Her Final Victim Read online

  Her Final Victim

  NJ Moss

  Copyright © 2021 NJ Moss

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  The right of NJ Moss to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  First published in 2021 by Bloodhound Books.

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publisher or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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  www.bloodhoundbooks.com

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  Print ISBN 978-1-914614-41-5

  Contents

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  Also by NJ Moss

  1. Millicent

  2. Jamie

  3. Hazel

  4. Millicent

  5. Jamie

  6. Before

  7. Millicent

  8. Jamie

  9. Hazel

  10. Jamie

  11. Hazel

  12. Before

  13. Millicent

  14. Jamie

  15. Hazel

  16. Millicent

  17. Before

  18. Jamie

  19. Hazel

  20. Millicent

  21. Before

  22. Jamie

  23. Millicent

  24. Hazel

  25. Jamie

  26. Millicent

  27. Before

  28. Jamie

  29. Hazel

  30. Jamie

  31. Millicent

  32. Jamie

  33. Millicent

  34. Hazel

  35. Before

  36. Jamie

  37. Hazel

  38. Jamie

  39. Millicent

  40. Hazel

  41. Before

  42. Jamie

  43. Millicent

  44. Hazel

  45. Jamie

  46. Before

  47. Hazel

  48. Jamie

  49. Before

  50. Millicent

  51. Jamie

  52. Before

  53. Hazel

  Acknowledgements

  A note from the publisher

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  For my wife, Krystle.

  Happy five-year anniversary!

  Also by NJ Moss

  All Your Fault

  1

  Millicent

  Once upon a time the hours and minutes leading up to the kill filled me with light. It would expand inside of me until all the darkness – all the pain – was squashed into dim corners. I wouldn’t have to face it, constantly, the never-ending maelstrom of leering faces and glinting eyes and untrue promises.

  Now there’s a pit in my belly, grotesque and ignoble. I feel as if I’m a mindless animal waiting in the dark, gripping a rock, scanning the pathway as I wait for my prey to come ambling along.

  I haven’t done anything differently. I’ve made sure the park doesn’t have CCTV, and the surrounding roads are quiet and unmonitored. I’m wearing a hair net and a hood and a mask and gloves. Even shoe-wraps. There isn’t a single uncovered part of me, except for my eyes. They must glint in the dark: the eyes of a jaguar suddenly appearing at the fringes of a fireside.

  I never choose my prey beforehand. Selection leads to patterns, and patterns are the police’s favourite toy. The only concession is that the quarry must be men, because men are evil down to their core. They might pretend otherwise, grinning in public, but once doors close they become savage beasts. They rape and molest and twist little girl’s minds. If I had my way they’d all be rotting in a mass grave.

  I picked up the murder weapon when I entered the park half an hour ago, at one o’clock in the morning. It’s the sort of haphazard weapon the police will ascribe to a spur-of-the-moment crime.

  The jagged edges of the rock bite into my palm as I squeeze, even through the glove.

  But I don’t feel it. There’s no expansion. There’s no certainty.

  It’s because this victim – whoever he ends up being – is not the victim. He’s not the man who will be my last. I know it’s dangerous to think like this. I’ve been careful over the years, establishing myself as a respected copywriter, wearing human faces to convince people I’m as trite and milquetoast as they are.

  But the fight is becoming harder and harder to win. The pull is too strong.

  Finally, the gate rattles. We’re in a rundown part of the city, and the lights in here are either broken or not switched on. The moon is forced to send the shadow of the gate across the concrete, iron-blue as it whines open.

  A man staggers down the pathway.

  I smile. This is good. This is very good.

  He’s dressed in a full tracksuit and sports trainers, with a gold chain glinting in the low light. The primary giveaway is the satchel slung across his midriff.

  It is so courteous of drug dealers to wear uniforms. Courteous and stupid, but I suppose I shouldn’t expect much from pathetic troglodytes who spend their days intimidating people on high streets and getting children hooked on their filth.

  I stalk forward as he swaggers in, doing that disgusting thing where he has one hand stuffed down his trousers. I’ll never understand why some men feel the need for this. Are they afraid they’ll forget they have cocks if they’re not constantly waggling them?

  This one is going to be easy to get away with. Even easier than the others. I’ll leave the murder weapon behind, like a junkie would.

  I walk out in front of him, head bowed but eyes raised so I can watch him. It’s too dark for him to make out any details of me, but I note his shoulders relax when he sees I’m a woman. He thinks it makes me weaker. That’s exactly what I want.

  “All right, darling,” he says, waving his hand, the one not fiddling his prick.

  I stop and tilt my head, the same way a hunting animal does.

  I just wish I felt it, bone-deep: the light, the whispers before the release. There’s nothing and yet I’m too far down the road to turn back.

  “You all right?” His voice is abrasive and stupid-sounding. He could be lowing as much as talking. “You want me to call you a taxi?”

  “What’s in the bag?”

  He flinches. He can hear the predator in my voice. I’m top of the food chain.

  Fearing me is the smartest thing this waste of skin has ever done.

  “None of your business. Why are you dressed like that?”

  I walk forward, reaching up to tug down my mask. The darkness melts to reveal our faces to each other. I see a man with a teardrop tattoo under his eye – it’s supposed to make him look tough, but he just looks sad and lost and ready to die – and a receding hairline and some fuzz around his chin. He sees a woman in her mid-thirties with her hair cut into a stylish fringe and innocent eyes that scream, I mean no harm.

  “You know what I think, little lamb?”

  “I ain’t got time for this shit, sweetheart. Look, I’ve tried to be nice—”

  “I think you’re going to use those drugs to make innocent women compliant. I think you’re going to force them to do things they don’t w
ant to do. I think you’re a monster. I think you broke me. I cried. I cried. Why didn’t you?”

  The man raises his hands, finally letting his worm go. His mouth falls open. He looks at me like I’m mentally diminished. A different form of light flares awake inside of me. It isn’t the kind I covet, but I’ll take rage over apathy any day.

  How dare he look at me like I’m insane?

  “Relax. Don’t be stupid. I’m happy to call you a taxi—”

  “Like to rape little girls, do you, you druggie fuck?” I snarl, letting the beast out between my teeth.

  “Fuck this.”

  He walks around the pathway, onto the grass, giving me a wide berth. I face the sky and drink in the stars and beg for some of their heat and power to cascade into me. But there’s nothing. I’ll have to do this cold. Maybe this is a sign.

  The man’s footsteps are soft on the grass, and then they become louder when he returns to the stone path behind me.

  Gripping my rock in an eagle’s talon, I swivel and judge the distance.

  He’s shaking his head. He thinks he’s better than me.

  I spring forward and bring the rock down as he spins at my approach. It crunches into his forehead and he stumbles and then I do what is necessary.

  If I didn’t fall upon him and hit and keep hitting – if I didn’t bring the rock up and down, up and down in mechanical efficiency – if his blood didn’t cast a rusty pallor to the night air, I know exactly what this man would go on to do. He’d use women. He’d hurt women.

  He’s a monster. He left me. He broke me.

  I perch atop him, straddled like a lover. This is the closest I will ever get to intimacy, and I’m fine with that. Let the worm-fiddlers dupe other women, women who don’t know how to fight back.

  But even now, there’s no rush. There’s no certainty.

  I let the rock tumble onto his belly. “What a disappointment you are.”

  Standing, I reach into my pocket, taking out the digital camera. The buttons are chunky and easy to use in the gloves. It’s why I chose this model. For a brief moment, the flash illumes what I’ve done: the petal of blood blooming across the pathway and congealing in the grass, his stupid and surprised face, his seeping forehead.

  Darkness returns, and I pocket the camera. “You’re not doing it. It’s time. This proves it. Why aren’t you making me feel?”

  I lean down and unzip his satchel. I won’t ingest whatever drugs this devil is peddling. I like to keep my wits sharp. I’ll dump them far away from the murder scene, leading the police to comb the area for any junkies desperate enough to kill a man for a few hours of amnesia.

  Not that I blame the junkies. I’d like to forget too, if I could.

  I reach inside the bag and take out his wallet, his keys, his phone – things a crackhead would steal – and then root around for the clear plastic bag that will contain his wares.

  Instead, I find a small box. I flip it open and stare down as the cheap-looking engagement ring glints in the moonlight.

  This doesn’t complicate matters much. The man still looks like a drug dealer. The police will come to the same conclusion. And if he’d proposed to some poor gullible woman, and if she’d accepted, he would have made her life miserable. He would have worn her down, belittled her: shattered her so he could rebuild her in his desired shape. I’ve done her a favour.

  If the law didn’t make it so tricky for me to tell her, she’d thank me.

  It’s time for me to leave. I’ll clean myself of this man’s blood, change into cattle clothes, and then I’ll burn my killer’s uniform and keep his corpse’s image close to my heart.

  But first: one last look. Perhaps, just maybe, something will flare to life inside of me.

  I glance at the silhouette in the inky pool… and nothing. My heart is cold.

  This lack of sensation proves it. It’s time I began the hunt that may end in my death.

  I kick him in the side, feeling his ribs give a shiver under the force. I kick him again, again, and again, until my leg tires and I have to accept no amount of violence is going to provoke what I need. I stamp on his face to be sure, caving in his cokehead nose, but nothing, there’s nothing.

  As I walk toward the lonely tree where I’ve stowed my exit bag, I imagine a pair of emerald eyes watching me. They belong to my final victim, and they are beautiful, and they are hateful. They are eyes whose brightness I will steal.

  2

  Jamie

  I’m sneaky for such a big bloke. Wearing socks helps, and Lacy’s boiler is loud. She won’t hear my footsteps if I need to change position. She won’t hear my breathing over the boiler’s hum.

  She’s on the other side of the door, in her bedroom, drying her hair as she gets ready for bed. She sings along to a pop song, only catching half the lyrics. Her voice is dog shit, but the effort’s what counts. It’s ten o’clock and she’s settling down for the night.

  I’ve been in this detached bungalow many times. She doesn’t feel like she has to keep her voice down because she doesn’t share any walls. She lives alone. She’s perfect.

  Tonight is the first time I’ve stayed this long without her knowing about it. We’ve fucked and watched Netflix and ordered takeaways, but even so, I know she’d probably overreact if she knew I was here.

  Not that it matters.

  The fuck am I going to do, leap out and shout surprise? I grin at the thought, almost laughing.

  The final nights are always my favourite. The main event will be happening soon.

  Once her hair is dried, her footsteps tell me she’s walking toward the boiler room, which connects her bathroom and bedroom. I flatten myself as she opens the door, holding my breath. I don’t move an inch. I could stay like this for several minutes if I had to.

  Lacy walks into the bathroom. Her music comes with her and her voice rises. She sounds sexy and confident, and my cock gets stiff. Singing wouldn’t do it for me in any other context. But there’s something about her lack of self-consciousness that really gets me going.

  She pisses in the dark, which is helpful. Some women turn on all the lights as they pass through their homes, especially if they live by themselves. Even if they know nobody’s lurking in the dark, they have to be sure. My grin widens. Nobody’s lurking in the dark… except me.

  Over the last few weeks, I’ve made it my goal to learn as much about her as I can. I know she prefers crunchy peanut butter to smooth and she only drinks green tea and she still hates her secondary school history teacher. I know she owns two vibrators and she’s ashamed of both of them. I know she was married and she has a daughter, but she was tricked into believing she’d be happier as a strong independent woman, and now look at her: alone, singing so she doesn’t have to think about the life she gave up.

  She’s too old to start again, and that excites me. It makes me stiff. The tension almost hurts.

  She’s proved how desperate she is every time we’ve been together, doing any depraved thing I ask her, grateful a younger man is showing her some attention. But they’re always grateful. The older they are, the hungrier they are to let me fuck their throats, their arses, finishing on their faces or their tits or inside of them.

  She could be reading her daughter a bedtime story, but the silly bitch didn’t even fight for custody. She abandoned her child.

  What’s wrong with her?

  She returns to the bedroom and gets herself set up for bed, moving her desk chair so she can place her laptop on it. I build a mental picture of her based on the sounds she makes. A little sigh: maybe she’s seen something on social media that’s upset her. Shifting sheets and noisy pillows: she’s restless, maybe wishing she was out doing something instead of hunkering down for a night of TV.

  She watches a stupid amount of reality TV. That’s probably one of the reasons she chose this sad life, separated from her family. She thought it would be glamorous. I can’t stand to listen to it, but it’s not like I’ve got a choice. Five episodes in a row �
�� into the early hours of the morning – these women rant and bitch and make problems out of nothing. It almost makes this not worth it.

  But just as my patience is wearing thin, the show cuts off mid-argument. She fell asleep mid-episode and now she’s shut the laptop in her sleep. She did that once when I stayed over, snaked her arm out of the covers and slammed it loudly.

  I won’t go out yet. I’ll let her get used to the sounds of the house settling. I love that phrase. It’s the house settling. It makes it much easier for my footsteps to go unnoticed.

  I’m proud of how cleanly this one went. Getting her into bed was easy. All it took was buying her some drinks and nodding in the right places. Hooking her was even easier. Tell her she’s beautiful, tell her she’s talented, tell her she’s whatever she wants to be, and she was mine. Once she thought she knew me, it was a simple matter of stealing and copying her key and watching her type in the code of her security alarm.