I thanked McIntyre for her concern and reiterated that I was in full control.

Then I closed my eyes and counted the heartbeats resonating in my hollow chest.

TWENTY

Trust is a trickster. A con man. A shark. We think we know it. We tell ourselves it’s a simple emotion. Either it’s present or it’s not.

Before Bram took me, I trusted in myself. I knew where I came from and where I was going. I was sure about my life. If not for him, I’d still be in full possession of the mettle I once prided myself on. I’d never have drawn my weapon during an interview with a witness. And I would know with certainty whether Carson’s warning about Tim was a harbinger of dangers to come.

Bram changed everything.

It was a Friday, and after a week of long hours collaborating with the Seventh Precinct on the murders of Becca, Lanie, and Jess, I was spent. I’d followed a breadcrumb trail of eyewitness accounts, had spoken with everyone from the missing women’s friends and loved ones to bar patrons and strangers on the street. I felt duty bound to find the guy. The fact that he claimed to be from Swanton made me feel connected to him. I had an obligation to figure out how my hometown could have produced such a monster. I needed to know who he was.

I should have gone home to a hot shower and a cold glass of wine, but instead I walked to Tompkins Square Park. Bram’s most recent victim had been found across the street at a construction site. I wanted to take another look around to see if there was something I missed.

I wandered the park for twenty minutes before it started to rain. There was an Irish pub down the block, its picture window emitting a warm and welcoming glow. A beer. That’s what I needed. A few minutes to clear my head.

Scanning the bustling pub from the threshold, I shook off my coat and took a seat at the bar. The bartender, a freckled brunette like me, smiled and said, “What’ll you have?”

A lucky break, I thought. A sign. There was a theory going around the precinct that Bram lived in the neighborhood. Sooner or later someone would recognize him. His days of ensnaring victims through the dating app were over. The papers had reported on the murders, the women of the East Village were on high alert, and we were monitoring IP addresses associated with user bios on the site. Bram would be crazy to go that route again, but I wasn’t convinced that meant he was done. Call it intuition, but I knew he was still out there. I just didn’t know where to look.

The pub received a steady stream of off-duty office workers looking for shelter from the cold September drizzle and a well-deserved Friday drink. A group of women with flat-ironed hair came in and went straight to the bar. I heard them debating cocktail options to kick off their night.