Chapter 5

I’m not a glass half full or a glass half empty kind of person. I’m more of a ‘where did I put my goddamn glass’ kind of person.

-Kayla’s secret thoughts

Kayla

One month later

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Janie asked. “You don’t look okay.”

I wasn’t okay. After the things I saw while I was in Benton, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be okay again.

I’d had a rough month.

And Janie being so far away hadn’t helped.

I’d been lonely in my apartment, and I was also tired of the prying eyes of the men of Free looking at me like I’d lost my light.

I hadn’t lost my light.

I’d been scared to freakin’ death.

Was still scared to freakin’ death.

But at least I didn’t have the eyes of the men who raised me constantly looking at me like I was about to break staring at me anymore.

My hope by coming home, and then moving to Hostel, Texas where Janie now made her home, was to get over what I experienced. The things I saw that other people had done—it’d been terrible. The worst ever. And I knew without a doubt that I didn’t want to be a detective. I couldn’t handle what I witnessed Loki going through on a daily basis. I couldn’t live with that being my life. No way, no how.

Which led me to now, back to square one. Again.

For now, I was working at Hail Auto Recovery. Rafe had called in a few favors, and now I was the newest office assistant. Only I wasn’t just working at the shop answering calls and going to pick up orders, I was also working at their club, Hail House, doing other odds and ends like stocking and payroll.

It wasn’t what I wanted to be doing. The pay wasn’t much more than minimum wage, but it came with insurance.

Everything had been going great.

Until this morning.

Until I’d turned on the news and listened with dawning horror that another murder like the one I’d experienced in Benton, Louisiana had happened here.

In Hostel.

In the tiniest town ever.

Why here?

I just didn’t understand.

“Wow, they think that someone cut him up with a freakin’ saw?”

I nodded. “The big parts, yes,” I confirmed through the gorge rising. “The smaller parts were literally cut up with shears. And then limb cutters like you’d use for trees. They think that the killer is using whatever is handy. This time it happened to be a guy who was a woodworker and had a shop at his house. He had a lot of saws.”

In fact, I’d seen the man just three nights past outside selling the Santas he’d carved out of wood using his chainsaw.

Now, though, this guy was dead, chopped up—literally—and the comparisons between his murder and the other killings indicated it was the same killer.

Plus, the guy had a fucking calling card.

He tucked the people’s scalps onto a freakin’ lamp shade and turned the lamp on. Frying the flesh and allowing it to burn and melt onto the lamp itself.

He’d done that to ten victims so far, and it seemed that number was rising.

And, if the same routine held true, over the next three months, two more murders would be committed.

For the last year, every four months, in a different state each time, three murders were committed by this man. They weren’t one hundred percent positive that the murders were committed by a man, but the profilers strongly suspected it was.

The murders had started in Florida. Then they’d moved from Alabama to Mississippi. Mississippi to Louisiana. And now Louisiana to Texas.

All of the murders were grizzly, but none of them more so than the last one I’d seen in Benton.

Though, that might just be because I saw the actual aftermath of the murder, but still.

The thought of him doing something like that here was freaking me out.

Like, I was literally sick to my stomach thinking about leaving my new apartment.

And then Janie gave me the out I needed.

“You want to watch Abrielle?”

Was it bad of me that I didn’t even hesitate?

“Yes,” I breathed. “Can I?”

She nodded. “I’ve been meaning to do this anyway…I started formula full-time today after her appointment at the pediatrician. The doctor said that if I was going to breastfeed, six weeks was a great start. She would get all the immunowhateverthefucks from doing it for that long. She also told me I was a good mother and to not stress.”

I blinked. “You are a good mother.”

She blew out a breath. “I think I need some time alone with Rafe. I’m so busy worrying about her, trying to be a good mom and working, that I haven’t given him much time lately. I know that you were going to go to the party, but honestly? This works out for me. I think we’ll skip it, too. It won’t take much to convince Rafe that I need to run home for a few minutes and to leave her here with you.”

I laughed, relieved that I wouldn’t have to go to the party. A party that I really didn’t even belong at yet since I’d been on as an employee for Hail Auto Recovery. “It works out for me, too.”

Honestly, I was relieved as fuck that I wasn’t going to have to leave.

Despite being invited to the club for this mandatory ‘team building party’ that the Hails put on every three months or so, I wasn’t really part of that team, or at least I didn’t feel like I was.

They told me I should go, that I’d be welcome, but I just didn’t much feel like it.

I’d had a long day on top of a sleepless night after I heard that there was a murder that might be linked to the serial killings sweeping the southern states, and I couldn’t get those images of the crime scene I’d seen out of my freakin’ head.

I was seriously messed up.

“Let’s do it.” Janie jumped up, clapping her hands.

***

Parker

I listened to her through the wall. She’d moved in a couple of weeks ago, and little did I know that the girl could talk.

And talking wasn’t really an accurate description either. Try gabbing. Incessantly.

All she fucking did was talk. To herself. To other people. To another girl who came over and talked just as much.

Only, this time, it was different. She was talking to herself, and what she was saying sounded panicked.

“I don’t think you’re breathing normally,” she whispered. Only, her whisper wasn’t really a whisper at all so I didn’t know why she even bothered.

“I don’t know what to do!” she cried.

I’d had enough.

Getting up, I grabbed my stethoscope and headed for the door. Moments later I found myself standing in front of her door.

I knocked, and she answered moments later, a look of hope on her face that was quickly dashed.

“I’m busy.” Then she tried to shut the door in my face. “And what are you doing here?”

I held my hand out and stopped her from closing it.

“I’m your neighbor.” I pointed to my place next door to hers. “And I can hear you through the walls. Who’s having trouble breathing?”

God, the woman was beautiful. Young, but so goddamn beautiful.

“I’m watching Janie and Rafe’s daughter for an hour while she errrrm…runs to the grocery store. But Abrielle isn’t breathing normally…I don’t think.”

I pushed past her and walked farther into her apartment.

Though the floor plan was nearly identical to my own, her decorations totally changed the whole look and feel of the place, though.

Where my place was bare and boring, Kayla’s was bright and cheery.

She had this fru-fru couch that looked like it would be uncomfortable as hell, like it came from some antique shop and was built not for comfort, but to be as ugly as possible.

“Where?” I asked, fitting the earpieces of my stethoscope into my ear.

“She’s in this rock and play thing,” Kayla pointed to it next to the couch, and I headed toward it.

Abrielle, Rafe’s little girl who looked like a mini-version of him, was lying in it, looking at me alertly.

I couldn’t say I’d ever seen her actually awake.

But this time, she was alert and staring straight at me.

I squatted down and picked her up into my arms, a pang of sadness hitting me when I remembered that Gunner and Jett had once been that small.

“What is she doing?” I asked.

But it was obvious what she was doing. She had this noisy breathing going on that sounded like she needed to clear her throat. But, as a baby, she hadn’t figured out how to do that yet.

Sort of like she was having a hard time breathing, yet she looked fine. I couldn’t say that I’d ever heard anything quite like it.

Not from an infant, anyway.

“How long has she been making the sound?” I asked, placing my stethoscope under her shirt and pressing it to her skin.

“For about five minutes now?” she offered.

Abrielle jumped when the cold pad met her skin but otherwise didn’t react to the intrusion.

“Is that cold, baby girl?” I asked her.

Kayla made some sort of sound in her throat, but I didn’t look at her or ask her what the sound was for since I was busy listening to Abrielle’s lungs.

“Everything sounds clear,” I told her. “Her color is great. She’s responsive. Honestly, she looks healthy. Did you call Janie and ask if this was normal?”

“Not yet,” I hesitated. “She’s…it’s the first time…it’s been six weeks.”

He blinked.

“Text her.”

She did, and received an immediate response back.

Big Tits McGee: Shit! Sorry! Yes. Tracheomalacia. That’s what the doctor appointment was for. We discussed her breathing issues. Apparently, she has a floppy windpipe instead of a developed one. All it means is that she’ll be a noisy breather for a while. I googled it after I left because I was freaking the fuck out. But then just decided to call Aunt Cheyenne. She said although it’s okay, she’ll probably outgrow it, that it could be bad if she ever got super sick. But for now, she’s perfectly all right.

“God,” I breathed. “She’s got what Janie just said was tracheomalacia. Something about a floppy windpipe that’s underdeveloped. She’s a noisy breather.”

Parker grunted. “Would’ve thought she would’ve said something before she left her kid with you.”

Me: Okay. But next time there’s something wrong with your kid, tell me.

Bit Tits McGee: I’m sorry. I was freaking out. I knew you were freaking out. And I’m a horrible parent. I should come get her.

Me: No, I’m okay. Do your husband, then come get her.

Bit Tits McGee: I’m hiding in the bathroom. I’m scared he’s going to find me unattractive.

Me: He loves you, Janie. He doesn’t care if you have a floppy vagina.

Big Tits McGee: I don’t have a floppy vagina. I’m looking at it in the bathroom mirror. It looks pretty good.

Me: I don’t even know what to say to you sometimes.

Big Tits McGee: I had to make sure there was no toilet paper bits in there.

I snorted and dropped my phone down onto the coffee table, then looked up to find Parker with his stethoscope around his neck, and his eyes studying the baby.

“You okay?”

He looked up and nodded. “Yeah.”

“Are you a paramedic?” I questioned.

He nodded. “Learned a lot of trades in the Navy.”

He didn’t expound, so I vaguely wondered if he was willing to share anymore.

Probably not, but I was never one to give up before I knew what I wanted to know.

“Why are you working for Hail and not at the fire station?” I questioned.

Parker shrugged. “I volunteer.”

“You volunteer?”

He nodded. “Hostel is too small to have a full-time department, so they make do with volunteers from the surrounding area.

“Why doesn’t Rafe do that?” I wondered aloud.

“Rafe has too many other things he’s trying to keep hidden to volunteer,” he said.

“Like what?” I paused. “And trying?”

Parker shrugged. “We all have our own set of particular skills.”

With that cryptic comment, he started to walk to the door, and that’s when I saw it.

It was a small hole, but still one that I could see, and that damn compulsion started to pound inside my head.

I swallowed and moaned, causing him to turn back around, but not far enough that I could no longer see the hole.

“What are you looking at?” he asked.

I blurted out the first words that came to mind.

“You have holes!”

He blinked. “I have holes?”

I nodded.

“Holes.” I pointed to the hole in his shirt, then went ahead and did what I had to do.

I poked it.

Instantly I felt better.

I was such a weirdo.

And his skin was so hot.

Oh god.

“It’s an old shirt,” he said. “I didn’t see a reason to change on the way over here.”

That set off another thought.

“You said you heard me…what do you mean?” I questioned.

His lips twitched.

“Either you’re the loudest person in existence, or these walls are too thin. I hear everything,” he admitted.

I opened my mouth, then closed it.

“You can hear me,” I finally settled on.

My brain was going crazy as I tried to remember everything I’d done over the last week that was considered loud.

He nodded.

“So, you heard me talking to the baby,” I asked.

He nodded once.

“I also hear every single time you yell at your Alexa.” He paused. “Like today, you were making Kraft macaroni and cheese, and you set a timer on her for seven and a half minutes. You told her to turn off forty-seven times, and forty-six of those times she didn’t listen to you because you were playing your Christmas music too loud.”

I moaned in my throat.

“What else do you hear?” I was honestly scared to ask.

“You sing in the shower.”

Yep. That was bad.

“I…”

“You also watch the news when you get up every morning. Not to mention that you can’t stop yourself from singing the stupid song you have as your alarm ring tone,” he continued, making it even worse.

I closed my eyes as embarrassment swept through me.

Abrielle made a noise and using the time to go and pick her up as a stall, I turned back around and said, “I’m so sorry.”

He winked.

“I’m sure you would’ve figured it out on your part when I turned the ball game on this afternoon,” he said. “But maybe not. It’s like you have to have noise to drown out the silence.”

I did have to have that.

Silence was deafening at times.

And I hated sitting there without noise of some sort going on around me.

Which meant that Parker likely heard me a lot.

“Wait…you’re my neighbor?” I asked as I gently moved Abrielle up to my shoulder.

Parker left with a laugh, then I carefully listened.

I could hear him walk down the hall, then I could hear his door shut.

Then, moments later, I heard him whistling.

He didn’t whistle, but I suspected he wanted me to know how easily I could hear him.

Which I could.

Really, really easily.

Dammit.

I’d never be able to masturbate again.