Chapter 11 Reed
Reed
The fire crackles, embers flying into the air as Candace clatters on her laptop. “That was a gimme target. You guys are going to need to step it up with the next one.”
“What you mean?” Cooper asks, rubbing his fingers through his blonde hairs, his eyes becoming transfixed on the wolf head taxidermy above the mantle.
“I mean that your next target is going to be an actual serial killer. Not an overweight sexual predator that can’t say no to a frosted biscuit. She’ll be a slight challenge, not a wobbly cupcake to be plucked off a bakery counter,” she smirks, typing furiously.
Thank God Cooper had it in him to strangle the Mayor. If he couldn’t do it, I would had to end him too. Right there on the lake.
It’s the code. The law. There is no room for weakness at Wolfston. No room for hesitation when your life is on the line. Mercy is a threat to us all. An opportunity to be exploited by those that want us dead.
But now he’s initiated. Guilty of blood spilled. Just like the rest of us. He doesn’t know that there is no going back now. He won’t be able to return to a normal life. We can’t risk it.
Moving forward, he has to learn how to hunt a hunter. It’s a whole different ball game. They are usually slippery and anticipating, waiting for their next target.
“She?” Cooper stutters, his smile fading.
“The Forest Siren,” Candace whispers, dangling her fingers in the air. “She’s been on our list for years. Too dangerous for us to take out solo, but since there’s two of you, it should be a piece of cake.”
“Can I sit this one out? I don’t think I feel comfortable killing a women yet…” Cooper says, his eyes looking toward mine.
Before I can speak, Candace interrupts. “Buttercup, you don’t get to choose your assignments. That’s my job. Maybe once you have a few more tongues under your belt we can talk. Capisce?”
“Candace, are you really going to give us one of the most psycho killers out there?” I ask, shaking my head.
“You betcha,” she says with a smirk that would put the devil to shame. “Consider it a couple’s retreat to beautiful Alaska.”
“Okay… tell us more about this Forest Siren. It’s been a few years since I’ve read about her patterns. Her modus operandi.”
“Okay,” she huffs, pulling out a file while clicking through a few webpages.
“So, first thing you need to know is that she loves dismemberment. Chainsaw, handsaw, butcher knife, you name it. She uses every tool in the book. The Siren loves chopping up every tiny bit of their arms and legs and spreading them through the forest branches like she’s preparing a charcuterie board for the grizzlies. ”
“She sounds considerate,” Cooper chimes in.
“Does she assault them?” I ask. “Any sexual sadism?”
“No,” Candace murmurs, reviewing the paper file. “She’s just fiercely passionate about killing men. Not a single woman is traced to her.”
“Mmmm this will be interesting,” I say, reviewing the manilla folder.
“Yeah, looks like she loooooves to entrap Caucasian men. You two won’t have a problem,” she snickers. “But a few of her victims have been Hispanic and Black. Probably whoever is an easy target.”
Cooper gulps. “So she’s basically Ted Bundy reincarnated.”
Candace grins large enough to move her eyes.
“Exactly. If Ted Bundy wore Dior and carried a handsaw at all times.
She slides a glossy photo across the coffee table.
It shows a forest clearing, littered with bones and moose skulls woven with human hair.
“Locals say she sings before she kills. Some soft, sweet lullaby that makes dumb hunters wander closer. Then she sews their mouth shut while she starts to julienne them alive.”
“Do you have a photo of her?” Cooper asks.
“Nope,” Candace responds.
“Then how do we know if it’s her?”
“By following her sweet lullabies, buttercup,” Candace chuckles.
She flips another page in the file, paper crinkling against her nails.
“The Forest Siren has been on our radar for years. Started with a few too many moose hunters going missing in Chugach State Park. Locals thought it was from grizzlies or a few dipshits falling into a ravine, until a couple of hikers found femur bones hanging from a cottonwood like Christmas ornaments.”
Candace taps another photo. “She just didn’t kill them and chop them, she organized them like they were in a play. Skulls perched on logs, like some kind of sick, twisted forest opera. She’s picky though. Never touches families, women, or kids. Only adult men—hunters, poachers, backwoods campers.”
“How’d she start?” Cooper asks.
Candace laughs, indulging in the horror.
“Oh, you’ll like this part. First suspected case was in 2014.
A park ranger found her old cabin, almost abandoned and soaked in crimson.
Inside they found the bones of her husband and brother, the flesh of their bones completely gone, like she made stew with their meat.
Rumor says her husband used to beat her after they moved to the forest. Guess the woods gave her clarity. ”
“How active is she?” I ask.
“She picks up in spring and then stops in the winter. The snow melts, the men enter the woods, and they never leave,” Candace smirks. “Can’t blame a women for protecting her territory. I kind of respect her in a noble, feminist way.”
“Yeah, but you can’t be out in the woods killing people for no reason,” I chime in, folding my arms.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah…” Candace shrugs. “Anyway, the locals say it’s seasonal work.
Six months of mayhem, and six months of hibernation.
Some people thought she passed since it was a quiet year, but last month two park rangers were found dead.
Their pickup truck was found smashed into a tree with blood smeared across the dashboard.
Their bodies weren’t found, but their vertebrae were strung together in two beautiful necklaces in the front seats. ”
Cooper’s face tightens. “Jesus Christ.”
“Don’t get holy on me,” Candace says. “She’d eat a priest if he wandered into her pines. But you have to give her credit. She’s an artist in her forest. She decides where the blood is spilled and the bones are placed.”
I skim the file. “But she’s never been spotted?”
“Oh, people claim they’ve seen her from the local police reports,” Candace says, her voice turning low.
“It’s always the same story—thin, young woman, in a pale beige parka, long black hair matted with pine needles, always humming a hymn.
They say she smells like sap and death. And she’s always singing some old song, whether she’s strikes or stalks. ”
Cooper’s eyes bulge. “You mean she sings while she kills?”
“Yeah, that’s what the locals say,” Candace says, grinning deviously. “Nobody that we know of has been able to survive her. So, if you hear that lullaby buttercup—you better run like your life depends on it.”
I shut the folder, my heart pumping with excitement. “Perfect. A homicidal siren with an artistic streak. Anything else we should know?”
Candace stretches her arms high above her head. “Only that she’s your next target, or you’ll both be her next victims. So, pack light, bring your sharpest scalpels, and a playlist that can drown out her singing. You’ll want the noise when she starts calling out.”