C H A P T E R S I X T Y – N I N E
The Eleventh Victim
Aidan and I concurrently agreed to hand the USB drive over to the police.
The next time I went into my internship, I called Detective Larkins to meet me in the office with Mr Havens and Mr Jackman present. They all waited patiently as I retrieved the USB drive from my handbag and held it out to Detective Larkins. He gazed at it curiously before accepting it.
"I found this," I announced, omitting the detail that it was in Arianna's house which turned into a crime scene, "and there are two articles on there and photographs of all the victims when they didn't realise." I drew in a sharp breath. "I also know it's Maxwell Blake behind the abductions and murders and I know he killed my parents, though the case was closed as unsolved because Ethan Blake paid to make sure it never got revealed that it was Maxwell who did it. I read the articles, including the one my mom wrote on Blake Industries which instigated everything from their deaths to Stephenson Daniel's murder and the break-in at the cinema to every teenage crime that has occurred this summer."
Mr Jackman bowed his head.
Mr Havens wore an apologetic grimace.
Detective Larkins was inquisitive, above all else. "I take it Aidan finally told you what we discussed during the interrogation when he was arrested? The skeletons in the closet?"
"Yes."
He nodded, though he was so characteristically impassive, I didn't even attempt to gauge his reaction to my revelations. Instead he declared, "We have a piece of software we can use on each victim's laptop to see whether they used this USB drive and when so we have a better grasp of the chain of events."
"You can do that?" I asked, nonplussed.
That was something Arianna would love to hear-
Oh.
Yeah.
Mr Jackman cracked a small smile at my incredulousness. "We can have the results by the end of the day too, providing we have examined each laptop in time."
Detective Larkins agreed. "Exactly, so I'm going to take this to the station and I'm going to send out officers to each house with a warrant to seize each laptop or computer necessary and state that they can have them returned by the end of the day." He turned to Mr Jackman. "I'll email the results as soon as they're processed. Thank you for handing this over, Addison. I'll be in contact soon." He nodded at each of us before departing.
Despite everything, I found myself asking, "Does he never smile?" out loud, though in hindsight, I perhaps should have kept it to myself. But in all honesty, I could only ever remember seeing Detective Larkins smile once at me, and even then it wasn't even a proper smile.
Mr Havens broke out into a smile. "You'd be surprised. I think I only ever see him smile at his wife. I'm sure once they have children, it'll reveal his softer side. Here, I'll get you some files from the archive room. You relax, okay?"
"Thanks," I told him, painting on a smile as I reached for my phone.
Addison: Given the USB drive in. They're examining all the computers. Will get results later
Aidan: Good. Like I said, this is going to end soon
How are you so certain, Aidan? Do you know something? Are you hiding something else from me?
The answer?
Yes.
***
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The Drifter
Mystery / ThrillerHe was the mysterious one. The one that seemed to pop up whenever I needed him. He then became my neighbour. He appeared first in my life one year ago to save me, but now he's back again, going against all that he has ever known and lived for. Becau...
