5. How to Bargain with Your Stalker
HOW TO BARGAIN WITH YOUR STALKER
Hazel
There’s a teddy bear on my bed. A little teddy bear that would be cute and adorable if only it was there when I left.
I knew Flynn had been here. The hairs on the back of my neck told me before I even opened the front door and saw the note with the new alarm code. The teddy pretty much confirms it though.
I let my bag slip off my shoulder and onto the rug at the end of my bed. My eyes skate over the room as I walk around it nice and slow. I poke the bathroom door open with my toe. It’s empty. “Bedroom clear,” I mutter like I’m an FBI agent before approaching the teddy as if it’s a bomb.
If you ignore that Flynn broke into my house to deliver it, the teddy is actually very cute. A purple bow is tied around the little guy’s neck with a tag attached to it. I reach out and flip the name tag over in my fingers.
Teddy Bundy.
I snort despite myself, then feel awful because puns about serial killers should not be funny.
Flynn breaking into my house again is not funny and presents from serial killers are creepy not endearing.
Sure, it starts off with teddy bears but before you know it, there’ll be a heart in a box on your pillow and sleeping will be nothing but a distant memory you look back on fondly in your nightmare ridden nights of insomnia.
I slip my phone out of my pocket and type a message to my new stalker.
Hazel
You’re not funny.
Dexter
Then why did you laugh?
I start typing out a defense when my fingers stall on the screen. Tingles spread across my shoulders. He wouldn’t… but then, how did he know I laughed?
I look around the room again, searching the shelves of the bookcase and the corners of the ceiling.
Hazel
Did you put cameras in my house, Flynn?
Dexter
Yes.
My hand tightens around my phone and I’m pressing the call button before my brain can communicate to me just how bad of an idea that is.
Rule #1 of being stalked: Don’t call your stalker.
Flynn picks up on the first ring.
“Hazel.” The way he says my name shudders through me—which is because I’m cold and so not because the deep timbre of his voice makes my bones melt.
“You can’t put cameras in my house, Flynn,” I hiss.
He doesn’t respond so I keep going. “It’s illegal. It’s immoral. It’s intrusive and rude and—” I break off and screw my eyes shut. “And you don’t care about any of those things.”
“I care about you,” Flynn says.
“If that’s true, you’ll tell me where the cameras are.”
“Bedroom, kitchen, living area, your old room, front and back door,” Flynn rattles off the locations like he’s ticking off a list with his fingers.
I grip the phone tight and trace my eyes over the room, searching the shelves and the desk by the door for anything out of place. “Turn them off. Please.”
The line goes quiet. “Okay.”
I blink. “Uh, thank you.”
“Want to hear a joke?”
I hang up and drop my phone on the bed. Then I stand in the middle of my room trying to figure out what just happened because that was way too easy. Why would he agree to just turn the cameras off? He could be lying I guess or…
I snatch my phone back up, my heart kicking into overdrive.
Hazel
What are you doing right now?
Dexter
Walking to your place.
Hazel
No.
Dexter
If you won’t let me use the cameras, we’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way.
Hazel
I’ll call the police.
Dexter
But then our date would be a little crowded.
I pull up the dial screen and type in 911.
The man every police officer in Seattle is looking for is about to be at my house.
They’d have a whole squad here in minutes.
But the call Wright got earlier plays in my mind.
Every single person Flynn’s killed deserved it.
I’m not sure I have it in me to turn him in and I really, really don’t want him coming to my house.
Hazel
Turn the cameras back on.
Dexter
Why?
Hazel
I have something to say.
I give him a few moments then I do a slow spin. “Fuck you, Flynn,” I shout at the walls like a madwoman. “You can keep your damn cameras on but stay away from my house.” I hold up my phone, my thumb hovering over the green button. “If I see you, I swear to god I’ll call the police.”
Dexter
I think I like you when you’re loud. Don’t forget to eat dinner x
A frustrated scream tears out of me, and I spend the next hour dismantling my house and climbing on furniture to try and find the blasted cameras.
I’m balancing on the back of the couch, looking inside the light shade, when my phone pings again.
Dexter
Get down from there. Right. Now.
I clench my teeth and jump back onto the seat cushions.
Hazel
You don’t get to tell me what to do.
Dexter
Clearly, or you’d be eating dinner by now instead of trying to kill yourself.
An image of me falling, my neck snapping against the floor flicks into my mind.
Young woman found dead in bungalow, cause of death: couch.
I slump down onto the cushions and drag my hand through my bangs, which get progressively wavier as the day goes on.
Hazel
Can you stop caring about my well-being? It’s confusing.
Dexter
No.
I tuck my feet up underneath me and try to ignore how my heart squeezes. All the energy leaves me in a rush, and I give up on my search.
Hazel
Will you turn the cameras off again?
Hazel
Please.
I chew on my lip as the three dots appear.
Dexter
They’re off. Now eat some food, Hazel.
I let out a breath. Maybe I’m being na?ve but for the sake of my own sanity I choose to believe my new stalker has done as I asked. My stomach rumbles then and I decide to hate Flynn a little more.
I slide off the couch onto the floor like jelly then drag myself up and walk through the arch into the kitchen. I don’t actually think I have any food, so I don’t know whether to cry or have a heart attack when I open the refrigerator.
It’s fully stocked. The drawers packed full of fresh fruit and veg, half a dozen microwave meals stacked on the shelves. I stand there, bathed in the refrigerator light, my brain glitching. Then I pick up my phone.
Hazel
You bought me food?
Dexter
Yes.
I stare at his answer. One word Flynn confuses me. It’s like in his mind the answer is really that simple. I needed food, so he got me groceries.
Hazel
I’m not saying thank you.
Dexter
What do you call a person who only eats tinned food?
Dexter
… A can-nibal.
I laugh a little, then scowl and put my phone face down on the old wooden dining table. It feels like I maybe shouldn’t trust the guy who broke into my house to not have tampered with the food, so I pick the pre-packaged mac and cheese and check the seals.
I put it in the oven because I saw on some cooking show that they’re better that way and then I head back to my room.
Teddy Bundy smiles up at me.
I debate going to stay the night at Wright’s but it’s dark out now and I can just imagine how me turning up on her doorstep would go.
Hey, so you know that serial killer who escaped from Drayford? Well he climbed in through my bedroom window last night. Long story short, I threatened him with my vibrator, we bonded over hot chocolate and Friends, but now he’s put cameras all over my house, so mind if I crash at yours tonight?
Not to mention the last time I went to Wright about a guy she almost killed him.
“Ugh.” I faceplant onto my bed, which makes Teddy Bundy fall onto his side. I place him upright, his fur soft under my fingers. I run my thumb up and down the little guy, trying not to find him annoyingly adorable.
I’m pretty confident Flynn’s not watching right now because I feel like, if he was, he’d be gloating.
Just to be sure though, I haul my comforter off the bed and carry the bundle into my tiny ensuite.
It didn’t escape my notice that neither of the bathrooms were included in Flynn’s list of camera locations and for some reason I really believe that’s a line he wouldn’t cross.
The bathroom is so small there’s barely any room to actually sit so I dump my comforter, then grab some pillows and my laptop and make myself a little nest in the shower. It’s not till I’m settled, with my laptop resting on my knees, deep in an article about Flynn, that I remember my food.
“Shit,” I swear as I scramble out of my shower-nest, stubbing my toe on the metal lip and then hopping the rest of the way to the kitchen.
The acrid scent of burnt cheese catches in my throat and I cough on the smoke that billows out when I open the oven.
I stare forlornly at the charred top of the mac and cheese, but my gran firmly believed that we don’t waste food, so I scoop the pasta into a bowl and take a bite.
It’s cold in the middle. But I’m starving so I decide to risk it.
I grab a fork and take my sorry excuse for a meal back to my shower-nest, balancing the bowl on a pillow and eating with one hand while I continue with my research.
Flynn was an up-and-coming photographer, his photos had been displayed in a bunch of different galleries before he was even twenty. There are dozens of articles about his arrest.
The Vigilante Choker Unmasked: All-star Seattle photographer confesses to seven murders.
Why the Vigilante Choker handed himself in: A psychologist’s theories.
Murderer or Hero: The full list of the Vigilante Choker’s victims and their crimes.
I click on the last article and start reading. It shows candid photos of each of the men Flynn killed along with details about their alleged crimes.
None of them were convicted criminals but their bodies were all found with damning evidence.
His first victim, Tyler Palmer was found lying on top of victim statements accusing him of rape and sexual assault.
The article says that the victims all later withdrew their statements but seemingly only after receiving threats and financial settlements from Palmer’s lawyers.
Evidence of those threats were found next to Palmer’s body.
The next victim, Randall Leewood, was discovered on top of a shallow grave of a missing sixteen-year-old girl. They later found traces of his DNA on and in her body. The details are horrific, and the mac and cheese curdles in my stomach.
I put the bowl aside and keep reading.
Maybe Flynn’s a monster, but I don’t think there’s a decent person in the world that wouldn’t argue the men he killed were worse.
I go back to google and find an article following his trial. It made papers across the world because of how he handed himself in. The police were chasing their tails until Flynn walked into the station one day and confessed.
Is the Vigilante Choker really crazy: A breakdown of the insanity defense.
The article outlines the M’Naghten rule, which states the defendant must meet one of two criteria to be deemed not guilty by reason of insanity. Either being unable to differentiate right from wrong or unable to perceive the nature of the act they committed.
Flynn may be a sociopath, but I don’t need to be a psychiatrist to know that he knew exactly what he was doing. The evidence he left of his victims’ crimes should have been proof enough, but I guess having the top lawyer in the city as your brother comes in handy when you’re convicted of murder.
The article paints a pretty damning picture of how the prosecutor fell apart and Flynn’s lawyer got the jury on side. Turns out it’s not too hard convincing twelve strangers that you’re not the bad guy when the people you’ve killed hurt innocent women.
There’s a video clip of Flynn on the stand, looking far too dapper in his suit, a sheepish smile on his face. He looks about as far from a serial killer as you can get. I catch myself tracing the cursor over the slight dimple in his cheek and quickly close the tab because that’s insane behavior.
Three signs you’re crushing on an inappropriate guy:
1. You don’t call the police when he puts cameras in your house.
2. You think a photo of him on trial for murder is cute.
3. You spend all evening trying to find reasons he’s not so bad.
The thing is Flynn’s murders don’t make sense.
Every article I’ve found says the only thing connecting the victims is that they were all rapists.
Flynn got his name, the Vigilante Choker, because of it, but how did he know?
Each of the victims was found with evidence of their crimes but until then, they were model citizens.
Lawyers and business managers, even a surgeon.
So how did Flynn know to look at those particular men?
Then there’s his latest victim. Garret Sleet.
Unlike the others, Sleet had been convicted of his crimes.
So why did Flynn go after him? It wasn’t just a crime of convenience, Flynn wouldn’t have been caught if he didn’t hand himself in.
There are dozens of rapists walking free in Seattle, but Flynn confessed and then rigged the trial so he’d be committed to the same psych hospital as Garret Sleet.
I don’t think his victims are random. I think Flynn has a list.
I pull up the article with profiles of all his victims. They’re the sort of men that went to fancy colleges on their parents’ dime, doing well in the world because they started three rungs higher than everyone else.
I don’t really know what I’m looking for, internet sleuthing is more Olivia’s jam than mine, but I keep scrolling until something catches my eye.
Garret Sleet’s mug shot. He’s holding the placard with his details in front of his chest but it’s the tattoo on the inside of his wrist that has my attention. Guys like that don’t normally have ink in places that show.
I zoom in and my gut twists. Uneasy familiarity grows like weeds in the pit of my stomach.
I go back to the photos of the other victims, scanning through each one more carefully this time.
There’s nothing obvious so I google each of them individually, scrolling through the bank of photos that appear.
I strike gold with an Instagram photo of Randall Leewood.
He’s lounging by the pool and there, cutting into the waistband of his trunks, is the same tattoo.
A snake in the shape of an S coiling around a calligraphic K. My heart beats in my ears. Loud, deep rushes.
I know that tattoo.