Chapter 3 - The Ghost on the Bus
Morgan took the day off under the pretext of a sudden migraine. The moment Julian’s car pulled out of the driveway for his purported "business meeting" downtown, Morgan gathered the sealed Mason jar and caught the westbound CTA bus toward Oak Park.
She rode the line back and forth for four grueling hours. Every time the doors hissed open, her heart pounded against her ribs. She scanned the rain-slicked platforms, watching commuters in heavy wool coats, mothers with strollers, and tired office workers. By the fourth rotation, despair began to gnaw at her. Had the old woman been a transient? A fluke?
Then, at the Austin Boulevard stop, the scent of dried lavender drifted into the bus before the passenger even stepped inside.
The woman wore the same grey trench coat and green wool beret. Her weathered face was carved with deep lines of sorrow and resolve. She swept her sharp, hawkish eyes across the interior, settling immediately on Morgan, who sat near the rear exit.
The old woman did not look surprised. She walked down the aisle with steady, deliberate steps and sat down in the vacant plastic seat directly beside Morgan.
“You soaked it,” the woman said without greeting or pleasantry. Her voice was raspy, scraped raw by age and grief.
“Who are you?” Morgan whispered, leaning in, her voice trembling. “What was on that chain?”
“Dimethyl sulfoxide blended with an untraceable cardiac glycoside,” the woman answered coldly. “A modern poisoner’s dream. Absorbs through the dermis in under three hours. Induces ventricular tachycardia. It looks like genetic heart failure to any coroner who isn't specifically looking for it.”
Morgan felt the blood drain from her face. “How could you possibly know that? Who are you to Julian?”
The woman turned her head slowly. Her eyes were rimmed with red, burning with a cold, unyielding fire. “Julian isn't his real name. Six years ago in Providence, Rhode Island, he went by Julian Mercer. Before that, in Philadelphia, he was Thomas Vance. And before that, he was my son-in-law.”
Morgan’s breath caught in her throat. The roar of the bus engine seemed to fade into a hollow hum.
“My name is Evelyn Vance,” the woman said, pulling an old, creased photograph from her coat pocket and pressing it into Morgan’s trembling palm.
In the photograph, a radiant, dark-haired woman with a sweet, open smile stood beside a younger Julian. The woman wore an elegant, vintage pearl choker.
“That was my daughter, Clara,” Evelyn said, her voice dropping to a harsh whisper. “Not your grandmother Clara—my daughter Clara. She inherited a historic brownstone and a substantial trust fund from her father. Eighteen months after their wedding, she died in her sleep of sudden cardiac arrest. The coroner found nothing. Julian liquidated the house, claimed the half-million-dollar estate, and vanished before the probate ink was dry.”
“Why didn't the police arrest him?” Morgan choked out.
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“Because there was no proof,” Evelyn spat bitterly. “Only a grieving mother’s intuition and a bathroom drain clogged with dissolved metal residue that nobody bothered to test. I spent five years hunting him across state lines. I found him in Chicago three months ago. And when I saw him buying that necklace from an illicit chemist in Bridgeport, I knew he had found his next mark.”
***
