Duskwood Mysteries

Part 22

I stood in shock and utter confusion at what was just exchanged. "You're his accomplice?" I asked Jake. He nodded. "Why Jake?" I asked, "Why did you do this? To Hannah?" "Hannah? What are you talking about?" he asked. "Great. Are you going to deny that you have nothing to do with Hannah's kidnapping?" I asked accusingly. "Absolutely." Jake said. "That's what I've been trying to tell you," Richy interrupted. I felt like I was having a brain freeze, "Then what are you guys hiding and colluding together for?" I asked. "For finding Hannah." Richy said. "You guys are not making any sense." I said. "Start from the beginning."

Jake and Richy shared a look. Jake sighed, "Alright I guess you have to know now. Richy and I have been working together independently from the others and parallelly to find Hannah." "Since when?" I asked. "Probably before you joined the picture." Richy said. "What?" I said looking at Jake. He looked away. "Yes. When your number was floating around in the group, I thought I had to eliminate people from the group as suspects. So, I started one by one. Trust me it wasn't easy. I started by trying to find out their whereabouts on the day Hannah went missing. Unfortunately, for some reason most members of this group are not avid phone and social media users, so it was difficult to track their timelines." Jake said. I kept my gaze on him not saying a word. "I was able to track one person's whereabouts though accurately....Richy." Jake said. "How?" I asked. "Because I wasn't in Duskwood that day." Richy said. "Precisely, he was 5 towns over and there were social media pictures which I confirmed by checking the surveillance footage from the location." Jake said. "Really? What was he doing? Reading to the blind I presume," I said sarcastically. "Close. I was participating in a car race. I won by the way." Richy said smugly. I rolled my eyes. "He could still be involved. Maybe he wanted that as an alibi. But who am I talking to? I don't even know what you were upto either." I said angrily directing it to both of them. Richy flinched but Jake ignored it. "No, I confirmed it. The footage was not doctored. Everything Richy said checks out. Hannah's car was in his garage and she had called him to ask him about it on the day she disappeared." Jake said. "But she called the shop.." I started. "I wasn't in so I had all calls directed to my mobile." Richy said. "That's why Jessy had no idea that Hannah had called that day." I said. "That's correct." Jake said. "Ok I understand why you trust Richy but what have you guys been working together on?" I asked. Jake cleared his throat, "I wanted Richy to ask and find out where the others were while I checked everything about you. But he couldn't find anything concrete. I even got to Duskwood to work together but Richy just wasn't assertive enough to dig things about his friends. We had a lot of arguments on that as well." "Wait, the loud voices that Cleo heard from your garage? That was you? And basically, he was doing what I am doing right now." I said. "Yes it was me. I had the intuition that if the culprit is within the group he/she would not let it slip away that easily and besides with them chatting with you, there are ways they can bluff easily. So the focus went on finding Hannah and away from finding who was guilty." Jake said. "Based on Alfie's story, Hannah was taken away by the man without a face into the forest. That was a lead but not a reliable one until the search of the woods was declared. Remember the one Cleo's mom had initiated?" Richy asked. "Yes I remember, but it was cancelled because we got that video about Cleo and the pictures that the kidnapper had clicked of her." I said. "Exactly, that kinda narrowed down our search area to the Duskwood forest. The kidnapper did not want us to search them. So, we had a starting point." Richy said.

"However, Dan's accident and the attack on Jessy kinda swerved our plans in another direction. Well not much Dan's accident but Jessy's attack yes. Also, Richy got marked around the same time as well. Somehow, we know the kidnapper is working based on the Legend of the Man without a face. And the weird part is, he showed himself on the camera when Jessy was attacked, making a statement which meant that we were close to something and he wanted to scare us away." Jake said. "I know all that. So, what did you guys do next?" I asked. "We had to start searching the woods, but it was a vast area, so we were trying to narrow down that as well. But then Lilly went all ballistic and put a bright red target on me." Jake said. "So, you had to abandon that plan." I said. "Yes, there was no way I was safe in Duskwood. So, I left trying to spread my tracks while you gathered more intel. And I had to wait until the danger was gone." Jake said. "Okay how does Richy's "disappearance" fit in all this?" I asked.

"After the heat on Jake had died down thanks to you and Lilly, we focused on narrowing down the forest area to search for Hannah. Two things helped: Amy's body and the way the kidnapper works." Richy said. "I don't get it," I said. "First thing, the kidnapper dragged Hannah into the forest, so he seems to know his way around the woods meaning he is well versed with the place. It's like his comfort zone. Amy's body was found near the forest. If we go by the fact that Hannah's kidnapper and Amy's murderer are the same person, then he would absolutely need a place that would not attract any attention and was far away from the people as possible. Basically secluded. Definitely not in the town. " Jake said. "Like the dare house in the forest," I exclaimed. Richy smiled. "Yup the dare house gave us an idea. The dare house was actually a cabin that was used many years ago by hunters or tourists or some people of Duskwood to be away from the noisy town. But it wasn't the only cabin, there were many built which were scattered all around the forest." Richy said. "Which could be the kidnapper's hiding place and that's what we intended to do. Search the cabins. Some cabins were privately owned whereas some were open for tourists. They were scattered far away from each other for privacy. Richy kinda knew the forest so I got to Duskwood to work together secretly without letting anyone know. Alas, more developments put a dent in our plans. Jessy getting marked, Phil's arrest and the group thinking of leaving Duskwood. That was dangerous. We hadn't eliminated anyone from the rest of the group and them leaving Duskwood could be disastrous. So, we thought of two ways to keep them here. One was Richy's idea of staying in a cabin which would baffle the kidnapper and the second was the attack on Richy." Jake said. "Yup, we first thought the guilty person from the group would give away some clue by saying that staying in the cabin was a bad idea but since that didn't happen, we had to stage an attack on me. The attack on me would sentimentally make sure the guys stayed and also legally bind them to be here as they are my friends and one of the few people who had seen me last." Richy said. "But why the video call to me?" I asked. "You were the other person who we trusted. If anyone else in the group is working with the kidnapper and we don't know who, picking someone who could be a culprit would probably tip our hand off. So you were our best option." Jake said. "And did you guys find anything?" I asked. "We didn't find anything. I did continue the search on my own when Jake left but I came up with nothing. All cabins were clean and I had to do that all by myself as Romeo here had to manage a huge crisis." Richy said looking at me. "My arrival in Duskwood." I said. "I was devastated with what I saw on the call. That was a lie? And you guys thought the best way to do this was by stabbing Richy? Do you guys know that things could have gone out of hand? How could you guys do this and not tell me? This was so risky." I looked at both Jake and Richy. Richy looked at Jake.

"I thought it was best to keep you in the dark and let you find information while we found Hannah. And trust me we had everything under control. Richy would have never been in harm's way. We had a plan for that as well. Richy would be "found" injured. We made sure that as soon as Richy was injured, there would be someone to take him to the hospital. The hikers were someone we had planted. They were also medical professionals who would make sure that Richy was fine. Besides I had the feeling you would break and tell the others because you would feel sorry for them." Jake said. Each word hit me like a stab from a knife. Richy was never in danger and Jake knew about this. I sat down on a chair with my head in my hands. All this that I had gone through in the past few days was for absolutely nothing?