CHAPTER SIX #2
"It's a popular spot. Beautiful views." Lang's voice had steadied, the momentary uncertainty replaced by careful neutrality. "Lots of photographers use it. Paulson himself probably shot there dozens of times—when he wasn't busy recreating other people's work, of course."
"Did you know he'd be there this morning?"
The question landed like a stone in still water. Lang went very still, his eyes locking onto Isla's with an intensity that felt almost predatory.
"No," he said slowly. "How would I know where Paulson was planning to shoot?"
"The same way you apparently tracked his locations for years. The same way he accused you of following him."
"I never followed him anywhere." Lang's voice had dropped, gone cold and flat. "Those were his paranoid delusions, not reality. I don't know where he got the idea that I was stalking him, but it was pure fantasy."
"So you didn't track his social media? Didn't monitor his upcoming shoots? Didn't happen to show up at locations he'd announced he would be photographing?"
"I followed his account, like any photographer keeps track of competitors.
That's called being professionally aware, not stalking.
" Lang uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, his composure finally cracking around the edges.
"I didn't kill Derek Paulson. I didn't like him, I didn't respect him, and I won't pretend to mourn him.
But I would never harm a fellow photographer, no matter how much I despised their ethics or their work. "
"Why not?"
The question seemed to catch him off guard. "What?"
"You clearly have strong feelings about Mr. Paulson. Years of accumulated resentment. He threatened you publicly, accused you of theft, tried to sabotage your career." Isla kept her voice measured, almost conversational. "A lot of people might consider that sufficient motivation."
"For murder?" Lang shook his head, something like incredulity flickering across his features.
"You don't understand how this world works, Agent Rivers.
The photography community is small. Everyone knows everyone, talks to everyone.
If I killed every rival who annoyed me, there wouldn't be anyone left to compete against." He paused.
"Besides, Paulson was destroying himself without any help from me.
His obsession with me had become his whole identity.
Another year or two and he would have alienated everyone in the industry. I just had to wait."
It was a callous statement, delivered with the casual cruelty of someone who had clearly spent time thinking about his rival's potential downfall.
But Isla had to admit there was a certain twisted logic to it.
Why risk everything by committing murder when time and patience might accomplish the same goal?
Unless time and patience had run out. Unless Paulson's threats had escalated beyond public posturing. Unless something had changed the equation in ways Lang wasn't willing to share.
"We'll need a list of your movements this morning," Isla said, rising from her chair. "Specific times, specific locations. And we'll be looking at those traffic cameras you mentioned."
Lang stood as well, his composure settling back into place like a mask being redonned. "Of course. I have nothing to hide."
"People who have nothing to hide don't usually need to say so."
The barb landed, a brief tightening around Lang's eyes that he covered with a thin smile. "Feel free to look at anything you like, Agents. You won't find what you're looking for."
"And what do you think we're looking for, Mr. Lang?"
"A convenient suspect." He moved toward the door, clearly ready to end the conversation. "Someone with a motive, a grudge, a history of conflict with the victim. I'm sure I tick all the boxes. But ticking boxes isn't the same as being guilty."
Sullivan stepped forward before Isla could respond. "We'll be in touch, Mr. Lang. Don't leave town."
"I have a gallery show to prepare for. I wasn't planning on going anywhere."
They walked out into the cold March morning, the studio door swinging shut behind them with a sound of finality.
The wind had picked up off the lake, carrying the particular bite of air that had traveled across miles of ice and open water.
Isla pulled her blazer tighter and wished, not for the first time, that she would give in and wear the damn winter gear.
"Well," Sullivan said as they reached the car. "That was enlightening."
"That was a performance." Isla slid into the passenger seat, letting James take the wheel as always. "Everything about that man is calculated. The studio, the clothes, the way he talked about Paulson—it was all designed to project a certain image."
"The image of someone who hated the victim but would never dirty his hands with actual murder?"
"Exactly." She stared out the window as James pulled into traffic, watching the industrial waterfront slide past. "He knew we were coming. Not specifically us, maybe, but he knew someone would show up asking questions. He was ready."
"Which either means he's innocent and just prepared for the obvious implications of their public feud—"
"Or he's guilty and had time to rehearse."
James was quiet for a moment, navigating through the morning traffic. "That alibi is garbage. Out scouting locations, alone, for three hours, on the exact morning his rival gets murdered?"
"It's worse than garbage. It's an alibi that can't be disproven but also can't be proven." Isla shook her head. "He's smart. If he did this, he did it in a way that leaves us with nothing but circumstantial evidence and a lot of reasonable doubt."
"So what do we do?"
Isla thought about the photographs on Lang's studio walls.
The compositions that echoed Paulson's work so closely that it couldn't be a coincidence.
The barely concealed contempt in Lang's voice, the way his mask had slipped when she'd pushed about tracking Paulson's locations.
The careful, calculated staging of Derek Paulson's body at a spot Lang had photographed dozens of times.
He was their primary suspect. Everything pointed in his direction—motive, opportunity, knowledge of the victim's routines and favorite shooting spots. But pointing wasn't proof. Suspicion wasn't evidence. And Marcus Lang knew it.
"We put surveillance on him," she said finally.
"Round the clock, starting now. If he's our guy, eventually he'll do something that gives us leverage.
And in the meantime, we dig deeper into his background.
Financial records, phone logs, anything that might show a connection to Paulson beyond the public feud. "
"That's going to require warrants. With what we have right now, a judge might not—"
"Then we build a better case." Isla's voice came out harder than she intended. "We find the evidence that proves he did this, or we find the evidence that proves he didn't. Either way, we don't let him out of our sight."
James glanced at her, concern flickering in his eyes. "And what about Brune? The LSK search?"
The question hit her like a physical weight. Robert Brune, still out there somewhere, hiding in the shadows while they chased a different killer. The shipyard search had yielded nothing. Mitch Connelly's body cooling in the morgue. The lake, patient and hungry, waiting for its next sacrifice.
Two cases. Two killers. Not enough hours in the day for either.
"We work both," Isla said, the words tasting like ash in her mouth. "We have to. Paulson deserves justice too."
James nodded slowly, but she could see the doubt in his expression—the same doubt she felt pressing against her chest every time she thought about the impossible math of the situation.
They were two agents with limited resources, chasing monsters in two different directions while the clock ticked down toward outcomes they couldn't yet see.
"I'll coordinate with Kate on the surveillance," James said. "She can probably pull a couple of bodies from the Marshals to help with the coverage."
"Good. And get me everything you can find on Lang's finances. If he was planning this, he might have made purchases—weapons, equipment, something that leaves a trail."
Isla thought about the photograph on Derek Paulson's memory card. The perfect composition, captured at the exact moment of sunrise, while its creator lay dead behind the viewfinder. The artistry of it. The cold, calculated beauty.
"Whoever did this spent a long time thinking about how it would look," she said. "And I think Marcus Lang has spent his whole career thinking about how things look."