Chapter 10

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"What else did he tell you to do, Jake?" Richard barked, stepping up right beside me. Jake shook his head, his breathing getting heavier. "Nothing! I swear! He just gave me the phone, the cash deposit, and told me the script. He said it was a game. He described you, lady! Said you'd be the chief on the case, with your hair pulled back in a tight ponytail, looking like you think you can save the world." My hand froze over my notebook. The pen slipped through my slick, sweaty fingers and clattered loudly against the metal table. A tight ponytail. That is how I wore it six years ago. Every single day on the force. Not today. Today it was down, messy, and unwashed from sleepless nights. The killer wasn't looking at who I am now—he was remembering who I was. "What did the man look like, Jake?" Richard's voice sounded incredibly far away, like he was speaking to me from underwater. The room began to tilt. "I don't know, he looked normal! Tall, dark hair," Jake rambled, desperate to talk. "But he had this... this crazy habit, man. Every time he spoke to me, he'd pull out this old silver zippo lighter with a deep scratch right across the front. He wouldn't even light it. He’d just flip the metal lid open and shut. Click, clack. Click, clack. Over and over again. It was driving me absolutely nuts." Click. Clack. The air left my lungs entirely. The gray walls of the interrogation room started closing in on me. My chest tightened so hard I felt like my ribs were going to snap. The sharp, metallic taste of blood filled my mouth because I had bitten the inside of my cheek without realizing it. Click. Clack. It was the exact cadence of my husband's nervous tick. The exact silver lighter I had bought him for our first anniversary. "Alyce?" Richard's hand touched my shoulder. It felt like an intense electric shock. I shoved his hand off me violently, stumbling backward out of my chair. It flipped over, crashing into the double-sided mirror behind me with a loud thud. "He's dead," I choked out, the words tearing at my throat, completely raw. "He's ash. I saw the forensics report. He's dead!" "Alyce, calm down! Who is dead?" Richard reached for me, his eyes wide with genuine fear. But I couldn't breathe. The room was spinning into complete darkness. I couldn't look at Jake, and I couldn't look at Richard. I bolted for the door, tearing it open and sprinting into the hallway. The harsh fluorescent lights blurred into a terrifying smear as my mind completely fractured. He was alive. The man I mourned was alive, and he was the one pulling the strings.