Page 150 of Unholy Bonds

I woke up with a yawn. Ryden lay on his stomach next to me, still asleep. Staring at my clock showed it was six in the morning. My body ached when I tried to stand up.

The Strangler was dead. I should have felt lighter, but something was bothering me. Now that I could think properly, I knew one thing. Logan didn’t look at me like he was in love with me. I saw his hatred when he looked at me, his disgust. Like I was the reason his life was… a fucking catastrophe.

That wasn’t love, the kind of love he spoke of in all those letters—obsessive, needy, consuming love.

If he could have, he would have killed me right there. So why didn’t he? What made him stop?

My disruptive thoughts were cut off by the ring of my phone. “Detective Rosario?”

“Doctor West, we need you at the ME office immediately.”

“What happened, Detective?”

“We found a dead body, and the circumstances… They’re not suitable for discussion over the phone.” He hung up before I could ask more. I woke Ryden and he yawned, rubbing his eyes.

“It’s Detective Rosario. He wants me to meet him at the ME office. They found a dead body,” I said with a frown. “Could it be… Logan?” I rubbed my forehead with a scowl.

“Let’s find out,” he said.

“I have to cover this,” I said, pointing to my jaw. I walked to the bathroom, and he followed me in. When I was done brushing, I grabbed the makeup kit and concealer and carefully applied it on my bruised jaw.

“How does it look?”

“It’s hidden. I don’t think anyone will notice.”

After we were done, he drove me to the ME office.

The place was already swarming with uniformed officers when we stopped just behind the crime scene tape. Lucy and the other employees of Coffee Connexion were staring at the scene, their faces pale.

I approached Detective Rosario and gasped when I took in the grisly sight before me.

On the bench, where I often took my lunch breaks, sat a dead body, perfectly poised, a gun in his hand. Not just any dead body—it was Logan Jones. My eyes widened, and my fingers trembled as I took a quick step back.

What kind of sick game was this? Who could have done this?

This is so fucking bad, Yara.

I killed him, and we left him buried in the marsh. Was I imagining this or was he here?

Logan was staring at me with lifeless eyes. He was like a ghost coming alive to torture me even after death.

Amy Walden gave me a worried look when she came out of the building with Detective Rishi Patel. He looked serious, and he came toward me as soon as he saw me. “The victim is Logan Jones, an artist at the gallery where Daphne Morgan was the director,” he said, fixing me with a steely gaze. “Dr. West, why did you run his fingerprints? Amy mentioned you brought in a dollar bill to test for prints, and the prints belonged to Logan Jones.”

Amy threw me an apologetic look. It was not her fault. I already knew this would come up as soon as I saw Logan’s body.

“He’s not just any victim, either. We also think he’s The Strangler,” Detective Rosario said as he stepped closer to me.

That was when I realized that I wasn’t the only ME at the scene. There was Doctor Kavya Metha, with her gloves on. I was asked here because they wanted to find out why I’d run a fingerprint search for Logan Jones. This was an interrogation. Maybe not formal, but it was.

“Are you sure he’s The Strangler? I checked his fingerprint because I saw him following me. I just wanted to make sure he wasn’t a threat.”

“He was definitely a threat,” Rishi said with a frown as he studied me with eyes that were so blatantly accusatory. He somehow knew I wasn’t telling the whole truth.

“He might have been stalking you because you were going to become his next tableau,” Detective Rosario said with a sigh. “Are you okay, Doctor West?”

“I am,” I said with a shudder. “How was he here?”

“We are assuming one of the women he tried to kill, killed him?” Agent Hayes said as Kavya Metha walked closer to Logan’s dead body, taking her scalpel out.

---