Duct tape kept her hands and feet immobile. An old rag shoved into her mouth would keep her screams muffled once she woke. If she woke, he thought and scratched an itch through the ski mask that had begun to grow suffocating. Shortly after six this morning, with dark, gray clouds hiding the early morning light, he’d attacked her as she’d walked home from her night shift at the hospital. Wearing the ski mask, along with a mechanic’s jumpsuit he’d soak in bleach later—as he’d always done after a kill—he’d slapped a rag doused with chloroform over her mouth until she’d grown limp and passed out cold. Petite and weighing next to nothing, he’d easily stashed her in his waiting truck, then he’d brought her to his workshop. He glanced at the digital clock on the workbench. He’d knocked her out over an hour ago, and now he worried he’d underestimated the amount of chloroform she’d inhaled. Usually his victims, or even Garrett’s, were awake within twenty minutes.
