Authors: Elizabeth Heiter
Vanished (32 page)
“I guess that’s true. But does it really matter how he got them here?” Tanner demanded. “Shouldn’t we be more worried about finding him now?”
“If the UNSUB carried his victims a quarter of a mile, then he’s really strong. Carrying a grown woman’s dead weight would be unwieldy, especially if rigor mortis had set in.”
Interest sparked in Tanner’s eyes. “And?”
“And he’d have to be taller than his victims and weigh more. He had to know it was unlikely he’d be interrupted when he buried his victims, because if he was seen a quarter mile into the woods and the cops showed up, he’d be in trouble. How would he get away? And imagine how long this took him.” She gestured to Barbara, only partially dug out, even with three cops working.
When Tanner opened his mouth, she knew exactly what he was going to say, so she preempted him. “He
did
want to get away. People sometimes say serial killers try to get caught, but it’s usually bullshit. This guy is having fun. He doesn’t want to end up in handcuffs or with a bullet through his brain. He wants to get away with it. To keep killing.”
“Do you think he’s targeting the women in Bakersville exclusively?”
“I think he’s hunting where he lives.”
Tanner swayed, his expression queasy. “Bakersville is a small town, Agent Baine. I know pretty well everyone here.”
Bakersville was never going to be the same. She’d been to other small towns where the residents thought all serial killers looked like monsters, that no member of their community could hide such dark desires. Once upon a time, she’d lived in one.
And the monster there had ripped her life apart.
“The killer seems normal to everyone around him. He’s not a stranger. And he’s not an amateur. These aren’t his first murders.” Evelyn gave Tanner her profiler stare, the one that warned things were going to get worse before they got better. “This killer is not going to stop until we stop him.”
ISBN-13: 9781460345825
Vanished
Copyright © 2015 by Elizabeth Heiter
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical,
now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and in other countries.
