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It happened so suddenly, she was running down the path, breathing in the cool fall air, as the sun was beginning to dry the dew off the grass. By the time Evelyn heard to rev of the engine, it was too late; the truck had was beside her and there was a hand on her shoulder. She tried to fight the hand off, but it was too strong; she was quickly overpowered in no time. The man in the truck jumped out, tied her hands behind her back, and put a bag over her eyes. He picked her up and roughly placed her in the passenger seat.

It had been 3 days since Evelyn had disappeared, when they received a phone call. Irvin and Ben were no closer to finding her abductor then they were to solving Alice’s murder. “Is this Detective Sloane?” the voice was gruff and graveled on the other end, “I need to speak with Detective Sloane, NOW.” the voice continued before Irvin could answer.

“Yes, this is Detective Sloane,” when he answered his voice cracked slightly. “What can I do for you?”

There was a sinister quality in the voice on the other end of the phone, “I have some information about Evey; I know where she is.”

Irvin put the call on speakerphone as he motioned for Ben to come to his desk. “Go ahead, please, tell us what you know.”

There other end of the line was silent; “I’ll call you back.” The line went dead.

The phone rang almost immediately, “Hello?!” Irvin shouted.

“She’s at the end of Mountain Road,” the man at other end chuckled to himself. “You’d better hurry.” The line disconnected.

Irvin and Ben raced to their car, as they made their way up to the end of Mountain Road they radioed for EMS vehicles and back up. At the top of the mountain where the road ended, they saw a mound. Without cutting the car off, they jumped out and run to the body lying on the ground. She wasn’t moving, there was a lot of blood pooling on the pavement. He felt for her pulse, there wasn’t one; she was dead.

Irvin removed the bag and looked into her face; it was uncanny how much she resembled Alice. As the coroner came to collect the body, Irvin stood and walked away from the scene. wringing his hands, shaking his head. He began to sob, “I’m sorry, Allie. I’m so sorry.”

Ben realized that Irvin had mistaken Evelyn for Alice, “Vin, who are you talking to?”

Irvin looked at Evelyn’s body, he was ashamed, “I—I’m sorry. I haven’t been able to get the picture of Alice Grey out of my head.”

“Understandable, but you called her Allie. You knew her, didn’t you, Vin?” Ben knew the answer before he asked.

“—Yes.”

Neither man said anything while they processed the scene.

The town was awake. They had heard about the girl’s disappearance and that she had been found. Irvin and Ben returned to the station with what little evidence they had, and began writing their reports.

The Chief called Irvin into his office. “Son, I’ve noticed you look at bit piqued here lately, wanna talk about it?”

“Oh, you know, this is my first murder to work, and I’ve been a little nervous.”

“I’ve heard that you knew Alice.”

Irvin hesitated, “---Yes, sir. I knew her, we went to school together, I was a family friend.”

“I’m sorry son; I know this is hard for you. I’m going to have to ask you to step off the case. You’re too close to his to remain objective.”

“No. I need to find this man.”

“Then help us, take another route, so someone else can take this case.”

“Let me work on Evelyn’s case, then.”

“Can’t let you do that. Haven’t you realized they are the same cases? The women are similar, and the wounds are the same.” With that Irvin switched shifts with Detective Alex Henry, who became the lead detective on the case.

Irvin remembered his conversation with Mrs. Grey. He was troubled by her silence at the end, he felt as though there was something left unsaid. He needed to talk with her again. The next afternoon, before work, he drove out to the Grey’s farm. “Mrs. Grey, can I talk to you?”

“Sure, Vin.” She left her apron on the table and stepped outside with him. They had walked well away from the house before they began to speak.

“I’ve been thinking about our phone call. I think there is something you are not telling me, Mrs. Grey.”

“—There is.”

“I really need to know, Mrs. Grey, it might help the investigation.”

“It’s about Allie and Grant. Before Allie moved back home, she moved out of Grant’s apartment and broke off their 5 year relationship. Grant had been a wonderful young man when Allie first began seeing him. He had a great job that paid well, so he could take Allie out for large expensive dinners, and buy her nice gifts. After the third year, he bought her an apartment with a great view of Downtown Chicago, and soon after that they moved in together.”

“Sounds like a great guy. Why did she end the relationship?”

“Like I said he HAD been a wonderful man. Once Allie moved in with him, he slowly morphed into a terror.” She shook her head as she remembered the first family holiday after Alice and Grant began cohabitating. They had come home, and he hated the farm so much that he and Alice left abruptly one night to go into the city for a hotel. “Soon he limited when Alice could leave the apartment, and when she would violate the curfews, he would beat her; when she left, he threatened to kill her.”

“Have you heard from Grant?”

“No.”

“Do you have a picture or a description of Grant?” Mrs. Grey handed him the last picture Alice had sent home of her and Grant and headed back into the house.

Grant Harris was from out of town, he lived near the University Alice had received her Bachelor’s of Arts in Psychology from. He was a clean-cut man. He had been the class president at his college preparatory school. He was the kind of man that caught all the attention, a people pleaser. When he graduated from Harvard, he had immediately taken over his father’s architect firm, and was quickly climbing his way to the top of the lists of the Nation’s top designers. He was originally from a small town in the south, but he had outgrown the plowed fields and small town news. He distanced himself far from that in his swanky office with the leather couches. He was known to mistreat those who didn’t do as he said.

Five hours later, thanks to a mysterious tip off, a tall, slender man in his early thirties was brought into the precinct. He was dressed in business attire with a smug grin of his face. “You don’t have any charges you pigs; let me go.”

“Sir, we have witnesses putting you at the scene, and we have reason to believe that you threatened Alice’s life.”

“Why would I do that? I loved Alice.”

The Detectives laid photos of Alice in front of Grant “These were taken at the scene.” Grant began to cry.

“I didn’t do anything to her, I LOVED ALICE,” he sobbed through his tears, “I LOVED HER.”

“Sir, we need for you to tell us where you were doing on the night Alice died.”

“My company was hosting a dinner, I gave a speech at the dinner; people saw me, they can tell you I was there.” His alibi was confirmed, he had given the welcome speech at his company’s dinner. Grant was free to go.

The alibi and Grant’s attitude made Irvin suspicious, so he made another trip out to the Grey’s farm to speak with Alice’s mother again, “Did Alice say anything to you the night she died, Mrs. Grey?”

“Only that she was going out, she went out often,” he voice quivered a little. “She came back for you, you know, Vin.”

“What? For me?”

“She told me so, while we were having a cup of coffee the other morning on the back deck, looking at the mist on the hills, when she turned and asked me if you were still around. She missed you, and the longer she was with Grant the more sure she was that she’d let something go that was the best thing ever happened to her. She missed you, Vin.”

Vin scratched his receding hairline. “It’s been 7 years. 7 years, I missed her too.”

“She was always talking about you, ever since you two broke up your first semester of college, she loved you.”

Vin needed air. He excused himself.

Evelyn’s reports came back, she and Alice had the same murderer. Although they have been murdered in different places, they had the same traces and wounds on their bodies. However, the killer had not been as through with the clean up of Evelyn as he had been with Alice. By a thorough examination of the body, the detectives found a few fingerprints, which they were able to piece together. They matched the prints taken from Grant when he was brought in for questioning. Alibi or not, the detectives had substantial evidence, they could question Grant again and this time they could include questions about Evelyn.

Once again, Grant was brought in for questioning. “Who is this, Mr. Harris?”

“I don’t know.”

“Mr. Harris, we found your finger prints on Ms. Cob’s person, how did they get there?” Grant didn’t respond to the question.

“Mr. Harris, have you ever seen this woman before?” Detective Henry tossed the photos of a bloody woman onto the table in front of Grant.
“No.”

“Then tell us how your finger prints ended up on Ms. Cob’s face.” There was still no response from Grant.

“We’ve also tied Alice’s murder to Evelyn’s, they were killed with the same weapon.” As he placed Alice’s photos on the table, Grant began to shake.

“She was leaving me. She wasn’t going to come back. She was going to leave my home, my life—and—and come back here to this—to him. And I wasn’t going to let her.”

“What do you mean, Mr. Harris?”

“I wasn’t going to let her leave me, not like that. I didn’t want to be alone. I deserved her, I worked hard to get where I am, and no one walks out on me, NO ONE.” He pounded the table with his fists.

“What did you do?”

“She left two weeks ago; I didn’t know where she went. One night I came home and her bags were by the door. She thought about just walking out, without saying anything, but she knew I would find her and make her pay. So, she waited until I came home. “I’m leaving.” She says.” His voice became thin and tight. “No one’s ever said that to me. Then she left her key on the table and walked out the door.”

“Did you make her pay?”

“I gave her what she deserved for walking out on me.”

“What did you do?”

“I found her here, in town. She was waiting for him, I suppose. I followed her, and told her to get in the truck, she did. Then I drove her to the back alley. That was when that old man came. I thought I was going to have to hurt him too, but she was a good girl. When you told her to shut up, she shut up good. Never heard another peep out of her once I told her to be quiet.” He got up from the chair. He wasn’t crying anymore, his voice wasn’t cracking, he was solid.

“Then I hit her. She would never leave me again, no. I hit her until I was tired of hitting her, at some point she passed out, she was lying on the ground. So, I went to my truck and found my knife, and I fixed her. I fixed her—if I couldn’t have her, no one was going to.” He brought his hand down on the table 3 times. “She was not good to me then, so I left her and went back to the hotel.”

“Mr. Harris, you left her there to die.”

“Didn’t matter, she was leaving me anyway.”

“What about Evelyn Cob? Why did you killed her?”

“I saw her running the Mountain Road. She looked like Alice; when I saw her, I was so mad, that she was still alive. He couldn’t have her! NOT MY ALICE. So, I took her where she would be safe, she kept trying to leave me, I wasn’t going to let her leave me again. So this time I made it so she would never leave me—Never.” The Detectives took down his story and lead Grant in hand cuffs to booking.

Irvin was sitting at his desk working on a report for the traffic stops he had made the night before, when they brought Grant through the patrol room, with that smug look on his face. Grant looked at Irvin and chuckled. “You aren’t ever going to have her. She’s mine. And she was good.” Irvin watched as Detective Henry walked Grant to the front of the desk and sat him down so they could fill out the paper work for him to be placed in the holding cell for the night.

Irvin’s blood was pulsing, his heart was pounding; he stood up and walked the Detective Henry’s desk. “This him? You got him this time?” Henry nodded. “Good.”

“She came back here for you, you’re a kid. I’m glad I killed her so she wouldn’t have to look at your sorry ass.”

Before Irvin knew what had happened, Grant had stood up from the chair and threw his arms over Irvin’s head, and pulled the handcuffs tight against his throat. “You’re going to join her soon enough though. Come any closer and I’ll break his neck.”

Irvin felt Grant’s grip on his head tighten and knew that he was going to die soon, if someone didn’t do something. So, Irvin grabbed his gun from his holster and pulled the trigger. The gunshot was louder than he ever remembered it being when he shot at the targets in his firearms classes, and the kick was worse than it ever had been. Grant started to twist Irvin’s neck, as Irvin shot again. Grant lost his hold and sank to the floor, pulling Irvin down with him. The two men laid there, as Irvin struggled to get free of Grant’s arms and the other Detectives rushed over to help Irvin.

Irvin jumped out of his chair again as phone rang. There was still a mark Grant’s handcuffs had dug into his neck, “He-llo?” His voice held the marks of the pressure of the handcuffs still left on his throat.

“Irvin, I need to see you in my office.” Chief Emerson’s voice rang out from the receiver. Irvin walked into his office.

“Have a seat. It’s time I gave you these back.” he said pushing Irvin’s gun and badge across the desk.

“Thank you, sir.”

“I’m glad you’re back.” Irvin was glad he was back, too.