Then the syringe appears.
A cold needle presses into my neck before I can react and bites. A sharp sting floods my veins, and weakness crashes over me all at once. My body turns heavy, useless.
This can’t be happening.
Every explanation I clung to dissolved the moment he removed the lenses from his eyes. The blue beneath was the exact same shade as Zayne’s.
How matters more than why.
How did no one notice him slipping into the investigation? How did no one recognize his face, or the truth standing in front of them this entire time?
He lifts me with little effort. The chain around my ankle loosens, metal clinking as it falls on the floor. I try to move, but my limbs refuse to listen. I try to fight, but my muscles give nothing back. My tongue tingles, then goes numb. My lips follow.
Whatever he injected into me strips away everything.
I am nothing now. Just weight. Just a body in his hands.
He carries me down the corridor. Red light bleeds from the room ahead, staining the walls as we pass through the doorway. Inside, there is only a table. Mirrors surround it on every side, reflecting me over and over again from every angle.
He lays me down.
Leather restraints close around my wrists. My ankles follow, forced apart, spread wide.
I stare at the ceiling, my chest rising in shallow breaths.
This is it, I think.
This is how I die.
This is the beginning of hell.
He hums a tune as he lowers himself into the chair. The sound crawls under my skin. He drags the chair closer, close enough that I feel his breath when he leans in.
“Let me tell you a story,” he says.
Cold metal flashes. The scalpel presses into my left wrist, and a sharp sting follows.
“In 2009, I met this gorgeous woman,” he says. “I fell in love.”
He chuckles, shoulders lifting in a careless shrug.
“Then I found out she’s married. To a cop.”
A loud laughter spills from him.
“The irony, right?”
A tear slips from the corner of my eye, tracking slowly down my temple.
I can’t speak. I can’t move.
“I challenged him,” he continues. “I killed women who looked just like her. Just to thrill him.”
His voice stays light.
“When I finally asked her to choose me, she couldn’t. She chose him.”
His grin stretches wide, teeth bared as his face moves closer to mine.
