Chapter Sixty-Four
Jackson
The call wakes me before the sun is even up. My phone buzzes on the nightstand, and I grab it fast so it does not wake Brooklyn. I’m still half asleep when I put it to my ear, but Chief Morris’s voice snaps me awake in an instant.
“Jackson, we’ve got another one. Behind the old grain mill by the river. Get down here.”
His voice is tight. That tightness usually means the worst kind of scenes. My stomach knots before I’m even out of bed.
I throw on jeans, a T-shirt, grab my badge and gun, and slip out of the room. Brooklyn’s curled on her side, clutching the blanket, completely unaware. Peaceful. Safe. And it guts me that I’m about to step into something that’ll tear all of that wide open.
Outside, the morning’s cold and heavy. I climb into my Jeep and drive fast, barely feeling my fingers wrapped around the wheel. The sky’s still dark, and the whole way there, I keep thinking, please not like the last one, please not worse.
When I pull up, the place is already taped off. Blue and red lights flash off the river like little explosions. Crime scene techs move around slowly and quietly, like they’re afraid of waking something.
Nash stands near the water, hands shoved in his pockets, jaw tight. He doesn’t even turn when I walk up beside him.
“She’s posed,” he says. “Just like the last one.”
My chest sinks. It’s that same drop I felt when I first saw Brooklyn in the hospital. A punch that hits and keeps hitting.
I step closer. The techs make room. And then I see her.
She’s young. Maybe mid twenties. Naked except for a pair of black stilettos. Her hair’s washed and brushed. Her makeup’s done. Her nails are painted the same dark cherry red as the last victim’s. Her body’s clean. Too clean. Like someone scrubbed her before placing her here by the water.
And she looks like Brooklyn.
Not just a little bit. Not enough to say it’s a coincidence. No. She looks exactly like her. The same hair. Same eye color. Same build. Same frame. Same height. Same everything that freezes my blood.
It’s like looking at a version of Brooklyn that isn’t breathing.
Two victims in two weeks. Same staging. Same type of woman. Same message. Whoever’s doing this is spiraling fast.
One of the techs walks over and holds up an evidence bag. Inside it is a thin silver charm bracelet with a single dangling letter.
The letter C.
My heart stops. Then it slams back into my ribs.
I know that bracelet.
It’s Brooklyn’s. She lost it when she was taken a month ago. It vanished along with everything else she had on her.
My jaw locks. My hands clench. Something hot and ugly burns up my throat.
“He’s sending a message,” Nash mutters. “Either to us or to her.”
No. To her. It feels too pointed. Too personal.
“We’re bringing her in,” I say. “I’m telling her myself.”
Nash nods. I turn and head back to my Jeep, but my legs feel numb. The steering wheel might as well be razor wire with how hard I’m gripping it on the drive home.
I don’t want to tell her. She’s finally been laughing again. Sleeping again. Touching me again without fear in her eyes. She’s been getting better. She’s been trying so damn hard.
And now this.
When I walk inside, she’s standing at the stove in one of my old shirts, hair messy, humming under her breath. She looks so peaceful, it hurts.
She turns when she hears me. Smiles softly.
“Morning.”
I go to her and kiss her forehead. She leans into me, but I hold on longer than usual. She feels it instantly.
“What happened?” she asks.
I breathe in hard and tell her everything.
I tell her about the body. Her appearance. The staging. The bracelet. All of it. I keep my voice steady and my hand on her back because I want her to feel anchored, not alone.
She listens, and she doesn't fall apart, but her jaw does tremble as she keeps her eyes on me. Present. Strong. Braver than anyone I’ve ever known.
When I mention the bracelet, her breath catches. She nods once, swallows hard.
We leave together. She’s quiet in the passenger seat, hands curled in her lap, staring out the window the whole way to the station. Her silence feels like a scream.
In the interview room, she sits at the table while Morris and Nash set up their notes. I stand beside her chair, close enough that she can feel me but not so close that it feels like I’m trying to shield her.
Morris starts first. His voice is low and calm.
“Brooklyn, we need to ask you some more questions. We know this is difficult.”
“I’m fine,” she says.
She’s not fine. She’s bracing. I can see it in the tight set of her shoulders.
Nash leans forward a little. “You didn’t have your bracelet when Jackson found you. It was missing when you got to the hospital. The killer left it under the victim’s hand.”
She stares at the table. Her fingers twist together.
Morris looks at her gently. “We don’t know why you were selected. But all four of the other victims had the same initials. C.R.”
Her face goes white.
Nash asks, “Do those initials mean something to you?”
She nods slowly.
I feel her breath shake beside me.
She nods slowly, eyes fixed on the bracelet in the evidence bag like it’s a ghost.
Morris keeps his voice soft. “Brooklyn, can you tell us what those initials mean to you?”
She swallows hard and lifts her hand. She points at the little silver C charm, the one that used to bounce against her wrist when she laughed.
“That’s mine,” she whispers. “That’s my bracelet. And the C stands for my first name. My real first name.”
Morris and Nash both straighten like they’ve been hit with the same invisible jolt before their eyes find mine, but I’m just as clueless as they are.
Nash’s voice is careful. “Your first name isn’t Brooklyn?”
She shakes her head.
“What is it?” Morris asks.
Her voice is barely above a whisper, but it’s steady. “Cecilia.”
The room goes dead still. Even the air feels like it holds its breath.
Morris and Nash exchange a look. A long, heavy one.
Morris leans in a little. “Brooklyn, we know this is overwhelming. But we need you to understand something. All four other victims had the same initials. C.R.”
She stiffens like the words hit her spine.
Nash adds, “You weren’t the only one with those initials. But you’re the only one who survived.”
Her breathing shakes again. I can feel it from where I’m standing beside her. I want to scoop her up and pull her out of this room, but I can’t. She asked to do this. She wanted to help. So I stay still and solid like she needs me to.
Morris tries again, slow and gentle. “We’re trying to understand the link. We don’t know why you were selected. We don’t know why he targeted you before the others. We don’t know how far back this goes.”
She closes her eyes for a second, then looks at them again.
“I stopped sleeping around four months ago,” she says. “Before I met Jackson. I was done with that life. Done with using my body to survive. I don’t get why that’d matter to him. I don’t get why he’d go after women who look like me. I don’t get any of it.”
Nash folds his hands on the table. “You got away. That alone could have triggered him. Killers like this don’t handle losing control.”
She shakes her head. “No. It doesn’t feel like that. It feels like he knew me. Like he knew who I was before Jackson found me. Before any of this.”
Morris nods. “That’s why we’re asking these questions. Anything you remember, anything that comes back, even if it seems small, could help.”
She drags in a shaky breath.
“I wasn’t tied up,” she says. “There was no rope. No restraints. I keep thinking if I remember that part wrong, but I didn’t. I wasn’t tied. I wasn’t chained. I just… couldn’t move. I don’t know if it was fear or something he gave me or something else.”
Her hand goes to her stomach, like it always does when she feels unsteady. I put my hand lightly on the back of her chair. Not touching her. Just letting her know I’m here.
Nash lowers his voice. “It’s alright if the memories come slow. Trauma doesn’t run on our schedule.”
She drops her gaze to her hands. They’re shaking.
“It doesn’t make sense,” she mutters.
And that’s it.
That’s the moment everything inside the room stops moving.
That’s where the walls feel like they’re holding something dangerous just out of reach.
That’s where the detectives go quiet.
That’s where I feel my heart drop into my stomach.
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