

That was crucial. She needed to witness the process, to understand what we were creating together.

Yes, together. Even if she didn’t realize it.

The realization would come. I just needed to be patient.

“You remember this one, don’t you?” I held up the photograph—one of her early landscapes showing the fractured ice of a frozen lake beneath Denali’s shadow. “‘Perception in Ruin,’ you called it. The piece that first made me understand you.”

I had all her exhibitions memorized chronologically and had visited each gallery multiple times. I’d watched her from a careful distance as she explained her vision to oblivious patrons who could never truly comprehend what she showed them.

Not like me.

I understood the messages hidden in her work—the deliberate focus on finding beauty within destruction. The way she captured light spilling through broken things.

It wasn’t coincidence.

It was an invitation to collaborate.

“When Elise died, I thought I’d drown in the darkness.” I picked up a picture I kept downstairs of Elise. Beautiful, beautiful Elise. “But then I saw your photographs. I saw the way you framed devastation, making it . . . transcendent. You showed me how to see my grief differently.”

Morgan’s lips moved, forming words I couldn’t quite hear. I leaned closer.

“Why . . . ?” Her voice filled the room in a dry whisper. “Why me?”

Such a simple question with such a complex answer.

I smiled patiently.

“Because you see what others don’t. You find meaning in broken things.” I gestured around the basement studio I’d constructed. “Just look at what you’ve helped me create.”

The walls were covered with my work. My photographs mimicked Morgan’s style but with my own distinct subject matter. Where she captured landscapes fractured by natural forces, my images featured people at the moment of transition.

Not the transition to death exactly—I disliked that crude term. But I liked to capture their transformation—the exact instant when understanding dawned in their eyes.

I’d arranged the images in chronological order, a timeline of my artistic evolution.

My early attempts were clearly amateur. But each subsequent photograph showed improvement.

Better composition. More skillful lighting. More authentic expressions from my subjects.

The empty frame at the center of the display waited for its occupant—the culmination of my vision.

“It’s almost time.” I lifted an antique film camera from its velvet-lined case.

The Hasselblad had cost a small fortune, but digital would never capture the depth I required.

Film had soul.

Film could hold truth.

I moved across the room and unlocked the restraints on Morgan’s wrists, helping her to a sitting position. She swayed slightly but remained upright.

“You won’t run,” I said matter-of-factly. “There’s nowhere to go, and you’re still too sedated to make it up the stairs. Besides . . .” I nodded toward the far wall where a topographic map was pinned and marked with precise red Xs. “We have so much work to complete.”

Her gaze drifted to the maps, recognition flickering in her eyes as she identified the locations—all places she’d photographed over the years. Some Xs were marked with dates. Others remained uncalendared, waiting.

I held up a photograph—one of Morgan herself, taken with a telephoto lens as she worked alone at Denali. In the image, she wore a look of intense concentration, unaware of being observed.

“I’ve studied your technique for years.” Pride rang through my voice. “Your eye for composition and your patience waiting for perfect light. But most importantly, your ability to reveal what lies beneath the surface, to make visible what others refuse to see.”

I helped her stand, supporting her weight as her legs trembled.

Part of me missed her feistiness, but I couldn’t risk allowing that side of her to show up right now. It wasn’t time.

“I’ve chosen the perfect setting for your transition,” I continued. “It’s not time yet, of course.”

She stared at me. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought she was sneering at me despite her sedative.

I stepped back and showed her a photograph.

“Do you recognize it? The abandoned mining office from your winter industrial series. The place where you captured light streaming through broken windows onto rusted machinery. Transformation through decay. You are very talented. I’m sure lots of people have told you that. ”

I guided her toward the white backdrop I’d installed against one wall, my hand gentle but insistent on her arm. This photo wouldn’t be one of my finest, but it was essential. I needed to capture this moment—not as art but as a message.

A message to Logan Gibson.

“You’re trembling,” I told Morgan. “That’s good. Emotion translates into the image. But I’m not going to hurt you, Morgan. You’re not like the others. You’re my collaborator. My muse.”

I left her slouched against the white backdrop and stepped back. Then I raised the camera to my eye, focusing carefully.

“Think of him while I take this first shot,” I murmured. “Think of Logan Gibson finding pieces of you, photograph by photograph, always one step behind. Imagine what he’ll see when he looks at these images. What he’ll understand about us both.”

The shutter clicked, capturing the exact moment when Morgan realized this was only the beginning.