Girl, Haunted (Ella Dark #22)

CHAPTER NINE

The night dragged on. Empty foam coffee cups littered the desk like casualties of a caffeine war. Ella's eyes burned, gritty and raw from hours of staring at grainy footage, searching for a face that refused to materialize.

She and Luca had been through all the USB drives, combing through endless hours of footage with the tenacity of a dog with a bone. But for all their efforts, they'd come up empty. The masked figure had been meticulous, keeping his face hidden from the moment he stepped into the Screamatorium to the second he slipped out after snuffing out Van Allen's life.

'Nothing,' Ella growled. 'Six cameras. Six hundred hours of footage. Our guy doesn't even show his face once. Why did none of those damn actors manage to pull his mask off?'

Luca scrubbed his face and said, ‘Maybe he’s got a skin condition.’

‘Not the time for jokes, Hawkins.’

‘Sorry. Maybe we ought to quit for the night. Come back tomorrow with fresh eyes.’

Maybe he was right. Ella was having intermittent periods of not knowing what state she was or what day it was. Even this caffeine wasn’t doing much to keep her straight.

She was about to pack up when Sheriff Redmond shuffled into the office. His salt-and-pepper beard was more salt than pepper now, and the bags under his eyes had bags of their own.

‘Any luck?’ he asked, though his tone suggested he already knew the answer.

‘Nothing. Our guy kept his face concealed the whole time.’

Redmond nodded. ‘Well, I've got some news. Jeremy, the admin guy from the Screamatorium? He says he can get us a list of names for that night's guests. But he needs access to the computers there to pull it.’

Ella perked up at that. Good. We need that list first thing in the morning. I don't care if you have to drag Jeremy out of bed at the crack of dawn. Get those names.’

‘I'll make it happen. I’ll wake the guy with an air horn if I have to.’

‘Appreciated.’ She was grateful for the sheriff's cooperation. So many local law enforcement types got territorial when the feds showed up, seeing them as interlopers rather than allies. But Redmond seemed to be cut from the same cloth as her.

Luca shut his laptop lid. ‘Well, if that's all we can do for now, I say we call it a night. We're no good to anyone if we're too fried to think straight.’

Ella wanted to argue, to insist that they keep going, keep digging until they found something. No detective ever cracked a case while they were asleep. But the rational side of her, the side that knew sleep deprivation was a torture method in some countries, obliged.

‘Yeah. Let’s come back in the morning. You too, Sheriff.’

Redmond said, ‘Understood. I'll have that list waiting for you, along with a gallon of the strongest coffee in Oregon.’

As Ella reluctantly began shutting down her laptop, a thought struck her. ‘Redmond, one more thing. Get some of your guys to keep an eye on the local haunted houses tonight. Just in case our guy’s got his next target picked out already.’

‘Will do, but every business in town is closed for Columbus Day, even the haunts.’

Ella breathed a sigh of relief. Columbus Day. She'd completely forgotten about the holiday, too consumed to spare a thought for anything else.

‘Columbus Day. Thank God.’

Luca said, ‘Yeah, thank God for one genocidal maniac giving us a breather from a homicidal one.’

But even with the haunted houses closed, she couldn't shake the nagging feeling that their unsub might still find a way to strike.

'Good news, but let's not let our guard down. Shadowland wasn't open either, and he still found a way in.'

‘I’ll have my guys do the rounds,’ Redmond said. ‘The Yamhill Grand Lodge is about three miles out. I assume that’s where you’re staying.’

Luca fidgeted in his bag and then pulled out a sheet of paper. ‘We’re booked in the… Yamhill Value Inn.’

Redmond's face traveled through a kaleidoscope of expressions, settling somewhere between horror and amusement. ‘Oh boy. Someone at your HQ doesn’t like you.’

‘What’s wrong with the Yamhill Value Inn?’

‘You might be better off sleeping right here. At least the only thing that’ll crawl on you is the paperwork.’

Ella, silently mourning the loss of a potentially decent night’s sleep, shrugged it off. ‘I’ll sleep on a cactus if I have to. Come on Hawkins, the sooner we sleep, the sooner we can get back here.’

***

The Yamhill Value Inn lived up to its name in all the wrong ways. It made Ella question the meaning of the word ‘value,’ and as she fumbled with the key – an actual metal key, not even a keycard – she couldn't help but wonder if this place was where roaches went for their vacation.

But as Ella stepped into the cramped, dingy room that would be her home for the foreseeable future, none of the downsides mattered because she had Luca by her side.

‘Home sweet home,’ Luca deadpanned. ‘Pretty funny that they gave us two separate rooms.’

‘News of our torrid affair hasn’t reached the admin department,’ she said.

‘To be fair, it’s a tricky conversation. What are they supposed to do? Ask us if we’re on co-sleeping terms?’

Ella threw her bag down and inspected the place. Water-stained ceiling. Ancient TV bolted to the wall. Questionable stains on the carpet. Not quite the Ritz, but a bed was a bed. ‘I’ve had worse. The room, I mean.’

Luca sat on the bed to the sound of flesh-on-wood. He bounced experimentally, then jumped back up and rubbed his backside. 'Padding is minimal. This is going to be a bumpy ride.'

‘You want me to take the other room? Leave you to wrestle the mattress in peace?’

‘Not really. Do you?’

She slithered beside him, put one hand on his knee and said, ‘No. I’d rather have your sweaty back next to me all night.’

‘You say the sweetest things.’ Luca reached for the TV remote and passed it to her. ‘Here. He who holds the remote is king.’

‘Thank you. Go and get acquainted with the bed.’ Ella flipped through a wasteland of infomercials and late-night televangelist ravings before landing on the news. Her finger froze on the remote as a familiar face filled the screen.

Austin Creed stared at her. The Mimicker. Her first big collar.

He shuffled along in his orange jumpsuit, hands cuffed, face blank as morning snow. Like he was taking a Sunday stroll, not a perp walk.

The news anchor's voice droned on. ‘Sentenced to death by lethal injection for the death of four women… dubbed the Mimicker by the media…. Terrorized Louisiana before being brought to justice by the FBI’s Behavioral team.’

Behind her, Luca let out a groan that could’ve woken the dead. Or maybe it was just the bedsprings.

‘Problem here, Ell. Something is digging into my kidney.’

Ella didn't take her eyes off the screen. Creed was being led through a gauntlet of reporters, microphones and cameras shoved in his face like he was some kind of twisted celebrity. She half expected him to start signing autographs.

‘Earth to Ella,’ Luca said. ‘You might want to turn that crap off.’

Ella's finger hovered over the power button, but she couldn't bring herself to push it. It felt like admitting defeat, like letting Creed have the last laugh.

‘He doesn't look too worried, does he?’ she said. ‘Son of a bitch probably thinks he's untouchable.’

Luca winced at something again. ‘He’s heading for death row, Ell. That’s pretty touchable. Speaking of death, I think something died in this mattress. Recently.’

Ella hit the power button and the screen blinked out, taking Austin Creed's smug face with it. Good riddance. She tossed the remote onto the nightstand, shimmied out of her jeans and made for the other end of the bed. Luca was already sprawled out, one arm thrown over his eyes, the other dangling off the side. He looked like a crime scene chalk outline come to life.

She said, ‘You know, when I imagined our first night away together, I never pictured this.’

‘That’s on you. I pictured exactly this.’

Ella slid under the covers and did her best to sink into the mattress, futile as it was. Her head buzzed with visions of Creed's dead-eyed stare, and the footage from the Scrematorium played on an endless loop. She knew sleep would be a fickle mistress tonight, but she had to at least make the attempt. Her circadian rhythm had only recently gotten back on track after eighteen constant months on the road, and she wasn't about to let this case derail her hard-won sleep schedule.

Beside her, Luca was oddly turbulent. He was usually asleep within minutes, but he seemed to be having a tough time adapting to the foreign mattress.

She scooted closer and draped an arm across his chest. He mumbled something unintelligible, then rested a hand on her hip. Even in sleep, he knew her. Anticipated her. It was a small comfort, but she'd take what she could get.