"Excuse my language, but what the actual fuck?" you stand in front of Lieutenant Elliott's desk very peeved.
"I don't think 'excuse my language' counts if you follow it with-" Trooper Wagner tries to add from his chair in the office before being silenced with a dismissive wave of your hand. Apparently you're scary when you get really mad, a factor that has certainly been used to your advantage.
"Y/n, it's a sensitive case, we don't know if this is anything yet or not. We're just following some leads and trying to solve this case, we haven't followed up on the idea that it's connected to your mother's case," Elliott responds calmly.
"Ok, then I'll look into it."
"Y/n, I really think you should just step back and let the police handle this."
"No, I'll take the case as a private investigator. If my father could solve Harlan's suicide, I can at least try to solve this." You continue snapping at Elliott.
"Yeah, so how's that going for you? Still getting mad at people and trying to kill them?" Wagner jokes, looking at Ransom who's just awkwardly leaning against the doorway like a child that was dragged to their parent's office party.
Ransom looks over at him and keeps his face emotionless, deciding to mess with him. "It varies from moment to moment," Ransom states.
Wagner looks slightly horrified, thinking Ransom is serious. Ransom smirks slightly as you look over, noticing the sudden unusual silence from Wagner.
"Ransom, be nice," you give him a slightly exhausted look.
"What? It was a good joke," he defends himself. You just sigh and turn back to Lieutenant Elliott.
"Please just help me, I want to solve this as much as you do. Just keep me in the loop, let me know if there's anything new and I'll share anything I find."
The lieutenant sighs and nods, "But if I get in trouble, this was your idea."
"Deal."
🔍🔪🔎
You sit on the couch, looking through the notes Elliott gave you on the case. Ransom is sitting next to you, watching you silently because he knows you don't like to be interrupted when you get focused. You glance over at him, feeling his gaze on the side of your face. You can't stop a slight blush from spreading across your cheeks.
"You want to know what's here, don't you?" you ask, knowing that Ransom just knows not to distract you. He nods and smiles slightly, proud that you know what he wants from a look.
You look back down at the notes. "Well, it was two teenagers... they were in a parked car, no one was around so they were probably there to... ya know.... anyways. The female was in the front seat, shot by a 9mm Luger apparently, the male was outside the car, probably trying to get help, but he was found dead, shot by the same gun," you clear your throat slightly as the reality of the horrible situation sinks in. "A man called the Police Department and told them about the murder, claiming that it was him... and... that he was the one that killed my mother as well... they uh... couldn't track the call, so it could be fake."
Ransom rubs your back gently. You lean into his side slightly, just in need of comfort. Everything he's done wrong just seems to slowly be slipping away from your mind in this moment. You just think back to all the good times you've had and how desperately you want them back. Just you and him together without the fear of him being taken from you for years.
"What are your theories?" he asks quietly, not wanting to press you when you're emotional, but unable to subdue his curiosity.
"Well... if the call was real, he's killed three people with about 18 years between... not unreasonable if he's older, maybe 40s. It doesn't seem like there's an obvious personal connection between the caller and any of the victims, so my guess would be a serial killer... there will probably be more cases popping up."
"Is this safe? If this guy is still out there, what if he goes after you? I don't want you to get hurt, Y/n."
You glance at Ransom slightly, reminded of how much you missed how sweet he could be. "I guess it's a possibility, but I won't be the only one taking that risk, the police are openly trying to catch him too."
"Then I'll help you. Maybe I can like get inside this guy's head, I could be a serial killer, so maybe I could think like him."
"Don't say that," you look at Ransom seriously, slightly hurt.
"What?"
"You're not a serial killer, Ransom. And you never will be and you couldn't be. That's not who you are."
He goes quiet, not knowing you were so upset about his situation. He assumed you'd be glad to see him go and move on quickly, but maybe he was wrong. He leans over and kisses your head gently.
"I'm sorry," he states quietly as he rests his forehead against the side of your head.
You blush slightly at the attention, "I know, just don't go saying stuff like that." He nods slightly.
🔍🔪🔎
You lay awake in bed that night. Ransom is sleeping on his stomach next to you with his face buried in his pillow. His arm is draped over you protectively. You hold his hand, gently running your thumbs over every detail of the back of his hand as your mind wanders through the case. You can't stop trying to think of something that could give you even the slightest push forward. Your mind feels like a blank slate. Maybe you're overthinking and need to try from a new angle.
You get so lost in your thoughts that you don't even notice Ransom wake up, and watch you out of the corner of his vision. That is until he speaks up.
"Y/n?"
You tense slightly, startled by the sudden sound of his voice. You look over at him.
"You know I love you, right?"
You hesitate. You haven't wanted to confront all these feelings, but you knew you'd have to sooner or later. You were just hoping for later rather than sooner. You nod, "I love you too, Ransom."
He smiles slightly and pulls you into his side with his one arm. He wraps his other arm around you and kisses your forehead before falling back asleep. He's the kind of person that can fall asleep the minute his head hits the pillow no matter what's going on around him. Something you had always envied.
You close your eyes and after at least a good hour of tossing and turning to get comfortable, you fall asleep.
🔍🔪🔎
You wake up early, ready for your usual morning run with Dodger, only to find that Ransom isn't in bed next to you. You head down to the kitchen where Ransom is grabbing two water bottles from the fridge. He turns around to put them on the counter and he spots you and smiles.
You can't help but stare slightly at the slightly too tight shirt he has on. Ransom certainly doesn't seem like the type that would have that level of muscular definition but oh damn is he ever.
"Ready to go?" Ransom asks, walking over and handing you a water bottle.
You take it, slightly confused. "Ready for what?"
"I'm going with you for your run, I want to spend more time with you," Ransom shrugs slightly.
"Ransom, you spend all day with me already."
"And somehow it's still not enough," he smirks and grabs Dodger's leash, running out of the house with him.
"Ransom, you ass!" you smile and run after him. You always hated letting him get the last word in any conversation and he knows it.
You catch up to him and just jump on his back piggyback style, holding on tightly so you won't fall off. He yelps, not expecting that and almost struggling to stay upright. He holds your legs and slows down.
"I don't think this counts as a run for you, Y/n," Ransom chuckles, smiling happily, finally able to forget about his problems and able to focus on spending time with you.
"Well it's your first morning run so you need to go twice as hard to keep so fit," you smile too.
You hop off his back and walk next to him. He, not so subtly, brushes the side of your hand with his pinky.
"If you want to hold my hand, just do it, you dork. I'm your fiancée, I think we're allowed to hold hands in public by now," you hold his hand and intertwine your fingers.
"Yeah? You took off the ring, Y/n..." he holds up your hand slightly.
"I... that was a mistake. I'm sorry, I'm putting it back on when we get home. I just don't want to think about... you know."
Ransom nods understandingly. He kisses your hand and you continue walking, giving up on actually running.
🔍🔪🔎
You get back inside your house and go to the kitchen to get a cold water bottle as Ransom takes the leash off Dodger's collar.
You make your way back to the living room, finding your ring on the coffee table right where you left it. You slip the ring back on and get up to go show Ransom.
As you stand up, you feel your phone buzz in your pocket. You take out your phone and quickly open the new message from the lieutenant. You see a picture of a letter and silently read it to yourself.
Your stomach drops as you read. It's a handwritten letter with various misspellings, confessing that the writer murdered the teenagers as well as your mother. The letter includes details about each murder that only the police and the murderer would know. Included in the letter was a cipher that the killer was demanding be printed on the front page of the newspaper, threatening further attacks if these demands were ignored. The letter is unsigned except for a symbol. A circle with a cross through it.
Ransom had wandered over while you were occupied with reading and rereading the letter, making mental notes of all the basic words being misspelled such as 'Christmas' becoming 'Christmass' and 'Fri' as in Friday becoming 'Fry'. Ransom looks over your shoulder and notices the symbol as well.
"What is that?" he asks.
"I don't know, but I plan on finding that out."
A/N:
I know I'm terrible at posting because there's such long waiting periods between chapters, but I'm really trying to be better at posting more frequently from now on, I just lost motivation this month. Anyways, since this story is based off a real case (which you might be able to guess by now with the symbol I mentioned) I feel the need to say that I mean no disrespect with this to anyone this case affected of course, it's just a fascinating case to me and I decided to use it for this story.
Thank you all for reading! I really didn't expect this sequel to get so much attention!
But I digress, thank you all for being amazing, much love💕