Let The Countdown Begin (Near To You - Chapter 5)

I walked into Paddy’s, taking my stool. Ken was grinning at me as he sat down my drink. “Do I look good?” I asked Ken, standing up and spinning around for him to see me.

He chuckled at me, “You look beautiful, TJ.” He told me, a reassuring grin on his face.

I sat back down on my stool. “Well, it’s just, tonight is the night,” I stated, taking a sip of my drink, “I’m supposed to pick Beau up at the airport in like three hours!” I was so happy that it was time for him to be back with me.

We had spent his last few days in Chicago snuggled up in my bed. There was a lot of laughter, a lot of tears – mostly from me – and a lot of, well you know. It was like we just couldn’t get enough of each other. Our little bubble of bliss was popped too soon when Beau had to go back out on the road. At which point I turned into that weird college girl who has a boyfriend back home and has to call him at least once, every single day. On a serious note though, we talked every night that he was gone. He’d tell me about all the funny things that happened. Like when his roadies pranked him by putting a fake spider in his hotel bed. I told him as much as I could, and he was the first to know when I found out – officially – that I had gotten the SAC position at work. We had celebratory drinks together via Facetime. Corny, I know. I had fallen right back in step with him. It made me wonder if maybe fate or destiny – what you wanna call it – I wondered if it was real after all.

“I’m happy for you, Teej.” Ken told me as I sat there sipping my bourbon, slowly. I didn’t wanna be drunk when I met Beau.

I smiled at him. “You really mean it?” I asked him. Ken’s approval had ended up meaning more to me than what I thought it would. Before Beau left, I made him come back to the bar with me and meet Ken properly. We all three ended up drunk after closing and laughed our asses off the entire night. Beau told Ken embarrassing stories about drunk, college me. Ken told Beau embarrassing stories about scared, lost in the big city me. I was drunk so I just laughed at the stories myself. Beau had left the next day, so I had come to Paddy’s which is when Ken gave his official seal of approval.

Ken came back after helping someone at the bar. “Of course. I was beginning to think you were gonna be one of those crazy ladies from Hoarders or something.” Ken jabbed at me, jokingly. I knew he meant well though. It was good to have someone who was happy to see me happy. I knew that my family wasn’t going to have quite the same reaction when they found out. They still blamed Beau for me running away to ‘gangland’ as my mother so lovingly referred to it.

“Ha. Ha. Very funny. You know I’m way too OCD for that.” I joked back with Ken as I finished off my drink. I sat and chatted with Ken as he worked for about an hour before it was time to head to the airport.

I stood up, wrapping myself in coat and scarf. December in Chicago was no joke. “I’m off!” I said, waving to Ken as I headed out the door into the cold. It wasn’t snowing currently but there was still a few inches on the ground that hadn’t melted away yet. I flagged down a cab and after a few short traffic jams we were finally there. I had to force myself to not act like an excited groupie whose favorite band was back in town.

I walked into the crowded terminal, his plane was already unloading so I knew he’d be coming through any second. I felt like a kid waiting for Santa. I felt the smile on my face grow even bigger as I saw his familiar shaggy brown hair bobbing through the sea of people. I threw my hand up in the air, standing on my tip toes to appear taller. As soon as he saw me, a goofy grin came across his face. He ran towards me and picked me up, kissing me hard. Anyone else watching probably hated us in that moment. I mean it was pretty disgusting how much of a movie moment it was. Plus, we were pretty adorable, if I do say so myself.

“I missed you so fucking much.” He told me in between kisses.

“I missed you too,” I replied.

After we got our initial make out session over with, we gathered his luggage and flagged down another cab to head home. We both struggled not to strip each other down in the car. We talked instead, to keep us distracted long enough to get to the apartment.

It seemed like it took forever to make it there, but finally we did. We hurriedly carried in everything. As soon as I closed the door, our clothes were flying off. You would think it would take some time to strip off all our winter layers, but it didn’t.

The next few hours were spent in the bed. The past two months without him next to me had been harder than going the four years without him. I was so glad to just feel his skin on mine again. We were lying there, catching our breath. That’s when my phone started ringing.

I knew it was work related due to the ring tone. “Sorry, babe, I’ve gotta get it.” I apologized to him as I wrapped a blanket around me to search for my phone. I finally found it in my coat pocket in the living room floor. “Hello?” I inquired. I hated getting calls from work at this time of night. It never meant anything good.

“Special Agent Harris, I hate to call you but there’s been another incident. We need everyone here as soon as possible.” The voice on the other of the receiver told me, urgently. I knew the voice, it was Billy, a forensic tech that worked on her team.

“Ok, Billy, I’ll be there in twenty.” I said pointedly before hitting the red button to hang up the phone.

I walked back into the bedroom, disappointed that I was going to have to work as soon as Beau had gotten back. “Babe, I’m sorry, but I have to go in. It’s urgent.” I told him. I threw the blanket onto the bed and walked naked to the closet to get dressed.

I smiled a little as I felt his arms wrap around me from behind. I turned around to face him, “I’m really sorry.” I apologized to him again.

He kissed me softly, moving some hair out of my face. “Taylor, it is fine. I’ll be here when you get back.” He told me, placing another soft kiss on my forehead. I nodded at him and grabbed some clothes to throw on.

Minutes later I was out the door and in a cab. I bundled myself up as I walked through the cold and into the building, heading straight for the conference room where I knew my team would be waiting. They were sitting around the round table as I walked through the door. “Sorry it took me so long guys, what’s the situation?” I asked as I sat down at the front of the table.

Billy stood up, turning on the projector in the room with the remote he held in his hand. He walked up to the board it was pointed on. “Well, guys,” he faced us from the front of the room, clicking the remote again, “looks like we have a serial on our hands.”

I grimaced at the photos that appeared on the screen. I had seen it all since I had been in this field, but you never got used to it. Not if you were human. There were three different photos of women, they all looked basically the same. Brunette, small framed. The tallest one couldn’t have been more than 5’3”. From what I could tell, they were all beautiful. They were all naked. All lying on the ground somewhere in wooded areas. One was surrounded by green grass, one fallen leaves, and one snow. That had to have been the most recent. They were all in pretty rough shape, bloody and beat up. I looked away from them as Billy continued to give us the details.

“The first victim was found over the summer in Finley Park off one of the hiking trails there.” He said, as the screen showed just the first woman’s crime scene photo next to a photo of her that her family had provided. “Sara Thomas.” He clicked his remote again. The second victim’s photo popped up. He continued, “Rebecca Wilde. She was found off the interstate heading north. A couple stopped to walk their dog and seen her body.” The group of us collectively shook our heads in sadness. Billy clicked the remote one last time and victim three’s photos came onto the screen. “And this is Hannah Merrick. Some teenagers found her tonight, back behind the mall.” Billy hung his head as he finished.

“Alright, everyone, besides the obvious similarities, what do we got that makes this a serial?” I asked the group. They flipped through the folders of information in front of them. They all took turns naming off the typical information. Every victim was in their late twenties - early thirties, brunette, small framed. They had all suffered the same injuries: blunt force trauma to the body, defensive wounds, ligature marks on wrists and ankles. They all showed evidence of torture but not of sexual nature. And finally, they all had the same cause of death and the marks to show for it: strangulation. Besides that, the murders were all exactly 60 days apart. Everything about this screamed ‘serial killer’. Now, it was going to be my job to unravel every piece of evidence to find out who this murderer was before another 60 days had passed. Let the countdown begin.