Page 95 of Knotted their Beauty

Thirty-Two

VES

I slowly pull into the parking lot of what has to be the sleaziest motel in the state of California, scanning the multiple cars, my eyes moving between some piece of shit from the seventies that has to be on its last leg, to the almost pristine BMW that looks like it just rolled off the showroom floor. I stare into the front windows of each room as I pass, my SUV creeping along until I’m forced to turn and go deeper into this cesspool.

Following the winding path full of potholes the size of craters, I almost bottom out when I hit a dead end, one single room tucked away in the furthest corner, hidden by unkempt landscaping and a busted street light.

If this were any other situation, I’d laugh at how fucking cliche it is.

Butler picked the one of only two rooms completely removed from the sex workers, drug addicts, and god knows who else is hiding out in this shithole, the people he could try to blame everything on, essentially flipping the switch on a neon sign that’s flashing I’m a piece of hot, rotting garbage, I’m in here and up to no good, and I’m begging to be found by someone who makes it their job to murder assholes like me.

Since, I’ve had a slight change in my career, it looks like I’m that someone today.

I park out of sight, avoiding the window on the room, then get out, placing a hand over the gun on my hip as I move toward the door.

“I don’t know who the hell you think you are,” I hear Butler say, confirming he is the idiot who rented this room. “But you have less than five seconds to get the hell out of here before I⁠—”

A gunshot rings out, shattering the glass a couple feet away from me, and I don’t even hesitate because my daughter is in there.

I kick open the front door, my gun drawn as I rush into the room but I stop short at what I see.

Butler is standing there in a white t-shirt and boxers, his suit crumpled in a pile on the floor, and he’s aiming his gun in the direction of the bathroom, but that’s not what makes this scenario even stranger—albeit infuriating—than it is.

No, it’s the two men aiming sawed off shotguns at him that he’s pointing his service weapon at.

I frown, moving my gun between them and my boss, my brow furrowing deeper as I pull my other gun from my shoulder holster.

The men are probably around six feet tall, six one at most, neither of them are what I’d call ripped, but I can tell that they’re both in extremely good shape with the way their clothes fit over the leaned, defined muscle. The clothes and what they’re wearing is just as unusual as their presence here.

The two men are dressed almost identically.

Black military grade combat boots covered by sterile booties. Black cargo pants and sweatshirts—one black, one burgundy—with the hoods pulled up and tightened over their heads, all of it sealed off and protected by a clear hazmat suit. They have multiple layers of tight, vinyl gloves on their hands, sleeves tucked into them and taped with duct tape around the wrists to secure them the same way the bottom of the suit is secured to the booties. And while all of that is very odd, it’s not the weirdest thing about how they look.

They’re wearing masks.

Masks that look like the faces of porcelain dolls, save for any kind of color to give them life.

Solid, aged white doll masks, tucked in and also taped to the hazmat hood, and the nose and eye holes have some sort of fine, black mesh on the inside, hiding the last trace of humanity you could find, and most likely acting as a preventative for leaving trace evidence.

It’s in that very second, as that last thought crosses my mind, I know exactly who I’m looking at, and why it’s been so hard to get a real profile for the serial killer I’ve been hunting.

These men are The Orphan, and they’ve been killing as a team the entire time.

“Thank god,” Butler spits as I point my second gun at the unknown men despite the fact that they aren’t the real criminals here. “It’s about damn time, I sent a call for backup as soon as these two broke in through the bathroom.”

I face my boss, noting how much he’s sweating, how frantic his movements are, and let my stare move over him again.

No, he didn’t. If he had, I would have heard the call over my radio, or been notified of it by phone as soon as he made it.

Lie number one.

He doesn’t know that I’m already onto him, that I already know he’s a sick, twisted, corrupt piece of shit, but I don’t think it would matter. I think Craig Butler would try to lie his way out of this no matter what he knew, and I don’t have fucking time for games because there are two other people missing from this scenario, and they’re the ones I’m most concerned about finding.

“Did you, now?”

Butler nods quickly, glancing at me before his eyes move back to the serial killers who have him in their sights. “We need to fix our system if response time is so delayed. That fucker almost took my head off.”

“I’m sure he did you a favor when he missed.”