Black Diaries

15. Fame and Glory

Five minutes after I was back from work that day, I was sitting at my computer, frantically hammering all variants of my name and description into any and every search engine I could think of. Call me a pessimist, but I think that a guy's parents won't be very pleased with his new girlfriend if they should happen to find out she's a bloodthirsty black widow. Parents normally don't like stuff like that. They're weird that way.

"Cassy Summers" didn't produce a lot of results that had to do with me. Next, I tried "Cassy McKinney," and that was a different story. Apparently, since I had stuck a knife into my husband, I had regained my maiden name.

The screen was littered with search results, quotations and pictures. My eyes landed on the line right under the search box, and I gaped. One million three-hundred and fifty-two thousand six hundred and thirty-seven search results.

I clicked on the first news site I came across.

The search continues for suspected murderess and black widow, Cassy McKinney. Not just the official forces of the law are on the lookout now. Ever since a reward has been offered, bounty hunters up and down the country are combing big cities, as well as the most remote hideouts, for the mysterious young woman who has such bloody crimes on her conscience.

Wait just a minute... reward? What reward?

It took me only a few moments to find out. An image search plastered my screen with posters of the face which I knew all too well from looking into the mirror. Beneath the photo, there was a number on the poster—a number with way too many zeros left of the dot and right of the dollar sign!

"Shit!" Turning to Lucky, I pointed at the screen, outraged. "Lucky, look! Look at that! They can't be serious! I can't be worth that much!"

Lucky flicked her tail at the screen dismissively. She didn't even raise her head.

"Don't you play the cool one! Have you any idea how many animal shelters could be financed with that kind of money? Typical of the government! Instead of using money for something useful, they just throw it away on unimportant stuff, like chasing after poor, harmless serial killers!"

Quickly, I jumped back from the picture search to the news site, wanting to see if there was anything crazier.

The police have issued another warning alerting the public of the dangerous nature of Cassy McKinney. By now, there is almost no doubt of her guilt. The body of her former husband, Matt Summers, was exhumed a few days ago--

"What? They dug him up? Poor dear! If I get my hands on those brutes..."

—and a vicious stab wound was discovered in his digestive tract.

"Vicious? Who are you calling vicious? It wasn't that big!"

And as if that were not enough, further sinister facts have come to light. Whereas at first, the investigators believed that this was an isolated crime of passion, the proponents of the theory that Cassy McKinney is in fact one of the monsters known as "serial killers" seem to be in the right. Besides traces of the murderess and her husband, blood from another person has been found at the scene. The current theory is that the totally innocent Matt Summers returned home from work one day early to catch his wife in the midst of her dark, murderous deeds—

"What the... you can't be serious! He discovering me?"

—and that he was eliminated in a desperate attempt to keep her bloody activities a secret. Detective Jones, the lead investigator on the case, is of the opinion that Cassy McKinney has stalked the countryside of Alabama for years, and many an unsolved murder or disappearance can be laid at her door.