Page 61 of Whispers in the Night

The press conference fallout was immediate and overwhelming.

By nine a.m., the tip line had received over two hundred calls. Most were useless—neighbors reporting suspicious activity that turned out to be perfectly normal behavior, anxious parents calling about their adult daughters who hadn’t answered their phones that morning, conspiracy theorists convinced the killer was a government agent or an alien or both.

But buried in the noise might be something useful. So Harper, Silas, Morris, and Holt spent the next three hours reviewing every single call, cataloguing, cross-referencing, looking for patterns.

“White male, thirties, seen loitering near the paper mill two weeks ago,” Morris read from his notes. “Caller is a night security guard, says the guy was just sitting in his car watching the building.”

“Get a description, run it against known offenders,” Harper said. “And pull security footage from that night if it still exists.”

“Woman reports her ex-boyfriend fits the profile and has been ‘acting weird’ lately,” Holt added. “Weird how?” Harper asked.

“Quote: ‘He’s been really quiet and distant and won’t tell me where he goes at night.’”

“So like every guy going through a breakup,” Silas muttered. “But check him out anyway. Get his name, run his background.”

The work was tedious, exhausting, and necessary. This was how cases got solved—not through brilliant deductive leaps, but through grinding, methodical elimination of possibilities until only the truth remained.

At eleven a.m., Harper’s phone rang. Oregon State Police.

“Agent Sinclair? This is Detective Kelly Kowalski from OSP Major Crimes. I worked the Portland murders three years ago—Sarah Williams and Christina Park.”

Harper put the call on speaker. “Detective. What can I do for you?”

“I’ve been reviewing our case files after your people reached out about the connection to your current investigation. I think we might have more victims than we initially thought.”

Harper’s stomach dropped. “How many more?”

“Potentially three. All killed within a two-month window around the Williams and Park murders, all with similar victim profiles, but the bodies were found in different jurisdictions so we never connected them. Two in suburbs outside Portland, one in Salem.”

“Were they carved with symbols?”

“That’s the thing—no. But they were killed with a single deep cut to the carotid, positioned carefully post-mortem, and all three resembled the confirmed victims. We assumed they were unrelated because of the lack of ritualistic elements.”

Harper exchanged a glance with Silas. “He was experimenting. Trying different approaches.”

“That’s what I’m thinking now,” Kowalski said. “I’m sending you everything we have. Maybe fresh eyes will see something we missed.”

“Appreciated. And Detective? If you find any more possibles, send those too.”

“Will do.”

Harper hung up and added three more pins to their map. Fifteen victims now. Fifteen women dead over five years.

“He’s been more active than we thought,” Silas said quietly, not for the first time.

“Or we’re just now seeing the full scope.” Harper studied the map, the pins spreading across six states. “We need to coordinate better with other agencies. There could be more victims we haven’t found yet.”

Morris looked up from his computer. “I’ve got California on the line. Detective Domingo from Sacramento wants to talk to you about their unsolved case.”

Harper spent the next hour on the phone with California, then Washington, then Idaho. Each jurisdiction had evidence to share, theories to discuss, questions about the Blackridge investigation. By the time she finished, it was past noon and Harper’s head was pounding.

“Break,” Silas said, appearing at her elbow with a bottle of water and two aspirin. “You’ve been on the phone for three hours straight.”

Harper swallowed the pills gratefully. “We’re making progress. Building a comprehensive timeline across all jurisdictions.”

“And you’re burning out. When’s the last time you ate?”

Harper tried to remember. Breakfast had been coffee. Lunch had been...more coffee.