Page 17 of Girl, Sought

‘Not really. The other two librarians are newbies. It’s only me and Ellie that have been here for years.’

‘Got it. If you think of anything else, please give us a call.’ The card trembled between her fingers as she handed it over, the adrenaline starting to spike. This was it. Their first solid lead. Maybe their only lead, if the state of Eleanor's records was anything to go by.

Luca fell into step beside her as they left the library, pushed out into the late afternoon gray. Rain had been and gone, but the air tasted of an impending storm.

‘Expensive suit, cheap shoes,’ Luca mused. ‘Sounds like somebody's trying awful hard to be something he's not.’

‘Trying and failing. What kind of collector wears a designer suit with Payless specials?’

‘Maybe someone who’s not a collector at all. Someone posing as a boyfriend, maybe. You thinking what I’m thinking?’

‘I’m thinking a lot of things. Is this a jilted lover? A jealous collector? Someone who purposely got close to Eleanor to steal one of her dolls? Maybe to sell it on?’

‘Come on, Ell. There’s no financial motivation here. If there was, he’d have raided that whole collection.’

The image of Eleanor Calloway, surrounded by her precious dolls, refused to budge. It clung to her like a bloodstain that wouldn’t vanish with a thousand washes. Their killer was out there, wearing his human mask, blending into the backdrop of everyday life.

But now at least she had a thread to pull.

'True. But that gives me an idea. Come on, let's go back to the precinct.'

CHAPTER EIGHT

Alfred Finch loved his bugs more than he'd ever loved a woman. The thought struck him as he adjusted the Hercules Beetle's position in its display case for the fourth time that evening. Forty years of marriage to the insect kingdom had spoiled him for human companionship.

People were messy, unpredictable. Insects followed rules. Beautiful, precise rules that worked like tiny clockwork.

His living room was a temple to the order Insecta. Glass cases lined every wall in perfect geometric patterns. Butterflies spread their wings like stained glass in a cathedral. Rhinoceros beetles posed with horns raised, caught forever in displays of aggression. Chilean rose tarantulas curled their legs in eternal sleep. Each specimen is perfectly positioned and preserved. His pride and joy - a Goliath Bird-Eating Spider - commanded attention from its custom-built hexagonal case.

This was how you measured a life, Alfred thought. In millimeters between pins. In the precise angle of antennae. In the way light catches compound eyes that will never see again.

Alfred's reflection ghosted across the glass as he made his rounds. At fifty-one, his hair had gone the color of old paper, and his face had more lines than a topographical map. But his hands remained steady as a surgeon's. You needed steady hands in this business. One slip while mounting a specimen could destroy thousands of dollars of work.

Decades of this work had afforded him a strange mothball smell that he couldn’t shed no matter how many new clothes he brought. He wore death like a comfortable old coat. It was his life. His legacy. Collecting. Categorizing. Pinning the once-living behind glass and labeling their corpses with a Latin name and a date. Like that made it science instead of an obsession.

But tonight, this obsession was paying off. Some fellow he'd met on a collector's forum was coming to buy his most prized specimen. His white whale in chitin armor - theSaltoblattella montistabularis. An African roach so rare it didn't even have an English name. They’d talked briefly on the phone and arranged a meeting today. The collector had said he’d bring the payment in cash.

Truthfully, Alfred didn’t want to part with his beloved roach, but getting this thing had cost him two marriages and most of his retirement fund. Worth every penny? Maybe, but financial woes had crept up over the years, and maintaining a collection like this was a pricey habit. He thought he could get seventy grand alone for the roach, and then a collector had swooped out of the sky and offered him a hundred grand.

Alfred loved hisSaltoblattella montistabularis,but a hundred grand could get him a lot more insects – and maybe fun a few expeditions to the caves of South America.There were species over there that hadn't seen light since the dinosaurs died. Virgin territory for a man with the right equipment and expertise.

The doorbell chimed.

Alfred's heart kicked against his ribs. Show time. He smoothed his cardigan, checked his teeth in a glass case's reflection. First impressions mattered in the collecting world. Like recognized like.

Alfred cracked the door, the chain still latched. Couldn’t be too careful in this eat-or-be-eaten world.

‘Mr. Finch?’ The man's voice oozed like motor oil. ‘I'm here about the roach.’

Alfred nodded, slid back the chain. ‘Of course. Come in. Mr. Jones, was it?’

‘Yes. Call me Peter.’

The man on his doorstep wore Armani like it was a costume. Brown hair, clean-shaven, everything screaming old money except those cheap shoes that looked fresh off the Walmart rack. His hands caught Alfred's attention immediately - soft and uncalloused, like he'd never handled a net or specimen pin in his life.

Warning bells chimed in Alfred's head, quiet but insistent. Field collectors had rough hands. Lab workers had chemical stains. This man's fingers looked like they'd never touched anything more strenuous than a computer keyboard.

Alfred ushered him across the threshold, noting the leather briefcase clutched tight in one pale hand.

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