EveryoneexceptDetective Sawyer.
Despite my best efforts, she remained distant and cold, almost antagonistic at times. Her instincts were too sharp, too finely honed by years of hunting killers who hid in plain sight. She must have sensed something off about me, even if she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what, like a prey animal sensing a predator nearby.
Actually, no.
She wasn’t prey.
She was another predator.
And that was what made her so dangerous. There weretimes I swore she could see through me, every carefully buried thought and secret laid bare under the weight of her stare.
But I knew that was an irrational fear to have.
My kills always masqueraded as something else: suicides that fit the profile, run-of-the-mill accidents, natural deaths attributed to underlying health conditions. Most people were more than willing to accept the easiest explanations. As far as Detective Sawyer was concerned, my crimes didn’t even exist.
Still, it didn’t hurt to be cautious.
When I looked back, I found Naomi watching me with open amusement.
I cleared my throat.
As it turned out, my carefully crafted attempts to seem more likable to Detective Sawyer had an unfortunate side effect: most of my coworkers were now convinced I was hopelessly pining after her—not that I’d done much to correct that assumption. If anyone wondered why I kept trying to win the detective over, despite her obvious disinterest, the romantic angle suited me just fine. But logic and rationality offered no defense against the small, infuriating sting of rejection.
“Don’t say a word,” I warned Naomi before she could open her mouth.
She pressed her lips together and mimed zipping them shut.
I exhaled slowly through my nose and grabbed the crossword puzzle off my desk, filling in the blanks.
D-U-P-L-I-C-I-T-O-U-S
Annoyingly, the word was the perfect fit.
2
Shay
Donovan sat behind his desk, displeasure etched into every line of his face. The massive stretch of polished wood took up half the room,most definitelynot overcompensating for anything. An array of medals gleamed proudly on the wall behind him, a spotless illusion of integrity, perfectly preserved behind glass. The rest of the office wore the same uninspiring beige as every other bureaucratic tomb in the building, interrupted only by military commendations and yellowing newspaper clippings from decades ago.
“Any new leads?” Donovan asked, his gold watch catching the light as he flipped through the file.
“Not yet, sir. We’re still working on it.”
There was a low hum. Another page turned.
“And what about Jared Finch?” Donovan asked, with all the energy of someone going through the motions.
“We haven’t found any evidence linking him to the crime scene.”
The case had turned out to be trickier than expected—the kind that followed me home and crawled into bed with me atnight, keeping me wide awake at 3 a.m., staring holes in the ceiling.
There were no witnesses. No DNA. No fingerprints.
All I had was a body and a long list of dead ends.
It was a good thing that I loved a challenge.
Donovan clicked his pen once, twice, the sound loud in the otherwise quiet room. Finally, he set the file down. “Interview him again.”
