Page 11 of The Girl He Crowned

Take Melody. Hewas watching her carefully, talking casually to her friends about how happyeverything in her life was. That was a lie, for a start. Her familyrelationships were anythingbuthappy. He’d found that out firsthand.Then there was the question of how she lied in her marriage, saying that shewas at work, when actually she was here, or occasionally at the apartments of asuccession of men…

She was more thanworthy of his attention, as the others had been. Debbie Danton had built awhole career on carefully crafted lies sold over the internet. Siobhan Maratyhad lied for money, selling gilded stories in place of the truth about anythingher clients paid her to, not caring about the manipulations she inflicted on othersfor a second.

Without truth, howcould the world fit together the way it should, each piece performing itsfunction, the whole running smoothly? In a world filled with lies, it seemed tohim that all was chaos, and he could not allow such chaos to persist.

When his list hadcome to him, he knew that he had to do this.

That was why, whenMelody Smythe got up to leave, he followed her, walking several yards behindher through the streets of Eddis, trying to stay far enough back that he wouldnot be spotted. The erratic way in which she went from store to store, lookingfor new ways in which to spend her husband’s money, made it harder to followher discretely. He could not predict her path as neatly as he would have liked,certainly not as neatly as he had with the others.

They at least hadthe decency to have a regular routine, something that he could make use of inthe course of his work.

He followed her alittle further, and when Melody cut through a deserted street, it occurred tohim that he might have his chance. He could kill her here, simply walk up andstrangle her with his bare hands.

That wasn’t hischosen method, though, and it seemed important to him tostickto hischosen method. Anything else risked disruption, even chaos. It would certainlyintroduce a greater chance of getting caught. No, his chosen approach hadworked perfectly so far, and had sent the message that he wanted to send, evenas he did what he had to do. He wasn’t going to throw that away just to snatchsome half chance that might or might not pay off.

He continued tofollow Melody instead. When she circled back to her car, a small but expensiveEuropean coupe, that was ok, because he’d already parked close to her. It waseasy enough to slip behind the wheel of his own vehicle and follow a discretedistance behind.

She was headinghome now. Home to the expensive house in the suburbs. Home to the safety offour walls and a high gate. Except… was it truly safety, or was that anotherkind of lie?

As she pulled intothe driveway, he kept driving past, but his eyes were firmly on the house as heassessed, trying to decide just how secure it actually was. This was anenvironment where his quarry would be alone for large portions of the day, anenvironment where her guard would be down, and there would be few interruptionsfrom outside.

Of course, therewere problems with such an approach in the form of security systems and lockeddoors, but it occurred to him that a security system would not be armed all thetime, and a locked door… well, picking a lock was something that required onlyprecision and patience. He had both of those in abundance.

The beginnings ofa plan started to take shape in his mind as he drove. Any security issues werejust a set of problems to be overcome. After he did so… well, he would be alonewith Melody Smythe in an environment he could control, where they would not beinterrupted.

Assuming that hetimed this right, everything should fall into place, and he was good with precisetiming. As for Melody Smythe, from the moment that he’d set eyes on her, hertime had already begun to run out. He had a pendulum waiting, just for her.

It was time forher to die.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Paige had expectedthe conversation with the construction boss overseeing work on the bridge to bea brief one on the phone. She’d expected that Christopher would come back aftera few minutes and have an answer one way or another. It hadn’t worked out likethat, though.

Instead, she andChristopher were currently parking outside a fast food restaurant slightly awayfrom the center of town. Even this seemed more upmarket than it might have beenoutside Eddis, its signs advertising authentic German street food. Paige wasn’teven sure quite what that meant.

She guessed thatshe was going to find out, even if this whole business of meeting at arestaurant seemed slightly strange. She got out of the car, heading for the doorto the restaurant, but Christopher shook his head as they approached.

“Mr. Willis saidto meet him in an alley around back,” he said, turning away from the door and headingfor the mouth of an alley at the side of the business instead.

“He wants to meetus in analley?” Paige said with a frown. That didn’t seem at all usualto her. In fact, it sent up a whole bunch of red flags for her. An alley seemedlike a spot for an ambush, not the kind of place where you would want to meetup with the FBI if there were another option available. Almost unconsciously,Paige found herself checking the presence of the Glock at her side.

“It should be ok,”Christopher said. “He’s just worried about being seen. He sounded prettynervous on the phone.”

That struck Paigeas more than a little odd. What would make someone scared just to talk to thetwo of them in a town like Eddis, where so much seemed so perfect? Why wouldanyone hold back from helping with an investigation that was trying to catch aserial killer. Paige couldn’t quite understand it, but she was determined to becareful now.

She moved forwardcautiously into the alley with Christopher, looking around for any sign of theambush she still feared might be coming in spite of Christopher’s briefreassurance.

The alley wasdingy and dirty in a way that was almost a relief after the cleanliness and expenseof so much of the rest of the town. Yet it also served to emphasize what astrange situation Paige was stepping into, and just how many dangerous cornerseven a town like Eddis could have. If she didn’t have Christopher to back herup here, she might not have made her way into the alley at all.

There was an SUVwaiting at one end of the alley, behind the restaurant, next to a couple ofdumpsters. It had tinted windows, so that Paige couldn’t see inside. With everystep she took forward, she found herself worrying that at any moment, someonemight come out of that SUV to attack.

Maybe the killerhad heard they were there, and had decided to eliminate the people hunting forhim.

She could feel thenerves rising in her, to such an extent that when the driver’s side dooropened, Paige almost drew her weapon on instinct, ready to fight. She had toforce herself not to react as a large man stepped out of the SUV, lookingaround nervously behind dark wraparound glasses.

He was a little tallerthan Christopher, perhaps in his late thirties, and heavily muscled under acouple of layers of fat. He was wearing a blue work shirt with the sleevesrolled up to the elbows to reveal the corded muscles of his forearms, jeans,and work boots that still had the dust of a construction site on them. Paigewondered if that was from the bridge project, or if he was managing more thanone construction site.

“Are you the FBI?”he asked, sounding slightly doubtful about it. His nervousness made Paige lookaround warily, still half convinced that this was a trick.

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