Page 79 of Girl, Undone
His office held the last pieces of his existence in Cedarburg.He would head there, take whatever he could get his hands on, and flee into the night.He cared not for his home.After all, it was merely a rented property that simply served as a secondary hideout after his office.Once he'd gathered his things, he would drive – drive until the city lights were nothing but a distant memory, until the roads no longer bore names, until he could vanish into obscurity.The police might learn his real name, but they'd never find him.
Maxwell Tanner, a future legend in the annals of psychological research, would live to scheme another day.But tonight, he had to disappear with minimal trace.He couldn’t help but recall the memories and achievements of the past few days.Four, arguably five victims, and each one had been a chapter in a thesis of terror that he had authored with scientific integrity.His deep dive into the caverns of human fear had breached boundaries that traditional psychology dared not even approach.This was psychology unbound by ethics and unchained from the constraints of academia.He’d jumped in where angels – and traditional psychologists – feared to tread.
And it had all been worth it.
Maxwell Tanner's breath hung in the air as he reached into his pocket for his car keys.He was ready to vanish into the oblivion that waited beyond the shadow of Helmsley Bridge when a sound, artificial amidst this cloak of nature, drew his attention.
Maxwell's world expanded violently as he spun around.
His heart plummeted into an abyss.
Fury surged through him.Panic, a sensation he had so often observed with clinical detachment in his subjects, now ensnared and squeezed him with suffocating force.
It was her.
The cop.The one from the group session.The one who'd confessed her fear of needles while Maxwell took mental notes and planned his final experiment.
‘Your game is over, Maxwell,’ she said.
***
‘Drop the gun,’ Ella demanded.
She had him in her sights.Maxwell Tanner.The genius.The researcher.The man who thought he'd cracked the code on human fear.
He was leaving here in cuffs or a body bag.Those were the only options left.
‘You.How?How did you find me?’
Ella didn't falter.Maxwell Tannner, so used to being the observer, was now the observed, and Ella let him stew in that experience.It was the same one he'd instilled in Julia, Tom, Rebecca, and Derek.Time to turn the tables on this psychopath and show him that he wasn't as smart as he thought.
‘I said drop the gun,’ Ella said.
Her sight was locked on his chest, and if Maxwell tried anything, she’d put a bullet in him.His body language told her there were no pressurized limbs ready to spring a sudden movement.
Maxwell's pistol hand slowly raised, and then, inch by inch, he turned the gun on himself.
Ella swallowed hard.
It was a move she hadn’t anticipated.
‘I know you want me alive,’ Maxwell said.
‘I don’t care,’ Ella lied.An alive suspect was preferable, but a dead one was a close second.
‘Then tell me how you found me, before I pull the trigger.’
Ella didn’t have time to give a lecture.All she cared about was putting this case behind her.‘Because you screwed up,’ she said.
Maxwell’s mouth twitched.He pushed the gun barrel into his temple.‘No I didn’t.I didn’t screw up.’
‘The group.The Scarecrow app.You told me where you worked because you thought I was a potential victim.You tried to give me poisoned coffee.You called me Miss Dark when I never told you my real name.You gave me your burner cell’s number and pretended it was Derek’s.Need I go on?’
‘Yes.’
‘The person who did this knew about my needle phobia, which limited it to a select few people.Oh, and Lily.I was at the group session when she mentioned her fear of heights.’
‘You think you've won?You think capturing me changes anything?’
