But in the reflection, the officer wasn’t investigating a crime scene. He was pointing at Abby. Giving a signal.
Below the scratched-out face, written in pen so small he needed a magnifying glass: “The man who never existed. The reason I became a ghost.”
Inside was a single photograph and a handwritten note from a retired officer, now deceased. The photo showed a girl, maybe seventeen, with dark hair cut bluntly at her jaw and eyes that seemed to look past the camera, through the lens, through time itself. She was standing in front of a crumbling stone wall, her arms crossed, a small silver locket around her neck. On the back, in faded ink: Abby Winters, Roxbury, April 2004. abby winters 2004
Taggart didn’t remember the name. He ran it through the system: no driver’s license, no social security number after 2005, no credit history, no death certificate. Abby Winters had been a ghost before she ever became a case.
Taggart’s phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number: You’re getting warm, Detective. Meet me at Bickford and Marcy. Midnight. Come alone. And bring the locket. But in the reflection, the officer wasn’t investigating
And somewhere out there, in the dark of Bickford and Marcy, a shadow that had been waiting since 2004 was about to move.
Taggart pocketed the locket, checked his sidearm, and walked out into the April rain. Below the scratched-out face, written in pen so
He looked down at the evidence box again. Tucked beneath the photo, he now saw, was the locket itself—he had missed it the first time. He opened it.