Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Kain
After walking Eva home, I returned to my apartment and searched for Ozarrow Woods in Sturbridge.
About fifty acres of it hadn’t been developed yet, still owned by Senator Falcone’s family.
I was waiting to hear from him regarding my request to visit the property.
I’d been to the campground and the public park but needed to examine the private areas.
There could be clues about Hawthorne’s network.
The underground complex that imprisoned me had been near Falcone’s property.
Maybe Hawthorne’s men hid there after the explosion, waiting for things to settle.
The senator had texted me earlier when I was with Eva, notifying me of his niece’s murder that would be splashed all over the news.
Twenty-five-year-old Shelly Clark’s body was discovered today in a church parking lot, wearing a floral dress with her hands clasping a bouquet of sunflowers.
The news didn’t report her missing any organs.
She’d been missing for several months in San Diego.
Her friend, Malory Evans, had also gone missing, but her body hadn’t been found yet.
The more I investigated Hawthorne’s MO, the more perplexed I became.
Sometimes his murders involved missing organs, while other times the bodies remained intact.
How did he determine which bodies to harvest and which to leave?
I knew he wanted healthy organs, but that would require his knowledge of the person’s health records.
But then again, did he really care? Psychopaths weren’t always logical, so maybe he just chose whom and when to extract depending on his mood and bank accounts.
I could spend days analyzing the fucker and still get nowhere productive.
I thought back to Senator Falcone. Why was his niece’s abduction kept from the news? The news didn’t always give missing people the coverage they deserved, but he was a senator. Why didn’t he use his power to push for more media attention?
I planned on asking him about his niece at Friday’s event and updating him on the Bleeding Hearts Killer. The country knew about the Black Rose serial killer, and he should be aware there was a copycat killer at large.
I walked over to my bookcase, retrieving Chaos, a book I hadn’t read in a long time.
I’d been obsessed with this book, wanting to get inside Hawthorne’s mind.
But all it did was confuse me about the man.
The book pointed out the many shadows within our society, not how to strengthen the darkness.
A serial killer would read books to improve his skills, correct?
Nonetheless, the book was an eye-opener.
All the things I once believed to be conspiracy theories were actually true because I tracked down some family members of those who were part of these secret CIA programs. What I discovered shifted my perspective on many things.
I learned that the official narratives behind our wars weren’t legitimate.
Mass shootings weren’t random either. There were hidden agendas that made a group of wealthy people wealthier.
Chaos created fear and distraction for a darker business to flourish.
The US government took part in psychological operations, torturing its citizens to study how it could control people’s minds.
Was this something Hawthorne wanted to do too? Or was he already part of something darker? Were these sick people part of his wide network?
The book portrayed Sigmund Freud as a fraud, not the revered psychiatrist people admired and studied. His theories were a deception to hide his own crimes of pedophilia, along with the elites who protected him. All the things I’d learned in school needed to be reevaluated.
Was Hawthorne trying to manipulate people’s behavior?
The book described unbelievable methods used by the military to manipulate people’s minds, making them commit crimes they had no memory of.
I remembered walking in on Hawthorne working on a dead body.
He was in a trance, listening to classical music while cutting out organs.
Was Hawthorne studying various methods of behavioral manipulation?
The endless questions gave me a headache, so I returned the book to its place and walked back to my desk.
The world is ruled by psychopaths—the elites.
That was the message I’d gotten from reading the book four times.
Blowing out a frustrated breath, I looked down at my arms. I didn’t have any tats prior to being kidnapped and branded.
But when I left, the art on my body told a compelling story I’d tell my children one day.
I didn’t want my kids or anyone’s kids to experience the same hell my friends and I endured.
The world was ruled by psychopaths, and these evil people must be eliminated.
My computer chimed, signaling an incoming message to my encrypted email. I clicked on Newton’s email, opening the shared file. My jaw dropped when I reviewed the data, a detailed spreadsheet that delivered more info than I expected. Why hadn’t anyone noticed this pattern?
In the past five years, hundreds of victims had died in cities scattered along the West Coast with the same MO: women or men holding bouquets of flowers with their hands tied with rope.
Instead of roses or bleeding hearts, the flowers often varied.
Most of the homicides didn’t make the news.
The more information I analyzed, the more I knew the killer had connections to Hawthorne.
I opened the files I’d stolen from Hawthorne, printed them, and spent the rest of the evening sorting through them.
Organization helped me stay focused, and I needed that to find this fucking copycat.
I sorted the pictures, placing them on the investigation board on the wall, adding sticky notes with dates, locations, and brief details of the images.
I stared at the names J. Masterson and C.
Loomer on the board. Those were the names on the coolers Andrew and Ben had dragged in to have us package their organs.
Was Anastasia related to this J. Masterson?
A quick search on my computer showed she had a brother named Jarrett Masterson, whose body was discovered with his organs removed about twenty years ago.
At that time, Anastasia and her older brother were fighting over their father’s inheritance and his law firm.
Her health was weak, and she was on the waiting list for a liver transplant.
Miraculously, she got a matching donor a week after her brother’s body was found.
Thoughts swirled in my head as tiny pieces of the puzzle shifted and connected. Did Anastasia pay Hawthorne to kill her brother for his liver? Did she miss a payment? Was that why he sent his crew to target her at the hotel?
Noah Loomer was the second person who had received the threat.
His mother, Catherine Loomer, died twenty years ago as well.
The reasoning was health complications, but I didn’t believe it.
Was Catherine a random victim? My gut told me no, but I couldn’t find anything else about her.
Hawthorne was a businessman, so I assumed he targeted healthy individuals to obtain their organs. Still, how did he get their names?
Before I knew it, fatigue tugged at my neck and shoulders. I leaned into the comfort of my chair and closed my eyes, resting . . .
“Twenty-five,” says eighteen-year-old Jay Gardner, who wants my Batman sketch for his younger brother’s birthday gift.
“Forty,” I counter, knowing he has the money. His dad is a hotshot lawyer, and they live in the posh neighborhoods of Brookline, whereas I live in Allston.
“Fine.” He hands me two twenties, slides into his black Beemer, and speeds off.
At seventeen, I have a driver’s license but no car. My parents aren’t wealthy, but I have a home. When my dad’s around, I wish my mom and I were elsewhere. But we’re stuck with him because he makes more money as an electrician than she does as a waitress.
With the money in my jeans pocket, I head home, cutting through the woods behind an elementary school playground.
A basketball rolls to my feet. I look up and see two men gesturing for me to return it to them.
Nodding, I pick up the ball, walk over, and hand it to the guy with the brown ponytail. I wish I had more time to play basketball, but my mother needs me these days.
“Thanks, bro!” says the man with the short blond hair.
“Sure.” I turn and walk away.
I hear the ball bounce to the ground near me, and I’m about to turn around when a powerful arm wraps around my neck, choking me. I fight him, but the ponytail man stabs a needle into my neck. An icy chill overcomes me. It doesn’t take long for my body to weaken.
Then smoke fills my vision.
I woke up out of breath, gasping for air.
This wasn’t a dream. This was a dark memory coming to the surface as a dream.
I got out of the chair, stretched my neck from side to side, and walked into the bathroom to wash up.
Exhaustion still tugged at me, so I slipped into bed, closed my eyes, and fell back asleep.
I sit up in a small bed that’s pushed against the wall of a cold, dark room.
There are no windows, and I’m the only one in the room.
Where am I? Who are those men who kidnapped me?
My hand goes to where he stabbed me, rubbing at the soreness.
Fear overwhelms me as I silently call for my mother.
She’s probably worried I haven’t gone home to help her clean the house.
If my dad comes home and finds it messy, he’ll hit her.
I hear cries from the other side of the room, so I get off the bed and walk over, pressing my ear to it.
Did they kidnap more kids like me? Who are these people?
What do they plan to do to us? Terror fills my mind, but I try not to focus on it.
I’m about to ask who’s on the other side when I hear footsteps.
My heart races as I rush back to the bed, resuming my position.
The door opens, and the man with the ponytail enters, grinning.
“Get up. You’re getting branded.”
Fear numbs me. What does that mean? I’m not sure what to say. I don’t want to say or do something that’s going to make them hurt me.
The guy seems to love the fear on my face because he says, “I’m Andrew. Don’t be afraid. You’re part of the team now. Behave, and you’ll survive. Don’t behave, and you’ll die.”
Nausea rises, coating my throat.
I choked awake with a burning sensation in my throat.
Fuck. I wiped the sweat from my forehead and inhaled a deep breath, forcing my pounding heart to calm.
Thirsty, I reached for the glass of water on my nightstand and gulped it down.
I didn’t understand this resurgence of memories coming back to me as dreams. I’d tried not to think about my experience, but something dark had already seeped into my bones, simmering there only to return unexpectedly.
I’d had nightmares of that horrible place, but they were mostly of body parts and faceless people wandering in the fog, looking for their missing organs.
Their pain and suffering shuddered through my body.
Most of all, I felt guilty for not being able to connect them back to their lost body parts.
Though I didn’t kill them, I was part of the dismantling process—I helped remove their organs.
Their faces were never clear in my dreams, even though I’d seen many of their dead faces. A swarm of ghosts searching to complete themselves haunted me. After a moment of self-loathing, I dropped back into a restless sleep.
Two days after I’m branded with a tattoo of a cross of two black roses on my right bicep, Tony brings me into a room with three boys and one girl.
They appear to be my age, but I’m not sure.
My shoulder is still sore, but it’s more tolerable today.
I’ve always wanted to get a tattoo someday, but on my own terms and with my art.
Not some stupid black rose cross. The symbol makes me angry at God for placing me in this hell.
I’m not supposed to make negative comments about it.
Razor, the guy who inked me, reminds me to keep quiet and just do as I’m told.
He wears an eyepatch and doesn’t talk about his eye injury, and I don’t ask.
I can’t trust anyone here. What if he tells on me, or worse, makes up some stupid story that could get me killed? All I want is to get out of here.
The boys and the girl stand around a long table, looking tense. They look at me, and I see hopelessness in their eyes. How long have they been here? Why are they wearing gloves stained red?
“Today, you watch and learn from them.” Tony points to the coolers near the back wall with the various refrigerators.
Razor enters, and Tony slaps him on the shoulder. “Perfect. You can show him what to do.”
“Isn’t that your job?” Razor places a box on the table.
“But you’re better at this. Come on! I’ll buy you something from the store. What do you want? Candy? Chips?”
“You’re going out again?”
He shrugs. “Another Black Rose drop-off with Hawthorne.”
My body jerked awake. Tony knew the details about Hawthorne’s MO.
Could the copycat be him? But then again, Hawthorne had several men working closely with him.
Aside from Massachusetts, he had locations in other states too.
Because of his wide network, it could be anyone.
I looked over at the clock on the nightstand: 4:00 a.m.
I had enough dark memories for one night.
Work awaited me. Groaning, I went to wash up, splashing cold water onto my face and brushing my teeth.
With coffee in hand, I walked into my office and searched Eva Collins’s family history.
I already knew about Eva from my previous research, but something about her grandfather spurred me on.
When I found his first name, a memory jogged in me. Could it be him?
Harold Collins didn’t have any social media presence. I scrolled through all the images with that name, and other people showed up, but none looked like him. Then I typed his name into the dark web search engine, and new images splashed onto the screen.
My eyes landed on an image of a group of men fishing in Maine. I enlarged the image to study the five men. Though the picture wasn’t clear, I couldn’t stop staring at a man who looked like a younger Harold Collins.
Recognition cleared the fog. “Holy shit.”