Page 30 of Whispers in the Night

He did. Over the next hour, they found him in the background of footage from multiple days. Always in a hoodie. Always positioned where he could watch Melissa without being obvious. Never actually working out, just...observing.

“He’s patient,” Harper said. “Disciplined. He comes here specifically to watch her, but he doesn’t approach. Doesn’t draw attention. Just learns her routine.”

“Now check Amy Thorne’s footage,” Silas said, pulling up files from early-morning sessions.

The same man appeared in Amy’s footage too. Different hoodie—gray instead of black—but the same build, the same watching posture. He’d been here in the mornings when Amy worked out, in the evenings when Melissa worked out.

“That’s dedication,” Silas said. “He’s restructuring his whole schedule around watching these women.”

“Or he doesn’t have a regular job. He has the freedom to be here whenever he wants.” Harper leaned back, rubbing her eyes, displaying the same exhaustion he felt. “Can we get stills of him? Even with the poor quality, maybe we can identify something. Gait analysis, body language, anything that might help us narrow down suspects.”

“I’ll have the tech team work on it.” Silas saved the relevant footage clips. “But we’re not going to get a facial ID from this. He’s too careful.”

“Then we look at gym memberships. Cross-reference with the employee list. Someone here knows this guy, even if they don’t realize it.”

They spent another hour interviewing staff members, showing them the fuzzy images of hoodie man. No one recognized him. Or if they did, they weren’t saying. Silas got the sense that people at gyms didn’t really pay attention to each other. Everyone was focused on their own workouts, their own bodies, their own goals.

The perfect place for a predator to hunt.

By noon, they’d exhausted the leads at Summit Fitness. Silas grabbed lunch from a food truck—tacos for him, a salad for Harper that she picked at without much enthusiasm—and they ate in his car while reviewing notes.

“The Daily Grind is next,” Harper said. “If he’s been watching both victims, he probably went there too.”

“We’ll hit it this afternoon. But first—” Silas pulled up a file on his laptop. “Morris found something interesting in the missing persons database. Remember those four women we flagged last night?”

“The ones who disappeared over the past three years?”

“Yeah. Morris dug deeper. All four of them had gym memberships. Two at Summit Fitness, one at a gym in Portland,one in Eugene. And all four frequented local coffee shops regularly.”

Harper set down her salad, her eyes alight with recognition. “That’s his pattern. He doesn’t just choose victims based on appearance. He chooses them based on lifestyle. Women who work out, who are health-conscious, who have predictable routines. Women he can watch without being noticed.”

“Which means there might be more victims. Women who fit the profile and disappeared but weren’t connected because they vanished in different cities.” Silas’s stomach churned. “We could be looking at a dozen victims or more.”

“We need to expand the search. Look at gym memberships across the region, cross-reference with missing persons, see how many women match the pattern.” Harper’s voice was steady, but Silas could see the weight settling on her shoulders. “This is bigger than we thought.”

“Yeah.” Daunting is what it was, and he had no idea how the hell they were going to solve it, but they weren’t going to stop until they did. Silas started the engine. “Let’s hit The Daily Grind. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find something that actually leads us to this bastard.”

The hipster coffee shop was located in downtown Blackridge—exposed brick, vintage furniture, the kind of place where everything cost seven dollars and came with foam art. It was busy with the lunch crowd, people on laptops and phones, the espresso machine hissing constantly.

The manager was a guy named Trevor—early thirties, beard, septum piercing, the kind of person who probably had strong opinions about coffee bean origins. His eyes were red-rimmed when they arrived, and Silas realized he’d probably been crying.

“Melissa was the best,” Trevor said, leading them to a back office. “Always on time, always cheerful. Customers loved her. I can’t believe she’s gone.”

“We’re sorry for your loss,” Harper said gently. “We need to ask you some questions about her routine here. Anyone who paid unusual attention to her? Any customers who made her uncomfortable?”

Trevor shook his head. “Not that she mentioned. But we get a lot of regulars. Melissa knew most of them by name, knew their orders. She was good with people.”

“What about this woman?” Silas showed him Amy Thorne’s photo. “Was she a customer here?”

“Oh yeah. Amy. She came in every morning around seven-thirty. Always got a cappuccino and a blueberry muffin. She and Melissa knew each other. I’d see them chatting sometimes when Amy came in.”

Silas and Harper exchanged glances. “They knew each other?”

“Not well, I don’t think. Just casual conversation. The way you know people who come into your work regularly.” Trevor frowned. “Wait, is Amy...?”

“She was killed two nights ago,” Silas said. “Same person who killed Melissa.”

Trevor’s face crumbled. He sat down heavily, covering his face with his hands. “Jesus Christ. Two of them. He killed two of them.”