CHAPTER 3: THE WOMAN IN THE PHOTOGRAPH
CHAPTER 3: THE WOMAN IN THE PHOTOGRAPH
A week later, Detective Harris visited me at the temporary guardian residence.
He carried an old photograph.
The moment I saw it, my heart stopped.
The woman in the picture looked familiar.
Not because I remembered her.
Because I had seen her recently.
Very recently.
"Do you know her?" Harris asked.
I nodded slowly.
"She works at the flower shop near the cemetery."
The detective's eyes widened.
The official records said Eleanor Reed was dead.
Yet an eight-year-old child had just identified her.
Within hours, officers surrounded the flower shop.
But they arrived too late.
The woman had vanished.
All that remained was a note hidden beneath the cash register.
The message contained only six words:
THEY KNOW I'M STILL ALIVE.
Alongside the note was a photograph.
Not of Eleanor.
Not of Clara.
Not of Julian.
It was a photograph of Arthur Sterling standing beside three unidentified people twenty years earlier.
One of them had been crossed out in red ink.
Across the bottom, someone had written:
"Arthur was never the target."
When Detective Harris read those words, a chill ran through him.
Because if Arthur had never been the target...
Then the killer's plan wasn't finished.
May you like
And somewhere out there, the next victim was already being watched.
To be continued...
