by Blake Pierce
What do you mean? she asked herself. What do you think you’re doing?
And yet she couldn’t drive the idea out of her mind—that she could somehow be getting a glimpse of the killer’s actual sensations.
She stepped back from the doorway and leaned against the building’s outside wall, taking deep breaths and trying to force herself to think rationally.
Surely, she told herself, you don’t believe that you can find out what happened to Rhea by paying attention to …
… to what?
But even as she stood there arguing with herself, she knew that she was sensing something real. She was getting some insight into what had happened here.
And she had to learn whatever she could.
Just as she felt sure he must have done, she stepped backward until she was hidden in the shadows near the door to the Centaur’s Den.
She imagined the door opening and Rhea stepping outside alone.
He sees her, she thought. But she doesn’t see him.
She wondered for a moment—had he been waiting especially for Rhea?
She remembered again what Dr. Zimmerman had said …
“The killer knew Rhea and wanted her dead.”
But now Riley realized that her rational mind was also engaged alongside this new rush of sensation, and she felt some doubts about the professor’s explanation. For example, how would the killer have known for sure that Rhea would choose to walk home alone that night, and not surrounded by friends? Could he have been lying in wait here for any girl who might unwisely decide to leave the Centaur’s Den by herself?
Might Zimmerman be wrong?
Riley didn’t know. She just knew that she needed to use her own instincts along with her own logic.
Now she was finding it easier to imagine Rhea blithely continuing on her way down the street. She remembered the boots Rhea had been wearing that night, and now she could almost hear them clacking against the pavement, and she could visualize the sharp outline of her figure under the streetlights.
For a few moments she stood where the killer must have stood, waiting for Rhea to get some distance away. Then she started to walk in the same direction. Riley was wearing sneakers, so her own footsteps were quiet. She guessed that the killer must have been wearing soft-soled shoes of some kind as well. He would have wanted to remain as silent as he possibly could.
Riley continued walking some thirty or forty feet back from where she imagined Rhea to be until she got to the campus, with its winding paths lighted by lamps. As she felt the killer must have done, she started to close the distance between them.
As she got closer, she realized that even her sneaker-clad feet would have become audible to Rhea—and so would the killer’s footsteps.
Did Rhea look back to see who was following her?
Maybe.
Or maybe she just quickened her pace.
Riley began walking faster to keep up with her.
She must have gotten scared, she thought.
And eventually, Rhea must have dared to look back.
Riley could visualize her face under the lamplight, could see her expression clearly.
She could see a half-smile of relief on her face.
She knew him, Riley realized.
But how well did she know him?
Perhaps just well enough to be relieved, Riley guessed.
Reassured, Rhea probably slowed her footsteps down to an ordinary pace.
Riley could feel the killer’s mounting satisfaction, and his eager expectancy.
Everything was going exactly as he had hoped.
And she could hear him calling out to her in a soft, friendly voice …
“Hey, it’s late. Would you like someone to walk with you?”
Riley imagined Rhea slowing to a near stop and replying in with a shy laugh …
“Yeah, maybe that would be a good idea.”
Riley could feel the killer’s exultation now as he walked toward Rhea.
She could also sense him thinking …
This one will do.
She’ll do just fine.
Riley suddenly froze in her tracks, jolted out of her uncanny feeling of connection with the killer.
She was stunned by the impressions that had flooded her mind, giving her imagination and her logic a power she hadn’t felt before.
But the sensations were gone now.
Try as she might, she couldn’t imagine what had happened after he’d joined his all-too-trusting victim here on the path.
But maybe that was just as well, after all.
Did she really want to visualize the murder itself as vividly as she had the events leading up to it?
She tried to shake off the feeling of palpable evil she had just allowed herself to experience, but the horror wouldn’t leave.
She wondered …
What did I think I was doing?
She remembered what Dr. Zimmerman had said about empathy.
“It separates us from the world’s most terrible monsters.”
But what happened to people who started empathizing with monsters? Might they become monsters themselves?
Her skin crawled at the very idea.
She remembered something else Dr. Zimmerman had said.
“This was personal. The killer knew Rhea and wanted her dead.”
Surely he’d known what he was talking about—much better than Riley possibly could.
And yet, deep down in her gut, she felt sure he’d been wrong.
The killer had known Rhea, but only a little—maybe not much more than her name.
And she had known him just well enough to not be frightened by him, to trust him to walk her to her dorm.
He’d had nothing personal against her. She just happened to be the girl who walked out of the Centaur’s Den alone while he’d been waiting.
Riley also felt sure that the killer wasn’t finished yet. If he wasn’t stopped, he would claim another victim.
It was only a matter of time.
She wondered—if Zimmerman had been wrong about that, what about the police?
Did they understand the kind of monster they were dealing with?
She tried to tell herself it wasn’t her business …
What do I think I am, a cop?
Anyway, what could she possibly do about it?
Without stopping to think, she broke into a run. She ran all the way off campus and then the remaining four blocks to the Lanton police station. She paused outside the building to catch her breath, then went on inside.
A uniformed woman was sitting at the front desk.
She asked Riley, “Can I help you?”
Riley’s heart was still pounding, both from excitement and from running.
She said, “I need to talk to somebody about—about the girl who was murdered on Thursday night.”
The woman squinted at her.
“Do you have new information?” she asked.
Riley opened her mouth to speak, but didn’t know what to say.
Did she have new information?
No, all she had was a vague but overpowering hunch.
She felt a hand on her shoulder and heard a male voice behind her.
“I know you. What are you doing here?”
Riley turned around and saw the big, reddish face of Officer Steele, the cop who had shown up when she’d been blocking the doorway to Rhea’s room. Riley remembered that he hadn’t been pleased to see her then.
“You’ve got some explaining to do,” he’d said. “Start talking.”
She didn’t guess he was any happier to see her right now.
She stammered, “I just—I want to know how the investigation is going.”
Steele’s face wrinkled with irritation.
“I sure don’t know what business that is of yours,” he said.
Riley felt a flash of anger.
“Rhea was my friend,” she said. “That makes it my business. And nobody has heard any news at all.”
Steele shook his head as if he were about to say no.
But before he did, the woman behind the desk said, “Go ahead, Nat. Tell the poor kid what you can. It can’t hurt.”
Steele let out a low growl of irritation.
Then he said, “We’ve been scouring Lanton for clues, questioning people left and right. We’re now pretty sure of one thing. Whoever did it was just passing through town. He’s not in Lanton anymore.”
Riley almost gasped with surprise.
“You mean—Rhea didn’t even know him?”
“No, he was probably a total stranger.”
Riley could hardly believe her ears. This completely contradicted what her own instincts had told her just now.
It even contradicted what Dr. Zimmerman had said in class.
She really didn’t know what to say now.
Officer Steele said, “We’re checking into similar murders around the country. Maybe the killer has done the same thing elsewhere. If so, maybe we can get the FBI involved, but …”
He shrugged without finishing his sentence. Riley knew what he was leaving unsaid.
“We don’t have much hope of that.”
She also felt sure that the local cops weren’t trying very hard.
It was all she could do not to blurt out what she knew—or thought she knew. But Steele already didn’t like her. It wouldn’t help to make him think she was out of her mind.
But she couldn’t leave without trying to make herself heard. She remembered the woman cop who had been at the crime scene—Officer Frisbie.
When she’d gotten Riley alone, she’d said …
“Right now my gut is saying that you’re the one person around here who might be able to tell me exactly what I need to know.”
For some reason, Frisbie had believed in Riley even when Steele hadn’t.
She also believed in gut feelings.
Maybe she’d listen to Riley.
She said, “Is Officer Frisbie here? I want to talk to her.”
Steele scowled sharply at Riley.
“Do you have any information?” he asked.
Riley wanted to say …
Yes, and you’re going about this completely wrong.
But she just couldn’t. She had nothing to say that this close-minded man would pay any attention to.
Steele said, “If you’ve got information, you can tell me about it right now. Otherwise, you’re wasting the department’s time.”
He turned and walked away.
Riley looked at the uniformed woman at the desk.
“Please,” she said, “could you just tell me where I could find Officer Frisbie?”
The woman looked a little reluctant to say no.
“Sorry,” the woman said. “If you’ve got a tip, just say so. If not, you’d better be on your way.”
Riley left the building, feeling weighed down by discouragement.
What was going on, anyway?
Dr. Zimmerman had been so sure that Rhea’s killing had been personal—and also an isolated event.
The cops seemed to think something completely different—that the killer was some kind of drifter who’d just come through and killed a girl at random, and might well be committing such killings elsewhere.
How could they have such conflicting theories?
And why did Riley feel so sure that both theories were wrong?
She trudged her way slowly back to the campus.
As she wended her way along the lighted paths, she found herself wondering …
Is he out tonight?
She stopped in her tracks and turned slowly around, watching and listening. Even by the lamplight, she couldn’t see very far into the winding, wooded paths.
Even so, she felt a palpable dark presence in the air.
He’s here, she thought. He’s watching me.
She felt sure of it.
She was surprised not to be terrified. She wanted to confront the killer face to face—even if it meant fighting for her life.
It would be better than drowning in the uncertainty she felt right now.
She was tempted to yell out …
“Come out! Show yourself!”
But she stopped herself.
What good would it do? Who could she expect to show up except maybe some campus cops, who’d be pissed off that she’d raised a false alarm?
As surely as she felt the presence of the killer, she knew better than to think he’d come out at her command.
If he really had her in his sights, he intended either to kill her right now or let her go.
She couldn’t make him decide one way or the other.
She stood there waiting silently for a few long moments. Then she remembered when she’d retraced the killer’s footsteps, how she’d imagined Rhea quickening her pace when she’d heard him approach.
She realized …
I’m doing this wrong.
He didn’t want to attack anyone who wasn’t afraid. He wanted his prey to be helpless.
By showing bravery, she’d spoiled herself as bait.
In fact, she felt his awful presence waning as he slipped away into the night.
Then she continued on her way back to her dorm, still mulling over the sensations she had experienced.
She’d never felt anything like that before.
Or had she?
Back when she was a child, after her mother’s death, hadn’t she sometimes relived that awful event from some point of view other than her own?
Hadn’t she also relied on flickers of a similar insight to steer clear of her father when his temper made him dangerous?
Then Riley asked herself the most important question.
Could she use a sensitivity developed in her terrible childhood to find out what had happened to Rhea?
She only knew that she had to try.
Riley whispered to the unseen and unknown killer, wherever he might be …
“You won’t get away—not forever. I’m going to make sure of it.”
CHAPTER TEN
The whole dorm was eerily quiet as Riley walked through the hallway toward her room. It was late, of course. But even at this time of night, somebody on the floor was usually playing music, oftentimes too loud. Nobody seemed to be in the mood for that kind of thing anymore.
Life is different here now, Riley thought.
She wondered if things would ever get back to the way they’d been before Rhea’s murder.
She opened her door quietly, hoping not to awaken Trudy. But as soon as Riley stepped into the darkened room, she heard Trudy’s voice call out.
“Riley!”
Riley felt a jolt of alarm. Trudy sounded desperate. Riley clicked on the light and saw Trudy sitting upright in her bed.
“Trudy!” Riley said. “What’s the matter?”
“What’s the matter?” Trudy echoed. “I haven’t been able to get a wink of sleep since I went to bed. I’ve been worried sick about you. Do you have any idea how long you’ve been gone? I didn’t know what to do. I wondered whether I should call the police.”
Riley sat down on the bed next to her roommate.
“I’m sorry I upset you,” she said. “I’m fine.”
Trudy shook her head.
“No, you’re not fine. Something’s wrong. You’re acting all crazy, staying out so late when a murderer is out there somewhere. I know, I know—Zimmerman says what happened to Rhea is personal and nobody else is going to get killed. But I can’t help feeling scared. Where were you, anyway? What were you doing?”
Riley fought down a sigh.
If she told her everything she’d been doing, Trudy would think she really was crazy. Still, her roommate deserved at least some explanation.
“I stopped by the Centaur’s Den,” Riley said. “I had a beer. And I ran into Rory Burdon and talked to him a little. He’s taking things kind of hard.”
Riley paused, then added, “Did you know Rory had a crush on Rhea?”
Trudy’s ey
es widened.
“No!” she said. “The poor guy. Did you tell him how Rhea felt about him?”
Riley shook her head.
“No, he was feeling bad enough as it was. He feels awfully guilty. He thinks he should have walked her home that night.”
Trudy cringed and lowered her head. Riley suddenly realized she’d said the wrong thing.
After all, she knew that Trudy felt the same way—only worse, maybe. She’d been too drunk to even notice when Rhea had left.
Riley figured she’d better change the subject.
“I also went to the police station,” she said.
“Why?” Trudy asked.
Riley hesitated, then said, “I don’t know, I … I guess I just wanted to know if they were getting anywhere with … you know.”
Trudy sat silently. She seemed anxious to hear what Riley would say next.
Riley said, “They seem to think it was someone Rhea didn’t even know—someone just passing through town. They think he’s gone by now. They also think maybe he’s done the same sort of thing in other places. They said that maybe the FBI could help.”
Trudy looked puzzled.
“But Dr. Zimmerman said …”
“Yeah, I know,” Riley said. “But the police see it differently. Anyway, nobody seems to think any of the rest of us are in any danger.”
Trudy stared into space.
“I wish I could believe that,” she said.
I wish I could believe that too, Riley thought, remembering the feeling she’d just had of the killer being nearby—watching her.
Suddenly Trudy startled Riley by hugging her tightly.
She started crying and said, “Oh, Riley, don’t scare me like this anymore, please? I know there’s not supposed to be any reason to be scared anymore, but I can’t help it. You’re my best friend. And the idea of losing you after what happened to Rhea …”
Trudy was too overwhelmed to talk anymore. She sobbed in Riley’s arms.
Riley didn’t know what to do or say. Could she really promise not to go off on her own like this again?
Why not? she thought.
It seemed only reasonable.
But nothing Riley had experienced a little while ago had felt reasonable. She’d felt driven by the moment of terrible connection she’d felt with the killer. Would she be able to resist the pull if she felt that connection again? Was this really the last time she’d go out into the night alone trying to find him, to understand him?