Page 48 of Girl, Haunted

‘Hangers, listen up, because I’m only going to say this once. Shit got realat Shadowland tonight. I’m talkingreal.’

Luca felt a shiver shimmy down his spine. The hell was this guy talking about?

‘Sorry, right, so Shadowland. It’s a new haunted house around here. I was going to break in, do a solo haunt like I did in the last vid, but while I was scoping the place out, I saw this guy in a mask run out. Just like, totally haul ass. It freaked me out, seriously.’

The video cut off with the abruptness of a guillotine blade. Frozen on Langley's mug, terror etched into every pimple and pore. Luca checked the date the video was uploaded. Two nights ago. The same night, Natasha Langston was killed in that very building.

Luca remained calm. He gave his mind a second to process everything and arrived at two potential conclusions.

Number one: this vlogger, this discount douchebag, might've stumbled ass-backward into their killer. Seen him in the flesh lived to monetize the tale.

Number two: HangingLangley, whoever he might be, had something to do with these murders and was doing his best to cover his ass.

It was too perfect. Too neat. Like the universe had decided to gift-wrap a killer and drop him right in Luca's lap. And that's what scared him most of all.

Because in all his years of studying the human mind, of peeling back the layers of trauma and neurosis, Luca had learned one immutable truth: the world was chaos. Messy, unpredictable, resistant to the neat categorizations and diagnoses that people like him tried to impose upon it.

So why did this feel so scripted?

What if this vlogger asshole was casing the joints, learning their layouts and using these stupid videos as justifications for him being at least two crime scenes?

Whatever it was, he needed to track down HangingLangley.

But first, he needed his partner.

Luca rushed to the door, peered his head around the corridor and shouted, ‘Ell! Where the hell are you?’

CHAPTER TWENTY

‘What?’ Ella asked. Luca’s manic tone had summoned her from the other end of the precinct back into her office.She'd spent the last two hours putting out and dodging verbal bullets from every disgruntled business owner in town. Between the irate haunt owners, the apoplectic mayor, and the general public's sudden fascination with pitchforks, she was running on fumes.

‘Ell, I think I've got something. You’re not gonna believe this.’ The words tumbled out like a verbal avalanche. Ella couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Luca so hyper.

'Hit me. Every haunt is closed down, but that doesn't mean our guy isn't going to strike.'

‘HangingLangley,’ Luca blurted, like that explained everything.

Ella blinked. ‘Bless you?’

‘No, no. HangingLangley. He's this vlogger, a real piece of work. But get this – he's got videos of himself trying to break into Shadowland and the Crypt of Despair. Right before the murders.’

Ella felt her blood pressure spike. She leaned over Luca's shoulder and squinted at his laptop screen. Sure enough, there was a string of videos, each thumbnail more clickbaity than the last.

‘Who is this guy?’

'I don't know, but in this one video, he's talking about seeing a masked man run out of Shadowland. The same night Natasha Langston died.'

‘He was at Shadowland the same night?’

Luca pointed to the screen. ‘Look at the date and tell me I’m making this up.’

Ella double-checked her partner's maths. 'You're right. What's this guy look like?'

‘Tall and gangly, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

‘That’s exactly what I was thinking.’ Ella jumped to her laptop with renewed focus. The world of pissed-off business owners suddenly seemed a million miles away. ‘Let’s find this guy’s real name.’

‘It’s Carter Langley. It’s right here in his description.’

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