It was the longest wait of his life. Police officers came and went, every one of them who knew him offering a warm greeting, everyone who didn’t giving him a hard stare. Logan was used to such looks – being as big as he was seemed to put people on edge. It was useful in some areas of life, but in others, it just made things harder. Like innocently waiting for some news outside the police station.
The sun had been up for a couple of hours. Peters’s personal car was in the lot, and now he waited with bated breath for the news. It made him nervous just to think about, and a weird, knotted sensation formed in his stomach. It sucked away his appetite and only added to his exhaustion. He could barely wait any longer.
It was a little after nine when Peters came out the front doors. He spotted Logan at the bottom of the steps and hurried down them, checking over his shoulders as if he were doing something wrong. This likely meant he wasn’t supposed to know whatever information he had acquired overnight.
“There’s an ID on the body,” he said.
Logan snapped to attention. A wave of heat rose and then crushed him, drawing sweat from his temple. He had never been this anxious. “And?”
“It’s not your girl. It’s not Jenny.”
“You’re certain of that?”
“Positive.”
A sigh of relief escaped him. He even went so far as to smile, but that smile quickly disappeared when he realized it was still someone’s daughter who had just been cut apart and left for dead. “Did you find out who she belongs to?”
“Does the name Lila Stevenson mean anything to you?”
“Nothing.”
Peters nodded. “I thought as much. She’s a New Yorker. Came over here for the weekend to study some building for a story she was writing. Must have walked down the wrong street and ended up like this. At least that’s what her parents think.”
“You’ve notified them already?”
“We don’t like to waste time.”
“Clearly.”
Logan stretched, pressing his hands into his lower back until it let off a small pop. He exhaled with it, realizing just how much stress this whole ordeal was causing him. “What the hell’s going on?” he asked. “Who’s doing this to those women?”
“I don’t know.” Peters shook his head with dismay. “It’s pretty twisted.”
“You think it’s the same person? The Doctor?”
“No reason to suspect otherwise. You?”
“I hope not, because that means Jenny is probably next.”
Peter bit his lip thoughtfully. Then, “He must store them.”
“The women?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s what I thought, too,” Logan said honestly. “There’s little to no chance he found the time to go out and get the next victim right after he killed the last one. But you know what sinks that theory? He came and got Jenny pretty swiftly.”
Peters agreed. “What will you do now?”
“Now…” Logan took a breath, understanding his next words were the grim truth and nothing but. He was stuck, clueless, with nowhere else to go. “Now, I have no idea.”