Have you seen Pepper, Sorin? This is serious. I’m worried.
She had a lot of nerve, after what she’d done to his mother.
No, he had lied.
Of course, he knew where Pepper was and he considered sending the mutt’s head to her with a note—“I’m missing you in hell”—before dismissing the plan. He was happy knowing that she would never see her precious Pepper again. At the same time, as much as he loathed Tonya, he saw how fear became her, how pretty she was in her anguish. His power over her enthralled him and he fantasized about what he’d do to her, about seeing a MISSING poster with Tonya’s face on it.
The van’s headlights raked the woods and gravel popped under the tires as Zurrn turned onto an abandoned forestry road. He knew this area, he’d been here before. As the van toddled along the old rutted path, soft groaning and cries rose from the back.
“Don’t worry. Not much longer,” he said aloud.
That incident with Tonya was the catalyst that had put him on the path of what was truly his life’s work as a collector. First, he earned scholarships to college and studied computer design. That didn’t last long before he drifted across the country trying this and trying that, before jumping from one computer job to another. During this time, he grappled with his animosity toward his mother, growing distant and out of touch. Only she knew where he was—he’d allow her that much—but he rarely responded to her letters or calls.
Perhaps out of guilt, but more out of curiosity, he monitored the online editions of the Chicago newspapers. He was living in Denver when he saw his mother’s death notice in the Chicago Tribune.
His mother’s church had placed the notice.
He contacted the church, then returned to Chicago to quietly arrange for her funeral. But he couldn’t bear to attend. Instead, he’d watched from a distance as they buried her, along with his past.
After her death he returned to Colorado and began severing all ties with his mother and the family name. She had no estate. She had nothing. He ignored or tossed into the trash any records or correspondence linking him to Chicago and the Zurrn name.
At this time he used his expertise to take on a new identity.
He was reborn and started a new life, off the grid.
He was invisible.
Still, he longed for the only joy he’d known through his collection. And he recalled how much he had enjoyed Tonya’s anguish. That’s when his metamorphosis happened. He was traveling when he was seized with a compulsion to start a new collection, a special one that rivaled anything the world had known.
He was nervous and made tiny errors in the early days when he captured his first specimen.
But it was a success.
A work of art.
He cherished it because he owned it.
Over the years he acquired other pretty specimens, enhancing his collection. He became expert at finding them, hunting them and keeping them for as long as he wanted. Each new capture enthralled him, so much so that he would press himself against their cell to feel the panic in their hearts beat against him. Oh, how he loved it.
Flutterings in the kill jar.
Most specimens were cooperative and loyal, but some would fall ill, harm themselves or try to escape. Escape was treasonous—it meant disloyalty. It was a wish to abandon him, like his father abandoned him; to break a promise and walk away from parental responsibility.
It meant that over the years it was necessary to discard and replace them. It broke his heart, but that’s how it was. The posters of the missing online, with terms such as “last seen,” and “disappeared without a trace” stood as testament to his refined skills as a collector.
My glory.
And no one ever knew.
Yes, other enthusiasts would occasionally surface in the news but only because they’d failed. Some across the country and around the world had kept their work going for years, as well, but they were defeated because of mistakes.
Never let a specimen escape.
True, Rampart didn’t go according to Zurrn’s plan. He’d intended for the case to be closed with the death of “Carl Nelson.” Sure, he could’ve ended things in the house rather than the barn. But the fire and staging of the specimen were stylistic touches he couldn’t resist. Still, the discovery by police wasn’t a setback.
It was a challenge.
Maybe I’ll go public like the Zodiac and the Ripper.
Zurrn would carry on creating his new garden paradise. But he’d have to make further adjustments along the way. At this moment, he was grappling with keeping the last of his remaining specimens. For years his plan was to start over with all new prospects to capture. But he’d grown partial to some of his specimens and decided to keep them.
And now, with the situation brewing in Rampart and all that business with that reporter, he realized that this was a game changer. This was his chance to showcase his mastery to the world. And the only way to do it was to sacrifice his treasures.
It had to be done. He was at war.
Time to get started.
He brought the van to a stop on a soft, earthen patch alongside a fast-flowing stream. Crickets chirped and starlight glimmered on the water. Isolated. No one around for miles.
No one to hear a thing. Perfect. History will be made, right here.
He stepped from the van wearing high-quality night-vision goggles. They provided him with brilliant, sharp images in the darkness as he worked.
First, he maneuvered the heavy-duty handcart used for moving vending machines and removed the wooden crates, positioning them on the ground.
Then he set out his instruments.
Next, he set up the stands for the studio photography lights, aligning them just so. Then he stood
