“The piece of shed snakeskin was small, but I contacted a friend who’s an expert in reptiles, and he examined it for me. He said they were vernal scales from the snake’s belly. The sample that we found was about half the width of the body, which is consistent with a python from Australia. He ran a DNA test on the sample that we had, and it looks like the snake your killer has is a black-headed python. It’s found only in northern Australia so there is no chance that the shed skin got there by accident or was already there when he dumped the body. The shed skin was on the blanket, that means your killer owns a black-headed python.”
Short black hair, owns a snake, their picture of the Nursery Rhyme Killer was slowly becoming a little bit clearer.
* * * * *
3:12 P.M.
“Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop,” he screamed, pacing up and down the room.
Why wouldn’t the baby stop crying?
What was wrong with it?
It had been going on for hours.
“If you let me go to him, I can calm him down.”
He froze, spun around, and glared at the woman. She hadn’t said much since she’d woken up here, he wasn't sure why. The teapot lady had yammered away at him incessantly. But this woman was quiet. She just lay there in the wooden box staring at him.
Perhaps she was in shock?
He didn’t know much about that.
He didn’t know much about anything that normal people seemed to experience.
He knew he wasn't normal.
Normal people didn’t kill other people.
Maybe he should feel sad or concerned or … something … because he wasn't normal. But he didn’t.
Right now, all he felt was annoyed.
The stupid baby had been crying ever since he grabbed it and its mother in the garage. He’d made sure to catch the woman when the chloroform made her pass out, and he’d made sure to keep hold of the infant, so why wasn't it grateful? He could have let it smash into the concrete floor, but he’d been thoughtful, the bratty baby had no right to show no gratitude.
Angry, he stalked over to the table where he had set the child and snatched it up, intending to shake some sense into it.
“He’s hungry,” the woman said quickly.
He stopped. “Hungry?”
“Yes, I usually feed him every couple of hours.” She curled her fingers around the metal bars that blocked the small head-sized hole in the box’s lid he had stashed her in. She had her face pressed against the bars trying to get a look at both him and her child.
He sometimes got cranky when he hadn’t eaten so he supposed he could forgive the infant for a similar reaction. “Okay. Fine.”
“If you let me out, I can feed him, and he’ll go to sleep,” the woman said.
That sounded like a trick of some sort. She wanted out of the box so she could run. Or possibly even perform some sort of magical spell on him. No. It was definitely safer to keep her in the box. That was a safe place. He had made it especially to keep those he brought here. She couldn’t perform any magic while she was in there. He couldn’t risk letting her out and having her get the upper hand, he had to keep her in there. “I’ll feed him.”
“You can’t, I breastfeed,” she protested.
He stormed over to the bag the woman had been holding when he’d grabbed her in the garage. He’d specifically brought it with him in case he needed it. He picked it up and shook out the content. “So, there’s nothing in here to shut him up?” he roared. That was ridiculous. He couldn’t take another second of the child’s whining.
“Please, just let me hold him,” she begged.
“No,” he yelled. “Absolutely not, and don’t ask me again.”
This day was not turning out like he had planned. He had been looking forward to it. He’d been excited. The woman and her child had intrigued him from the second he’d first seen them. He had known instantly that they were his next victims.