Page 19 of Girl, Haunted

Redmond’s expression fell faster than a corpse in concrete shoes. ‘How do you know? Couldn’t this just be two and done?’

‘It’s possible, but we have to work on the assumption he has victims in mind.’ Ella mentally rifled through historic cases of mission-oriented offenders; David Berkowitz, Rodney Alcala, Joseph Paul Franklin. She’d never heard of one that stopped at two. ‘Killers like this view their murders as necessary, sometimes even noble. He’s trying to say something, cleanse something. We just need to figure out what.’

The sheriff clawed at his bushy beard. He looked like he’d aged a decade in the past few minutes. ‘This is just what we need. Real scares to go with the fake ones. The ghost folk around here are going to eat this up.’

Ella took one last look at the scene and concluded that there wasn’t much else to see here. No CCTV, no witnesses, no shortage of hiding places. Just one unlocked entrance that anyone could have breached.

She asked, ‘What’s the population around here, Sheriff?’

‘Twelve-hundred last time I checked. Minus two.’

Ella did the napkin math. The director had told her to keep this case close to the chest, but small towns offered an advantage cities didn’t. In New York, neighbors wouldn’t piss on you if youwere on fire, but towns like this? They were full of busybodies and gossipers and curtain-twitchers. Which meant someone knew this killer.

'Get the news out there,' she said. 'Newspapers, websites. Hell, sky write it if you have to. I want everybody in Yamhill to know what happened here.'

Sheriff Redmond's bushy eyebrows shot north. ‘You kidding? That’s asking for a whole lotta attention.’

‘Uh, Ell?’ Luca this time. ‘Edis told us to keep a lid on this.’

Ella waved off their concerns. ‘Yes he did, but if our killer’s a local, and chances are he is, someone knows him. A town this small? I’d bet my ass that everyone knows everyone’s dirty laundry.’

‘It’s true,’ Redmond admitted grudgingly. ‘Can’t sneeze without half the town offering you a tissue.’

‘Exactly. And if we’ve got someone with a vendetta against haunted houses, someone will know him. Besides, people don’t just wake up one day and decide to kill two people. Our guy’s in the system somewhere.’

Redmond still looked skeptical, but he nodded slowly. ‘Alright, I’ll put the word out.’

‘Great. Just keep the finer details to ourselves. Now, we need to check out crime scene number one. Is it far?’

‘Couple of miles,’ the sheriff said. ‘You can follow me.’

The thrill of the hunt burned in her veins. Two bodies, two haunted houses, one psychopath playing puppeteer with the Grim Reaper.

Time to cut those strings.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Screamatorium had seen better days. That was clear the second Ella set foot inside the joint. If Shadowland was the shiny new Cadillac of haunted houses, this place was a rusted-out Ford Pinto ready to burst into flames at the slightest provocation. Sheriff Redmond led Ella and Luca through a maze of rooms that seemed to be sorely lacking in the realism department.

‘Quite a change from Shadowland,’ Ella said as she eyed a barrel full of red liquid. It looked more like cherry cough syrup than blood, but then again, maybe that was the point. Nothing said 'terror' quite like the threat of a Robitussin overdose.

‘This place has been here donkey’s years. Oldest attraction in town. I guess it hasn’t been updated much.’

They moved into the next room, a Victorian nightmare complete with a claw-foot bathtub that looked like it had hosted its fair share of dismemberments. A mannequin of an old woman lay in a four-poster bed beside a grandfather clock that had frozen at three o’clock.

But it was the antique porcelain doll sitting on a dusty shelf that caught Ella's attention. Its pale, cracked face was frozen in a perpetual smile, and its eyes gleamed an unsettling crimson. The doll seemed out of place among the cobwebs and decay, too pristine, too carefully positioned. It was like a single red rose in a bouquet of dead flowers.

‘Huh,’ Luca said, leaning in for a closer look as they passed it by. ‘Animatronics. Seems a bit sophisticated for this place.’

‘Agreed,’ Ella said. She followed Redmond into the next room and felt like she'd stumbled into some demented farmer's twisted harvest festival. Pumpkins dominated the space, but they were far from regular jack-o’-lanterns. These monstrositiesranged from tiny to colossal, all boasting razor-sharp grins and downturned eyes.

In the corner of the room stood a scarecrow draped in a black robe, but where its head should be, a massive pumpkin sat instead. Just like the porcelain doll, the scarecrow’s eyes flashed red in a choppy rhythm.

Next followed a clown room, complete with a moving head that reminded Ella of John Wayne Gacy. Then an undead room, and finally, a room with no particular theme. It was as ordinary as white bread, with piles of crates stacked in one corner like a half-assed attempt at Jenga. A sign hung above the exit, proudly proclaiming ‘CONGRATULATIONS - YOU'VE SURVIVED’ in garish neon letters.

Beside it, a cymbal-clanging monkey leered at them with another set of flashing red peepers.

And there, in the center of the room, was the main attraction. A dark stain marred the floorboards. Ella didn’t need the sheriff to tell her what it was.

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