The woman was there again.
Her porcelain skin looked paler than usual, but her eyes were still very red and fatigued. As always, her lips moved but nothing was heard.
Rylee wasn't scared of her.
But she was unable to process why this was happening again. Her breath felt gummy, and her neck was itchy due to all the sweating. She had no idea where she was, but she knew how this was going to unfold.
The woman lit a turquoise coloured candle in the middle of the room. But it wasn't a room. They were actually... in the woods. The tree trunks thickening with side shadows, the branches swaying noiselessly and the whole thing seeming so alive even in the dead of the night.
As Rylee's eyes stayed fixated on the candle flame, the woman started writing something in the sand. K E I...Wait, no, they were...at the...beach.
It was so obvious with the sound of the waves crashing against the shore that she couldn't believe she had missed it.
"He's involved" the woman said to Rylee
She stared into her soul as if waiting for Rylee to answer back. "He is not innocent....his son..beware of his..". Her tone was assertive, but her words weren't very clear.
Who is 'he'?
Before Rylee could react, three men appeared out of nowhere.
They dragged the woman away as she grappled against their pull. An another man watched it all from a distant corner. The letters in the sand were no longer legible. Rylee tried hard to make sense of them, but on looking closely at it all, she only realized one thing.
The abnormal sweating, her unusually warm and heavy breaths, the sultriness that nearly choked her...she wasn't on a beach.....she was on fire.
***
"Had a bad dream, eh?"
Sebastian Thompson woke up to find his daughter rolled up inside a duvet fort. She was lying on the couch in Austin's room, her eyes wide open, continuosly staring at the ivy vine in their front yard.
"Not bad... just very bizzare" Rylee answered without looking up.
He sauntered towards her and let out a concerned sigh "Is it the house chica?"
The house. The mansion they had shifted into. Rylee would certainly agree that this place was something far from normal.
The house was full of dismantled electrical equipments fixed at odd places, the staircase produced a metallic tune whenever someone walked on it in a specific rhythmic pattern, every mirror under this roof was cracked at the exact same corner in the exact same manner, the small worn out piano in the kitchen had some keys painted in blue, there were fossils framed in the hallway and the list went on.
But Rylee knew that it wasn't the house.
"Nah, must be all the psychological thrillers I've been watching recently" she tried making stuff up to convince her dad.
"Psych fanatic" Sebastian affectionately ruffled her hair "don't test your limits"
"Don't think I have any" she smiled at him. "Speaking of which... where are we on the serial killer case?"
"Um, do I need to report my investigation to you chica?"
"C'mon dad, you know I love to hear your findings and theor-"
"This is a highly sensitive case" he started walking towards the door.
"Dad!" Rylee got up to stop him from leaving "I'll be careful, I promise"
A few minutes later she adjusted herself on the rolling chair as she watched her father dust his study.
"You do this every morning?"
"Of course" he shrugged with an 'ain't that obvious' expression.
"Alright" he slid a coffee mug in her direction, over the glass top of his desk "I won't be showing you any pictures from the crime scene"
Rylee gave him a thumbs up "Works for me" She knew she could sneak in her father's study any time and look at those pictures herself.
"So, remember the latest victim?"
"Yep. Thomas Flynn. Originally from Quintflake but had been ordinarily resident in the neighbouring town of Swinford for the last 14 years. He's the owner of Plastrim Automotives, a small company which had been doing fairly well. Thomas was known to be diligent, civil, quite below average when it came to being social and was an amiable person, indicating that he had no foes, atleast there are none that we know of-"
"Oh easy there chica.." Sebastian Thompson couldn't help raising a brow at the impressive work done by his daughter "you little detective you know a lethal amount of information"
Rylee pompously smirked at the compliment.
"But there's something important that you do not know"
He opened a case file and ran his fingers over something written in it "Thomas Flynn suffered some significant injuries on the back of his head, and a closer look revealed an arm injury as well, which is indicative of-"
"Struggle...Physical struggle. A possible fight with someone" Rylee completed his sentence.
"Exactly...But that's not even the main twist in this case"
He continued "Thomas Flynn was stifled to death."
Rylee let out an audible gasp on hearing that. She was both exhilarated and astonished at where this was heading.
"The killer that we're looking for has a particular modus operandi- he slits the victim's throat, then stabs them- thrice in the abdomen, twice in the chest-aimed at the heart, and then five times in the eye
Thomas Flynn was stifled first. But it was done very slyly. The very slight dark discolouration of his skin suggests death by asphyxiation.
And all the other victims of this serial killer, be it of the past or the present, were only stabbed to death.
Fun fact-"
"Statistically a very small percentage of serial killers deviate from their MO" The words fell out of Rylee's mouth as she eagerly waited for Sebastian to confirm what she was thinking "Dad.. that means only one thing.. "
"Yes" Sebastian verified his daughter's hypothesis "Thomas Flynn was very likely murdered by someone else.
Someone who's not the serial killer we're looking for."
YOU ARE READING
Blue
Mystery / Thriller"Are you telling me that you've been receiving those letters since LAST YEAR?!" She couldn't believe what was happening. "uh....yes" he confirmed, more like re-confirmed. "and they are-" "yeah" he sighed "being sent by someone from the PAST" ...
