Page 28 of Hunt Me, Daddy

Writhing underneath me in my bed.

I wanted her in every way that would make her mine.

CHAPTER 7

Kit

I knew something was wrong before I turned on the light.

That sounded dramatic, which annoyed me. I preferred my instincts with documentation. I liked timestamps, camera stills, logs that could be exported and handed to someone with an expression that said ‘please enjoy being wrong’ in writing. Feelings were not evidence. Feelings were messy little biological alarms built by centuries of people who survived by assuming every rustle in the grass hid a monster.

Still.

My apartment felt wrong in a way I couldn’t put my finger on. Nothing was disturbed or ransacked from what I could tell. My door was locked. The strip of string and tape along the inside edge of the frame was exactly where I’d left it. The pressure log from the entry mat showed only my own departure and return. The hall camera had recorded nothing but the empty corridor, Mrs. Alvarez’s grandson dropping off groceries, and my upstairsneighbor dragging what I sincerely hoped was furniture down the hall at three-fourteen in the afternoon.

Everything was fine.

I stood just inside the apartment with my bag still on my shoulder, keys in my fist, and did not believe that for a single second.

The room was dark except for the thin wash of city light through the windows, Boston spread out beyond the glass in wet black angles and gold reflections. Rain had fallen earlier, leaving the streets slick and shining below. The radiator hissed in the corner. The kitchen smelled faintly of old coffee, lemon cleaner, and the takeout I still hadn’t eaten.

I locked the door behind me.

Then I checked the lock.

I set my bag down slowly and started searching my apartment. The first sweep took nine minutes. Living room. Kitchen. Bathroom. Closet. Under the couch because paranoia was embarrassing but corpses were worse. Behind the shower curtain. Bedroom. Window locks. Fire escape latch. Desk drawer. Safe panel beneath the sink. The book I had left face-down on the arm of the couch was still face-down, spine angled toward the lamp, corner aligned with the seam in the cushion exactly the way I had left it.

I knew that because I photographed my apartment before leaving now.

Every time.

Some people took selfies. I took crime-scene reference images of my own furniture.

Healthy? Debatable.

Useful? Definitely.

The second sweep took thirteen minutes because I slowed down. I checked angles. I checked shadows. I checked the tiny dot of clear nail polish I’d placed on the underside of the desk drawer, the paperclip balanced behind the router, the quarter on the windowsill, heads facing out. Still there. Still aligned just right.

Everything was undisturbed.

My pulse should have settled.

It didn’t.

The apartment did not feel invaded in the way I had expected invasion to feel. That was the worst part. There was no violence in it. There was no door kicked in, no drawers emptied, no threat scrawled across my mirror in lipstick like some man had watched too many bad crime dramas and wanted to make sure I knew he was dangerous. This was quieter. More careful. Like someone had stepped inside my life, breathed the same air as I did, and taken nothing. Nothing obvious, anyway.

I moved toward the kitchen table because it was the only place left. The crossword sat where I’d left it. Oralmostwhere I’d left it.

The paper had been smoothed.

That was the first thing. I hadn’t smoothed it. I had cut the crossword out of the newspaper three days ago, folded it once, unfolded it, cursed at it twice, and left it slightly curled at the corner because fighting paper at two in the morning was where I drew the line on personal dignity.

Now it lay flat.

My pencil sat beside it.

The last three answers had been filled in, but not in my handwriting.