She went over to her bookcase, reaching between a couple of reference books to remove a box file and taking it over to sit at the small coffee table. With her usual research, Paige liked to keep the files on her computer, but not this. This was far too personal.
Slowly, she took out the old newspaper clippings, the fragments of reports that she’d been able to find, a couple of maps, several photographs, and her own notes made over several years. There were her notes on the few interviews with people she’d been able to get, using her PhD thesis as a cover to go and talk to them.
It meant that she had a lot of information, and Paige had read it over so many times that she knew the basics about this serial killer by heart. The Exsanguination Killer had been active for perhaps three years before he killed her father, although Paige knew that there was always the possibility of finding an older case somewhere further down the line.
To date, he seemed to have killed as many as fifteen people, mostly preferring men, although one woman had also been killed alongside a man, apparently when she had interrupted the kill and he hadn’t been able to get away. The murders were big enough to make the news whenever they happened, and distinctive enough that they weren’t likely to be mistaken for anything else, so Paige was fairly confident of the numbers.
His methods were consistent: he immobilized his targets using a stun gun, bound them, took them to a secluded location if they weren’t in one already and then cut major veins so that they would bleed out slowly but surely. It seemed to be a point of pride for him to inflict the minimum of additional trauma with no major slashes or stabs to the bodies. All the wounds seemed to have been made with some kind of very thin, very sharp blade: probably a scalpel.
The majority of the murders had taken place in the open air, and the couple that had been indoors had taken place in secluded cabins out in the woods. This wasn’t a man who was attacking targets in their homes.
Beyond that, Paige knew that she didn’t have nearly enough information. There were limits to how much she had access to, even as a researcher into serial killers. She didn’t have the full police files on the murders and had no idea if there was useful trace evidence that might allow her to finally find him. She guessed not, because the police might have found him by now if there was.
One she joined the FBI fully, she might be able to look closer. It was just one more reason to make sure that she completed her training successfully.
The Exsanguination Killer’s last kill had been a couple of years ago. He’d been dormant since then. It was possible that some change in life circumstances had stopped him from killing or shifted his focus away from it. Some killers stopped temporarily while they were in relationships or in prison on some minor charge. Maybe the killer was even dead. For all Paige knew, he might have had a heart attack walking down the street.
As horrible a thought as it was, Paige hoped not. She hoped that this was only a temporary pause. She hoped that he would kill, or try to kill, again. It wasn’t enough for her for the murders to stop. She had to know who had done this. She had to have answers.
Paige was still contemplating that when she heard a knock on her door, loud enough that she jumped. She couldn’t imagine who would be there at this time of the morning.
She went over to the door, looking through the spyhole, and was surprised to find Christopher standing there, a worried look on his face. He raised his hand to knock again, and Paige pulled the door open.
“You’re awake, that’s good. I need you to get ready to go as quickly as possible.”
“Why?” Paige asked. “What’s happened?”
Something must have happened to bring him around here. She couldn’t imagine him coming around just because he wanted to see her. Well, a part of Paige could imagine it, but she also knew that it wasn’t ever going to happen.
“There’s been another murder.”