Chapter 2
TWO
Emily
Eureka Springs is one of those towns that has gotten stuck in time. People here believe in their own ghost stories, convinced the town is haunted, but they also believe it could be a better place. And somehow, it becomes home to someone who lives only to prove them wrong.
The Ozark woods surround it, and to me, someone who has just arrived, it seems like the perfect little town. Crooked buildings. Too ornate. Too stubbornly carved. Almost like they have secrets of their own to hide.
And they do hide things.
People. Corpses. Secrets buried deep in the soil at the edge of the woods.
And I came here to see if I can answer the question of why.
Why this town? Why these people? Why this man?
I exhale deeply and glance at the clock on the wall, five in the afternoon.
The apartment I rented for the month is bare. Cherry red walls with dark wood paneling beneath. Old oak furniture. Porcelain plates line neatly inside the cabinets. Worn carpets hide scratches carved into the wooden floors over time. It has a small balcony with a wooden table and two chairs.
Even the flowers hanging from the rusted iron fence are completely dry, yet they still add a touch of charm to the place. More charm than my modern, monotone black and white apartment in the center of New York, overlooking foggy streets and constant motion.
I walk into the kitchen wearing black satin pajama shorts and an oversized black sweater that could have fit me three times over. It slips off my left shoulder, brushing against the single braid resting there. I tiptoed to the fridge to grab a glass of white Pinot Gris.
I bite my lower lip and pour the wine into a glass from the cabinet near the fridge, in the hope that at least the wine will blur my vision enough that I won’t notice half the broken things in this place.
“I just quit the job I came here for,” I exhale. “Emily, you can be a real stupid bitch.”
I take a sip.
“But hey, at least you didn’t let that asshole call you a dumb blonde slut.” I lift the glass in the air, then bring it back to my lips. “I am dumb. I wanted to be the one to close the case.”
The words come out loud.
My eyes sting, yet my cheeks stay dry.
I haven’t cried in years. Work and study filled the space where grief should have been. I didn’t even cry at my father’s funeral—a decorated detective who cared more for cold cases than his own daughter. I used to wait for him every night, until he stopped coming home altogether.
Everyone carries trauma. Some numb it with alcohol or sex, I bury mine in books, studying psychopaths instead.
“Maybe that asshole was right,” I say, leaning against the kitchen cabinet. “Maybe I do want to get laid.” I exhale. “This was supposed to be easy.”
A low bark comes from the living room.
“Daisy,” I call, rushing forward with the wine glass still in my hand, leaving a thin trail across the floor as I run toward my Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. My ex’s idea of a birthday surprise, two years too late.
I drop to my knees. She rises from her bed and pads over, resting her small head in my lap the moment I hit the floor.
“Oh, baby,” I say softly. “Mommy forgot about you.” I stroke her head. “You must be hungry.”
I lift her into my arms and carry her to the kitchen.
With her still held against me, I grab the dry food from the cabinet and pour small granules into her bowl. Then I open a can of wet food and layer it on top. Her tiny nose is already sniffing, excited.
I placed her on the floor. As she begins to eat, I open the fridge, pour another glass of wine, and step out onto the balcony. I sit down and wrap myself in a blanket.
The night is cold. Autumn here carries a sharp chill, but the fresh air brushes my cheeks, cooling them as the wine settles in my body.
I look up at the sky. It’s so peaceful.
No car horns. No traffic. No screaming voices in the streets.
For the first time in days, I feel calm. The sun dips slowly, painting the sky with soft orange hues that make everything feel unreal, almost perfect.
Daisy finishes her food faster than I pour it. She trots onto the balcony and sits in front of me, watching closely and waiting for a treat.
I smile and lift her onto my lap.
“No treats for you, miss. The vet said you need to lose some weight.”
She barks in protest.
I laugh quietly, stroking her head as she leans against me.
Sometimes the price you pay for peace is the hardest one.
“Zayne Mercer,” I whisper. “I guess this is goodbye.”
His voice still echoed in my head. Calling me freckles. I have four across my nose, always hidden beneath concealer.
How did he even notice?
I close my eyes. Just as I exhale, a knock on the door snaps them open.
I can hear the footsteps pacing at the doorstep.
My heart begins to pound. No one knew where I lived.
I stand up slowly. Daisy growls from the balcony as I move toward the front door. She follows close behind me, her nails clicking softly against the floor.
The knock came again, three firm raps.
“Who is it?” I ask, my voice breaking as my hand hovers over the doorknob.
“Detective Kade Rourke,” he answers through the door.
“Not today, Satan,” I mutter, relief flooding my chest when I realize it’s just him. I raise my voice as I walk away, not even bothering to open the door. Daisy remains planted in front of it.
“I have an update on the case,” he calls out, banging on the door two more times.
“Good for you,” I shout back, exhaling sharply.
“I’ll leave a file at your doorstep,” he says. “Read it and call me if you still want to treat Zayne Mercer.” His voice hesitates. “We’ll need your expertise.”
I roll my eyes as his footsteps fade.
After a moment, I return to the door and scoop Daisy into my arms. With my free hand, I twist the doorknob and pull the door open.
He is already walking away toward a blue Toyota Corolla. The paint on the car is peeling, and for a brief second, I almost feel sorry for him when he trips over a small rock near the tire. But he catches himself just in time by gripping the side of the car.
I lean down and pick up the file from the doorstep. As soon as it is in my hands, I hear the car start and pull away. I didn’t need to look up to know it was him driving past.
I close the door behind me.
As I walk back inside, Daisy presses her small paws against my chest, asking to be put down. I lower her to the floor, and she trots into the living room, curling up in her plush pink bed beside the green sofa.
I follow her, but before reaching the living room, I move to the balcony and grab my glass of wine, leaving the door open behind me. I sink onto the sofa, lean back, pull my legs up, rest the file on my lap, and open it.
The papers are old. Torn at the edges. Some have small holes, either from age or from rodents. Entire sections of text are blacked out. Some parts are missing; some were hidden.
Then a Polaroid photograph slips free and falls into my lap.
March 1981.
My breath catches.
The image stares back at me.
Zayne Mercer.
My hand flies to my mouth as I gasp.
“This is not possible.”
We don’t live in a world where people don’t age. Everyone has an expiration date.
Which means this has to be a joke.
Or something much worse.
I slam the file shut without reading the rest and storm into the hallway.
My bag hangs from one of the hooks near the entrance. I am the kind of person who keeps their phone close because work follows me everywhere, but today I ignored it. No one was calling me anyway.
That thought barely finishes forming when I check the screen.
Ten missed calls.
From the detective.
Perfect.
I press the screen hard, anger guiding my thumb. It doesn’t even ring once before he answers, and the second he does, everything I have been holding back spills out.
“Is this a joke to you? Do you think I am stupid? That man...”
“That man,” he interrupts, “is the Ozark Butcher from the eighties.”
I swallow hard.
“He died in 1981,” he continues. “I am waiting on DNA results from the lab, but there has to be a match. They look identical, Dr. Beckett.”
My heart begins to race faster, pounding against my ribs with a pressure that makes it hard to breathe.
“Are you saying it’s his son, or?” I ask, my voice speeding up with my pulse.
A loud knock hits the door out of nowhere.
I gasp, my shoulders jerking upward before falling again as my breath stutters out of me.
“There’s more,” he says.
I stare at the door, my eyes widening.
“Open the door,” he adds. “Will you?”
I roll my eyes as I walk toward it.
“You scared the shit out of me,” I say, unlocking it. I keep the phone pressed to my ear as I lean against the doorframe. “Are you stalking me, detective?”
“I need your brain on a few things.”
I nod once, lips pressed together, eyes narrowing at him. “Mhm.”
He steps inside without waiting for an invitation and pulls a small voice recorder from his jacket. He leans back against the kitchen counter as I close the door and move toward him.
Daisy notices the stranger immediately and rushes over to sniff him. When he gives her no attention, she loses interest and pads back to her bed in the living room.
“In 1998, there was an explosion at the Halden Institute,” he says, exhaling slowly. “When the firefighters arrived, they found bodies chained in the basement.”
His hand drags along his jaw, fingers brushing through his salt-and-pepper hair.
“The site,” he continues, “stays with you. They found a lab in the basement. Most of the records were destroyed in the fire, but a few survived—incident reports, funding logs, internal memos. Everything that didn’t burn was sealed and reclassified.”
My eyebrows pull together. “How do I not know about this?”
“Because it was buried,” he says. “What they found wasn’t something they could explain away. So they controlled the story. Seven years later, they reopened the Institute. The town was told it had been an accident. That was the official version. Nothing else.”
He presses play on the recorder.
The first few seconds are mostly noise; just movement, and muffled voices, the hiss of static. Then screaming breaks through—panicked voices. Fire crackles in the background, something pops, and glass shatters near the microphone—people shouting over each other, words blurring together.
Near the end, the noise drops off.
A boy’s voice came through, breaking as he called for his father.
I don’t realize I’m crying until something warm hits my lip.
“There were kids inside?” I ask.
“They never found him,” he says, and plays the tape again.
“Stop,” I cry out.
He doesn’t.
“Stop,” I whisper, my voice collapsing. “I can’t listen. I can’t listen to their screams.”
He rewinds the tape and presses play again.
This time, he brings the recorder close to my ear. “Can you hear something odd?”
I wipe at my tears, forcing myself to listen past the screaming. Beneath it, threaded between the chaos, were whispers. Repeating over and over again. “Protect the boy. Protect the boy. Seven. Five. Thirteen. Nine. Fourteen. Nine. Protect the boy.”
He presses the stop and turns to me.
“This tape was sealed with those files,” he says. “I was on desk duty back then. First year as a cop. When we caught Mercer, I saw the same numbers tattooed on the back of his neck, right beneath a barcode.”
“You think he’s the boy who ran away?” I ask.
“It fits,” he says, sliding the recorder back into his jacket. “But I need you to get it out of him. I need you to connect both cases. Him looking identical to the Ozark Butcher from the eighties is not a coincidence. And if there are more monsters like him out there—“
He slams his fist against the counter.
“I need to know.”
I stare at him, searching his face for a motive. For anything that would compromise this case.
Then I see it. This isn’t about the case at all.
“How did your wife die?” I ask quietly, my heart hammering in my chest.
“She was Zayne Mercer’s eleventh victim,” he says. His eyes gloss over almost immediately. “I went on national news. I called him out.”
A short, humorless breath slips out. “I said he hid behind dead women. Said if he wanted me, he knew where to find me.”
I inhale, already knowing what comes next.
“He proved me wrong,” he says. His voice breaks, just once. “He took her instead. Made sure I was watching.”
The words come out tight, controlled—worse than shouting.
“I put her in his line of sight,” he says, tapping his chest. “I thought I could protect her. I thought I could outsmart him.”
His jaw locks. He scrubs at his eyes with the heel of his hand.
“So no,” he says quietly, forcing the words out. “I don’t get to stop. Not until he’s in a cell waiting for death row, no matter how crazy that son of a bitch is.”
“You want me to prove his sanity,” I say, swallowing.
“Pretty much.” He starts toward the door. “Don’t fucking disappoint.”
“Detective,” I say, my voice rising. “I’m sorry for your loss. I know how grief can eat someone alive.”
“Yeah,” he says, waving without looking back as he opens the door. “Sometimes the ones we lose are the ones we fail to love the most.”
The door slams shut.
I stand there, staring at a single dot on the wall in front of me. For several minutes, my mind goes completely still. No noise. No patterns forming. No pieces trying to fit where they don’t belong.
Just emptiness.
Eventually, I force myself to move. I walk back into the living room, welcoming the noise of the space—anything to fill my head again.
It is easier that way.
When your mind is loud, there is no room for the thoughts that keep you awake at night.