The Tenant In 4B Pt. 2
Manhunt
Two weeks later, in another housing project across town, a strange man in his early fifties signed a lease for a vacant apartment. He carried a duffel bag and a toolbox. The property manager showed him around the property, pointing out some of the common complaints the unreliable heating and the faulty plumbing system.
"I'll need to make some modifications. For Security reasons."
The property manager didn’t think nothing of it and handed him the keys.
That same night, the drilling began.
Detective Maria Santos had seen enough crime scenes to know that you need a strong stomach for this, but apartment 4B made her pause at the threshold. The forensics team was already photographing everything, their camera flashes illuminating the makeshift torture chamber in stark white bursts.
Maria Santos: “Officer Chen, any sign of the girl?”
Chen who was dusting the doorframe for prints.
Officer Chen: “Nothing yet. But we found something else.”
Chen led her to the bedroom closet, where they’d discovered a hidden panel behind a false wall. Inside was a collection of driver’s licenses, social security cards, and photographs—at least a dozen different identities, all with Mr. Greene’s face but different names.
Detective Santos: “Thomas Mitchell, David Warren, Robert Hayes…” She flipped through the IDs. “This goes back fifteen years. How long has he been doing this?”
More disturbing were the photographs tucked between the fake documents: Polaroids of young women, all taken from a distance. Surveillance photos. Some showed the subjects at work, others walking to their cars in parking garages or entering their apartment buildings. Shanice’s face appeared in at least six of the photos.
The apartment complex residents had gathered in the courtyard below, their voices carrying up through the broken windows. Santos could hear little bits of their conversations—anger, fear, and the uncomfortable realization that a killer had been living among them for weeks.
Ms. Perkins was holding court near the mailboxes, her earlier warnings now vindicated.
Ms. Perkins: “I told y’all something wasn’t right about that man. All that bleach, those strange hours. Nobody stopped to listened an old woman.”
Dante stood apart from the crowd, smoking nervously. He kept replaying that moment when he’d opened the door, wondering what would have happened if he’d pushed the door further open. The bucket of acid would have hit him square in the face.
Inside the apartment, the forensics team had made another discovery. In the kitchen behind refrigerator, they found a notebook filled with meticulous handwriting. Names, addresses, schedules. Mr. Greene had been studying his neighbors like specimens.
The entry for Shanice read: Works nights, walks home alone, no boyfriend, mother works double shifts at the hospital. Perfect.
But there were others: Maria from 2A - too many visitors. Tyrell from 4A - too nosy, eliminated. Jennifer from 1C - promising, but has a dog.
Detective Santos felt a chill as she realized the scope of his planning. This wasn’t random violence—it a psychopath on the loose.
Officer Chen called her over to the bathroom, where they’d found something else behind the wall of bleach bottles. A metal toolbox, much like the one witnesses had seen Mr. Greene carry when he first arrived. Inside were surgical instruments, restraints, and a cell phone.
The phone’s recent call history showed only one number, called repeatedly over the past three weeks. Santos dialed it.
A gravelly voice answered on the second ring.
Voice: “Package ready for pickup?”
Santos: “This is Detective Santos with Metro Police. Who am I speaking to?”
The line went dead immediately.
Outside, the crowd was growing restless. News vans had arrived, and reporters were trying to interview anyone willing to talk. The story was spreading: “Serial Killer’s Lair Discovered in Housing Project.”
But Santos knew they were missing key to the puzzle. Mr. Greene hadn’t just vanished—he’d disappeared with purpose. The apartment had been abandoned and look like someone left in hurry , but not randomly. Certain things were gone: his clothes, the duffel bag witnesses remembered, and most telling of all, any photographs or documentation of his most recent activities.
Jamal, the teenager who’d delivered food to the apartment, approached Detective Santos hesitantly.
Jamal: “Detective, I remembered something else. That night I brought him food? I saw him loading something into a van. White van, no windows in the back. And there was someone else with him.”
Santos: “Someone else? Can you describe them?”
Jamal: “Older guy, maybe sixties. White hair, real thin. They were carrying something heavy between them. Wrapped in a tarp.”
The pieces were starting to form a picture Santos didn’t like. Mr. Greene hadn’t been working alone, and if he’d fled, it meant he might surface somewhere else. Some other apartment building, some other hunting ground.
As the forensics team continued their work, Santos stepped onto the small balcony overlooking the courtyard. The residents below looked up at her with a mixture of expectation and fear. They wanted answers, wanted to know they were safe.
But standing there, looking out at the maze of similar apartment buildings stretching into the distance, Santos realized the terrifying truth: Mr. Greene could be anywhere, setting up shop in another 4B, introducing himself to another property manager, carrying nothing but a duffel bag and a toolbox.
The hunt for Shanice had become something much larger—a race to find a predator who had perfected the art of hiding in plain sight, and who was undoubtedly already scouting his next hunting ground.
In the distance, a white van without rear windows pulled away from the curb three blocks over, its occupants invisible behind tinted glass.