Page 45 of Girl, Sought

‘I already told you twice.’

‘So tell me three times.’

‘Fine. The bathroom break wasn't exactly a cover story. Four cups of coffee will do that to you. But I knew Vanessa wasn’t going to comply, so I took matters into my own hands.’

‘You took a risk.’

‘I took a leak. On the way back, I checked the other two offices on the row. One had nothing in. The other.’ He pulled out his phone and swiped through photos. ‘That's when I saw these.’

Masks. Seven of them in a neat row.

But it wasn’t enough to make a connection.

‘Hawkins, these masks look nothing like the one our killer wore.’

‘So? How do we know he doesn’t just have a mask fetish? Maybe he has a huge collection of different styles?’

‘Because our killer wears these masks for a reason. He doesn’t just stockpile them. And heknowsthat we’d see that footage from Finch’s breeding room, so you think he’s dumb enough to broadcast his mask fetish to the cops?’

‘That’s assuming that we made the connection between the killer and the appraisal firm. Our unsub thinks he’s way smarter than us, remember?’

Ella began to pace the room. ‘Alright, what happened after you saw the masks?’

‘I slipped inside, took some photos, found a locked drawer with a bunch of trinkets in. Watches, jewelry, ornaments, that kind of thing.’

She knew her unsub was a collector, but she wasn’t sure if his collecting habits extended beyond the single prize pieces that he stole from each scene. He might have taken trinkets from his victims, but one of the problems with dead bodies was that, unless it was a limb, you never knew what was missing.

‘How many trinkets?’

‘I don’t know. Twenty? Fifty?’

‘Well, what is it? Twenty or fifty? Because that’s a big jump.’

Luca asked, ‘Why does it matter?’

‘Because if this Gabriel Thorne person has been collecting trophies from victims going back years, then there’s a big difference between twenty and fifty victims. Fifty would put him as the third most prolific serial killer in America. Is that likely?’

Luca pulled up the pictures on his phone. ‘Here, look. I’m counting nearly thirty trinkets right there, and that’s just the top layer.’

Ella took it, inspected it, handed it back to him. ‘Wait a minute. If this drawer was locked, how’d you get in?’

‘Guitar string. Aggressive locksmithing.’

‘Did you at least lock it when you left?’

Luca bit his lip. His silence spoke volumes.

‘Fantastic. So not only did you break into a private office, you left evidence that someone had been through their stuff.’ She fought the urge to throw something. Preferably at his head. ‘What happened to being careful?’

‘In my defense, I was kind of in a hurry. Heard footsteps.’

‘That's not a defense, that's an aggravating factor. If this Thorne guy realizes someone went through his stuff-’

‘Then what? He files a police report? Calls the FBI to complain someone broke into his office full of murder trophies?’

'That's not the point, and you know it.' The headache building behind her eyes threatened to go nuclear. 'If he realizes law enforcement is onto him, he might accelerate his timeline. Kill again before we can stop him.'

'Hey, we got a lead, didn't we?' Luca gestured at the business card. 'Senior Acquisitions Specialist with a wall full of masks and a drawer full of suspicious jewelry. That's not exactly nothing. You said Vanessa said only three people have access to every client's records. If Thorne has an office on-site, chances are he's one of them, right?'

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