Page 27 of The Serial Killer’s Sister (The Serial Killer’s Daughter #3)

I see right through your words in everything you do.

Teary eyes, broken heart: life has torn you apart.

MAY

One year ago

The smell was like nothing he’d known before.

Or maybe it was similar to the butcher’s, now he thought about it – only much more potent.

Overpowering. He stepped away from the bloody mess on the plastic sheets and stuck his head outside the bathroom door, gulping in some fresher air.

He should’ve brought a mask. He’d become cocky, he recognised that.

Thought it would be easy now this was his fourth killing.

Even a serial killer can be surprised, though.

At least there was a human side to him still, he considered.

All this murder hadn’t diminished that part of him – he wasn’t an evil psychopath like he would be portrayed as in the media.

The media attention would be a challenge.

They’d think he’d done it all for the wrong reasons – the pseudo-psychologists and psychiatrists would come out of the woodwork giving their two penn’orth, their theories about why he is the way he is; what traumas in his childhood had affected him and made him into a monster.

They’d say that his inability to maintain relationships had turned him into a woman-hater.

They’d all be wrong. And that was a hard pill to swallow.

He knew there was a small part of him that would want to put them right; ensure they printed the truth.

He just needed to find out what that truth was.

With more neutral air in his nostrils, he went back into the compact bathroom – to the torso with its remaining two limbs – and bent down to retrieve the saw.

Sweat beaded his brow and dark patches spread under his armpits.

His hands were wet beneath the gloves but he continued to hack away, determined to finish the job.

While he worked, he imagined all the ways in which he was going to tear her life apart, too.

The rush of adrenaline his fantasy created was enough to power him through even the toughest bones.