Girl, 11 Amy Clarke (e reader comics .TXT) 📖

new girl has gone missing. And maybe it’s just this case, this podcast, that is making me suspect TCK is involved. So here I am, with a cup of coffee in the middle of the night, to record. Because this is how I think.

I am starting to believe that something everyone told me was impossible is happening. I know how unlikely it sounds. I know all the reasons it shouldn’t be true. But I believe the Countdown Killer might be back in Minnesota—now, in 2020.

Three days ago, an eleven-year-old girl went missing. She was apparently taken on her way to the bus stop, by a man with a bright orange scarf and a bald head with no hat despite the freezing temperature. The uncovered head could mean a couple of things. He could be stupid or forgetful—maybe he meant to put on a hat and didn’t in the end, the fault of some surge of adrenaline due to what he was about to do. Or he could have done it on purpose. An uncovered bald head in winter is memorable, just like a bright orange scarf is memorable. He was taking a girl in front of witnesses—maybe he wanted them to note those parts of his appearance so they wouldn’t notice anything else. TCK did the same thing, the few times he was seen near his victims.

The man told Amanda he needed her to come with him because her dad was in an accident. This is similar to the pretense we know he used to get Nora Watson to come with him, and based on the victimology of his other targets, is probably an excuse he had used before.

Amanda is the right age to continue his countdown, if he wants to replace the victim who escaped. And we have found no clues that she was taken by anyone else. The one suspect we had has already been cleared. A dark, unmarked van unfamiliar to the area was seen in the vicinity. There has been no ransom call.

If he has come back, if he has started killing again, the next girl will be taken tomorrow—today, actually. If it really is him, he wouldn’t have made the decision to start killing again lightly. He doesn’t do anything by accident. In order to figure out where he’ll strike next, we need to know why he came back in the first place.

Maybe he came back because of me.

Edit that last line out.

Maybe this is connected to the man who told me he knew who TCK was. I still don’t know what he was going to tell me. But I think that could have been the start. If TCK knew he was about to be exposed, maybe that would be enough to get him to kill Leo. And that was enough of a taste of murder to remind him how much he liked the control, how badly he missed his mission.

But that doesn’t line up with how he stalked his previous victims, how he carefully chose them and knew everything about their routines. He would have needed to start that months ago, before he ever knew he was at risk. Could that be what Leo saw? A man stalking young girls? Maybe Leo was a neighbor or a coworker, and he saw the man behaving strangely. He did say something about “before it’s too late for her.” Could her be Amanda? Is there evidence on the flash drive that he was going to give me?

Edit that last line out.

It can’t be a coincidence, a murdered witness who says he knows the identity of TCK followed by another kidnapped girl who exactly matches his preferred type of victim?

No one will believe me. Or maybe everyone will blame me.

Edit that last line out.

I can’t use any of this.

20

Elle

January 17, 2020

At the police station, the sound of the elevator bell made Elle look up from her notes, hoping to see Ayaan step off. But it was just Sam Hyde.

She yawned and looked back down; she had gotten there first thing, leaving the house even before Martín was awake, and her eyes burned from lack of sleep. She had spent the night rambling into her mic, recording absolutely nothing usable. Finally, she’d tried to gather her thoughts and suspicions into something resembling coherent. She had two pages of handwritten bullet points, ready to show the commander.

Sam sauntered up to her. “Heard Bishar’s got you on one of her cases. How’d you manage to wrangle that?”

Not in the mood, Elle turned a page in her notebook. It didn’t seem to be enough to convince him to leave her alone, though.

“So, are you doing this case for your radio show too?” he asked, thumbing her notebook.

She jerked it away from him and looked up. “How’s that murder case going? Any leads on the person who shot Leo Toca in cold blood a week ago?”

A slow smile tugged at the corners of Sam’s mouth. “In fact, there has been some progress. We’re still looking into Duane Grove, but Leo’s ex has apparently been dating someone new, and her coworkers say he had a jealous streak. We haven’t been able to get ahold of her, but her phone last pinged a cell tower in Stillwater. We figure she’s laying low with her new man there.”

Well, that confirmed for sure that Maria Alvarez’s suspicions about who her daughter was dating were wrong. She didn’t even get the city right. The more Elle thought about it, the more she felt Luisa was a dead end. If she was seeing someone who lived thirty minutes away and working full-time, she probably didn’t have time to keep tabs on her ex-husband—if they were even still on speaking terms. It was weird that she wasn’t answering her phone, but if her boyfriend killed Leo out of some stupid jealousy, that would explain why she vanished.

With Amanda’s case looming and another episode to record next week, Elle just didn’t have time to keep chasing Leo’s