Chapter 33
Jiya
The smell of old coffee and lemon-scented cleaning products fills the interrogation room. The metal chair digs into my back, and the fluorescent lights buzz overhead, washing everything in a sickly pallor that makes even Detective Ramirez’s warm brown skin look gray.
I keep my breathing steady. In through the nose, out through the mouth. My hands rest on the table, not clenched, not fidgeting. The perfect picture of confused innocence.
“Ms. Kline, let’s go over this again.” Ramirez slides a photo across the metal table. Elisha Briggs stares up at me from the glossy paper, his smug smile captured mid-laugh at some fundraiser. “You’re sure you don’t remember serving this man at Penumbra?”
The other detective—Michaels, he’d introduced himself—leans against the wall behind her, arms crossed, watching me with the patience of a man who’s done this a thousand times.
“Like I said, Detective, we get hundreds of customers a week.” I don’t touch the photo. “He’s not a regular. If he came in once or twice, I wouldn’t necessarily remember him.”
This was a clean job. Perfect. I’d been so careful with Elisha. They can’t have anything concrete. Just circumstantial connections they’re fishing with.
“Elisha Briggs ordered three of your signature drinks that night. The “Pink Death”—interesting name, by the way. Very fitting.” Her eyes glint. “Still don’t remember him?”
“Lots of people order that drink. It’s popular.”
Ramirez raises an eyebrow. “Even though you spent over an hour chatting with him at the bar? Even though multiple witnesses saw you flirting with him?”
I shrug. “I flirt with lots of customers. It’s part of the job. Better tips.”
“And what about going home with him? Is that part of the job, too?”
“I don’t sleep with customers.”
Michaels snorts from his position against the wall. “That’s not what your coworker says. Jake, right? Says you left with Briggs around closing time. Says you looked cozy together.”
My pulse spikes, but I keep my voice level. Jake wasn’t even working that night. They’re fishing, trying to get me to contradict myself.
“If he says he saw me leave with anyone, he’s mistaken.”
“Is he?” Ramirez leans forward. “Or are you lying to protect yourself?”
“I’m telling the truth.”
Ramirez pulls out more photos, arranging them in a neat row. Elisha Briggs again, but this time he’s sprawled naked across silk sheets, eyes open and glassy, mouth slack. The purple discoloration around his neck stands out against the white bedding.
I let my eyes widen in manufactured shock, my hand flying to my mouth as I push my chair back slightly from the table. “Is he dead?”
“You know he’s dead.” Ramirez’s voice hardens. “You killed him, Ms. Kline. You flirted with him at the bar, convinced him to take you home, and then you poisoned him while he was expecting something very different.”
My heart hammers against my ribs, but I keep my face neutral. “That’s ridiculous. I told you, I might have flirted with him—I do that with lots of customers—but I never went home with him.”
Ramirez’s lips curl into something that isn’t quite a smile. “Then perhaps you can explain this.”
She slides a tablet across the table and taps play. The grainy security footage shows the lobby of an upscale apartment building. A woman with pink hair wearing black enters the elevator.
The woman is me.
Ice floods my veins. An elevator security camera. How could I have missed it? I’d been so careful to take the glasses with me, to leave no prints, no DNA. But I missed the hidden camera. Fuck.
“That’s not—” I start, but my mouth is dry.
“It’s not you?” Ramirez finishes. “It’s fascinating how much this woman resembles you. Same height, same build. Even has your distinctive pink hair.”
I swallow hard. “Lots of women have pink hair.”
I stare at the tablet, at my face captured in pixels. My mind races through options, excuses, explanations—none of them good enough.
“What we want to know is why,” Michaels says, his voice taking on an almost conversational tone. “Was this personal? Did Briggs do something to you? Hurt you?”
They’re fishing again, trying to get me to confess to motive. But their tone has shifted, becoming almost sympathetic.
“We know about Briggs’ history,” Ramirez continues. “The sealed records from when he was younger. The pattern of complaints from female employees at his company that never quite stuck.”
My head snaps up. They know what kind of monster Elisha was.
“Young women. Always young women who needed something from him. A job, a promotion, a good reference.” Ramirez’s voice is neutral. “Maybe you found out what kind of man he really was. Maybe you did something about it.”
For a moment, I almost want to tell them. To explain that Elisha Briggs deserved what happened to him. That he was a predator who used his position to coerce and abuse women who had no other choice.
But I stay silent.
“We understand that kind of anger,” Michaels says. “When the system fails, when men like Briggs get away with hurting people... Sometimes it feels like the only justice is the kind you make yourself.”
“I don’t know what you want me to say,” I tell them. “I didn’t kill anyone.”
Ramirez closes the laptop. “Elisha Briggs was found dead in his bed the next morning. Cardiac arrest. Thirty-two years old, perfect health.” She leans forward. “Toxicology found traces of a compound they couldn’t identify. Something unusual. Something that broke down quickly in his system.”
My heart hammers. I knew they’d find something. But the compound I’d used—a derivative of monkshood mixed with certain cardiac glycosides—should have degraded within hours.
“I want a lawyer,” I say.
Ramirez leans back, a hint of satisfaction in her eyes. “That’s probably wise.”
Michaels moves for the first time, stepping forward. “We’ll give you a moment to reconsider your position, Ms. Kline. The DA is willing to discuss reduced charges if you cooperate. First-degree murder carries a heavy sentence in Massachusetts.”
They gather their files, and I watch them, my face blank.
The door closes behind the detectives, and I’m alone with the photos of a dead man and the crushing weight of evidence I never knew existed.
I lower my head, staring at the reflection of the fluorescent lights on the metal table. My mind scrambles for solutions, for escape routes, but there’s nothing.
I’ve been so careful for so long. Seven years of perfect kills. Not a trace, not a clue left behind. And now this—undone by a security camera I never spotted. My hands tremble, and I slide them under the table.
Calloway’s face flashes in my mind. His pale blue eyes crinkle at the corners when he laughs. The gentle way he touches me, like I’m something precious. The darkness in him that mirrors my own.
Just when I found someone who understands me—who loves the monster behind the mask—I’m going to lose him.
No more late-night whispers about our next targets. No more planning elaborate deaths over breakfast. No more feeling his body against mine, warm and solid and real.
I breathe deeply, trying to steady myself. My bank account won’t cover the kind of lawyer who could get me out of this. Working at Penumbra pays well, but not well enough for the legal team I’d need to fight video evidence and whatever else they have.
The thought of prison walls closing around me makes my chest tight. Years—maybe decades—in a concrete box. No freedom. No Calloway. Just endless days under fluorescent lights brighter than these, surrounded by guards and other inmates who could never understand what drives me.
The worst part is knowing I’ll never get to say goodbye. Calloway was hiding when they took me. He has no idea what evidence they have against me. He’s probably planning some elaborate rescue right now, not realizing it’s hopeless.
The door to the interrogation room swings open again, and Michaels returns with a paper cup of water. He places it in front of me without a word.
I take it, grateful for the moisture to soothe my dry throat. As I sip, a fresh fear crystallizes in my mind.
What if they’ve been watching me? What if they know about Calloway?
The water suddenly tastes bitter on my tongue. I’ve been seeing him almost every day for weeks now. We’ve been to restaurants together, walked through parks, visited his studio. If they’ve been tracking me, they must have seen us together.
My chest tightens. If they connect me to Calloway and start digging into his past...
I picture Ramirez piecing together the Gallery Killer murders, finding the pattern that connects them to Calloway. All because they were investigating me. All because I got sloppy with Elisha Briggs.
I set the cup down, forcing my hand not to shake. If I go down for this, I go down alone. I can’t let them find Calloway.
A lump forms in my throat. For the first time since my roommate’s death, I feel something dangerously close to despair.
“I want to make a statement,” I say to Michaels.