Page 307 of Sinister

Fiona appears surprised by my words, but that doesn’t stop her from handling me roughly.

“You should have thought about your baby before this,” she snarls. “You’re done for, Valentine.”

She tightens her grip over my arms, and I start believing that perhaps I really am done for—that this is the end. My mind feels foggy and tight, my vision dimming by the second, and yet there’s still this instinct to survive.

I push back with my leg. I don’t know where my blow lands, but judging by the ow sound she makes, I think it did land somewhere.

The handcuffs brush against my wrist. I draw my leg back and kick again, this time hitting her in the stomach. It works, just enough for me to shake off the cuffs, throw them to the side, and get on my hands and knees so I can propel myself upward and run again.

But she reaches for me, her hands circling my ankle, and I cannot move.

“Let go!” I cry out. Using my other leg, I try to hit her in the face.

“I won’t allow you to get away,” she tells me.

“I haven’t done anything! I’m not evil,” I grit out.

I’m out of breath, tired and aching. The ground is cold. Fiona’s grip on my ankle is tight and relentless. I don’t know how much longer I can hold on since my strength is waning by the second.

Soon, my body will betray me, and I’ll . . .

No, I can’t die.

Fiona snorts at me. “You’re not evil?” she chuckles at me. “Of course you’d think that.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’ve been watching you from the beginning, Petra. I know everything about you.”

I blink.

“E-everything?” I whisper.

“Everything,” she confirms in a smug tone. “Martinez didn’t believe me, but I knew. Call it a woman’s intuition, but I was so sure of you.”

Martinez? I rack my brain until I remember that’s the name of her partner. But . . . does that mean they’re in this together? Have they been killing people in fucked-up satanic rituals as a team?

At first, it seems ludicrous to even consider—two detectives, people of the law, going on a murder spree. But the more I think about it, the more I realize that the way the murders occurred, it seems impossible only one person would be behind them.

Especially a woman—not feminist of me, I know. But Fiona is not a large woman. She might have FBI training, but there’s just no way she would have the strength to chop a body up into pieces.

“If it hadn’t been for that boyfriend of yours, I would have got to you faster.”

“W-what? What are you talking about?”

She rolls her eyes. “As if you don’t know. Every single time I tried to look into you, your boyfriend would coincidentally show up. Don’t think I don’t know you asked him to threaten me.”

“Threaten you?” I stare at her in shock. “What the hell are you on? I never did that.”

She narrows her eyes at me.

“For weeks, I’ve been trying to come to your house for a meeting. Every single time, your boyfriend answered the door to tell me you were not home.”

What? But . . . weeks? Sin and I weren’t even together at that point, were we? Although granted, with his abilities, he would be able to intervene at the drop of a hat, more so considering he’s been watching me constantly.

Then where the hell is he now?

If he’s such an expert at watching me, then how could he miss my absence? Did he blink, and suddenly I was gone? For fuck’s sake, if he wants to call himself a stalker, he’d better stalk better.