“No. I can’t.” I take a big step back from him. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. Shit.” He rubs a hand over his face. “It’s my fault. I misread things.”
The expression on his face. He looks … uncomfortable, awkward.
He’s probably not used to being turned down. A guy with a face like his … I can’t imagine it ever happening.
No woman in her right mind would ever say no to a coffee date with Jack.
But I’m not a normal woman.
I hate that I can’t have those things that I once took for granted. I hate that my life is this way. But it is. And there isn’t a damn thing I can do to change it.
I wish I could tell him that he hadn’t misread anything. I do. I would love to go out for dinner with him. When I was the old Audrey, I would have taken him on that dinner and more. But now … I can’t.
I won’t.
“I should go.” I start to leave, but he says my name.
And that has me turning back.
“Friends?” He gives me a tentative smile.
I briefly close my eyes, wishing I could do at least that.
I stare past him. I can’t bring myself to look him in the face. This guy has an effect on me. I have never been so affected by a man before. And why I am now with him, I’m not sure.
That is something for me to figure out later—when I’m back at my apartment, alone.
“I don’t … have friends.”
His brows pull together. “You don’t have friends?” he echoes my words back to me.
I shake my head. “It’s just …” I push a hand through my hair, releasing a sigh. “I’m not someone you want to be around.”
And with that, I pivot on my heel and walk away from him.
He doesn’t call me back this time.
And I can’t decide if I’m relieved or disappointed.
Murdered Female Found
The body of twenty-five-year-old bar worker Natalie Jenkins was found in her apartment late last night. Sources say she was stabbed to death.
After not coming in to work for her shift and not being able to get ahold of her, concerned staff had called the police.
Police are not saying if Natalie’s case is linked to the murder of twenty-six-year-old veterinarian nurse Molly Hall, who was found dead in her apartment three months ago, her throat slit and her body mutilated.
We’ll update as we learn more on the story.
I stare at the words on my laptop screen, them screaming and jumping out at me in the silence of my apartment.
An icy chill slithers down my spine.
That is the second woman who has gone missing since I moved here six months ago. Both found murdered.
I had been here three months when Molly Hall disappeared. I followed the story in the beginning because it unnerved me—for obvious reasons due to my past experience with Tobias.
Aside from the fact that Molly looked similar to me, it was the way she had been killed.
Tobias liked knives. It was his weapon of choice.
Throat slit. Body mutilated.
That is exactly how Tobias killed all the women back in Chicago.
He would break into their apartments and wait for them to come home. Then, he would attack.
I get the bitter taste of bile in my mouth, feeling nauseous, just like I do every time I think of anything related to what Tobias put those women through—his sick, twisted way of getting my attention or whatever the hell he was doing.
I never understood any of it. I still don’t.
But I guess no one can understand the mind of a psychopath, except the man himself.
Not that Tobias has ever admitted to any of his gruesome crimes. He maintains his innocence to this day. He currently has his lawyers working on an appeal to try and get him out of prison.
Jesus, I can’t even think about what I would do if he ever managed to get out of jail …
I press my hand to the upper part of my stomach, feeling the familiar scars he left there.
It won’t happen. He won’t get out of jail.
I’m safe.
And there is zero evidence to say that Natalie Jenkins’s murder has any link to Molly’s. Just because those two women were murdered, stabbed to death, does not mean that another serial killer is on the loose or that those women’s deaths are at all connected to the crimes that Tobias committed.
He has been in prison for a year. These women were murdered during that time.
And people are killed every single day in America. It’s an awful fact, but it’s true.
Knife crime is high.
Nothing in that news story says Natalie’s murder was the exact same as Molly’s.
In fact, it says Natalie was stabbed to death and that Molly had her throat slit and her body mutilated. If anything, Molly’s murder is closer to Tobias’s method, but that still doesn’t mean it has anything to do with his previous crimes.
Each woman could have been murdered by an ex-boyfriend, a family member, or a friend. Something like eighty percent of people are murdered by someone they know.
Yes, the murders of those women are similar to the killings of Tobias Ripley—both killed by knives in their apartments.
But the same could be said of a lot of murders.
Yes, Molly Hall looked a lot like me, but that means nothing.
And I have no idea what Natalie looked like. They didn’t show a picture of her with the news story.
What if she looked like me?
Fuck.
I shouldn’t look her up. I know this. But still, I can’t stop myself.
Self-control has never been a strength of mine.
I’m already opening up a fresh window, bringing up Google and typing Natalie Jenkins in the search bar, before I can think again about why this is a bad idea.
The screen fills with links. I click on the Images tab, and the first row of pictures shows photos of the same girl. She has dark brown hair.
Please be her.
I click on the picture and find her
