Word Count: 8945
One month before East Highland
The evening breeze hit Mara's face as she pedaled down Figueroa Road, her hair whipping behind her, blonde streaks probably looking all dramatic and movie-like in the wind. Well, from the right angle, anyway. Probably.
She liked biking around this time of day. Summer dusk. That perfect little window where the day's heat finally started eff off and the colder night air began creeping in. Plus, there was the view. The LA skyline under the orange tint of the setting sun was genuinely picturesque. There were definitely poems written about views like this. Mara wouldn't know shit about any of them because poems were for nerds.
Her bare legs kept the pedals moving in a steady rhythm, her skirt fluttering dangerously high with every rotation. And yeah, she was definitely flashing her panties to a couple of passersby. She just didn't care. Let them look. They could crash their car for all she cared. That was a them problem, not a Mara problem.
And if they actually did crash?
That would be fucking hilarious.
Mara had learned this particular dating app trick from Jules, though if Jules ever realized that, she would absolutely lose her shit. Jules was strangely hypocritical like that, but Mara loved her regardless. Mara had started maybe six months ago, right around the time she'd stopped looking like a fucking twelve-year-old and started looking like a fucking fourteen-year-old, which was apparently enough for most guys on these apps. I mean, just swipe right on a pretty face, don't ask too many questions, then agree to meet at some random sketchy motel off the freeway. It was depressingly easy to get laid if you were a teenage girl who didn't act like one.
Mara also tried really hard not to think about the implications of that, because the lack of any actual control over what happened through these apps was fucking staggering. It was pedo heaven. And with the way things were, Mara also tried not to think too hard about what exactly that said about men in general. She'd already formed her opinions there, and they weren't exactly flattering.
The Starlight Motor Lodge—yup, an incredibly stereotypical name for a sketchy motel—was where she was supposed to meet this guy. And somehow, the place itself was every bit as stereotypical as its name suggested. Two stories of stucco and rust, with an exterior walkway lined with doors that looked like they'd creak ominously every time someone opened one. Then there was the parking lot, full of trucks and sedans that probably shouldn't be there for one reason or another.
And, of course, there was the sign.
Classic neon. Sickly pink. Half-dead and buzzing away over the parking lot, with the S completely gone.
TARLIGHT MOTOR LODGE.
Yeah.
Real classy establishment.
She never understood why people liked fucking in motels. A decent hotel had room service, robes, wine—all the good shit. A car had the benefit of being able to go pretty much anywhere, even somewhere with an actual view. A jacuzzi had jets, for fuck's sake. But motels? Motels had thin walls and grime formed from a collection of mysterious stains that probably carried the psychic residue of every sad hookup that had happened there before.
Maybe that was the appeal for some people. The anonymity of shared desperation.
Still, despite the obviously poor choice of venue, the guy's profile had shown abs. And not the inflated, steroids-kinda abs either. They were tanned and well-defined, which suggested something closer to manual labor being the origin of them. Mara wasn't generally an abs-licking kinda gal, but every rule had its exceptions. And she was kinda very bored and horny.
And, well, the house was empty. Jules was at some art thing tonight, and David was working late, which meant Mara had a window.
She locked her bike to a rusted pipe near the ice machine. Not that anyone would bother stealing this piece of shit, but habits were habits. Better to lock up a shitty bike than walk home because some asshole had even shittier standards.
Then she caught her reflection in the window of a parked car and gave herself a quick once-over.
Hello, sexy.
People looked at Mara and saw a petite blonde with a heart-shaped face, wide blue eyes, and a slightly upturned nose that made her look perpetually innocent. Like she still believed in Santa or some shit.
Mara was also very goddamn short. Five-three on a good day, and that was assuming the universe was feeling generous. Her wrists were thin enough to wrap your hand around. Depending on the light, the outfit, and apparently whatever mood her face was in that day, she could look anywhere between fourteen and seventeen.
Which was a very weird range to occupy.
But she'd learned to use it.
The thing about being underestimated was that it was a gift that just kept giving. Every time someone looked at Mara and saw harmless, their guard went down. And when people's guard went down, they stopped performing. Stopped thinking about how they looked or what they said around someone who could actually affect their lives. They just acted like themselves.
And that? That was information.
Mara collected information like a goblin hoarding shiny shit. She was a data junkie. Couldn't get enough of it. If information could make you fat, she'd be morbidly obese by now.
Thank God it didn't.
She loved how she looked, thank you very much.
She started up the metal stairs, her sneakers barely making a sound against them. Mara could be sneaky as shit when she wanted to be, and right now she wasn't even trying.
The walkway smelled just plain bad. Some unholy amalgamation of chlorine drifting over from the pool nobody used, cigarette smoke leaking out from the rooms, and that general stale motel smell that seemed to have soaked itself into the building.
Mara was really, really starting to regret coming here.
Mara started humming to herself, mostly to distract from the aforementioned smell. "Every step that I take is another mistake to you..." she hummed under her breath as she kept walking. "Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow."
Yup. Linkin Park versus Eau de Shitty Motel.
She'd been on a Linkin Park funk lately. Jules made fun of her for it, called it her "angst phase," which was just insulting. What Jules didn't understand was that you didn't need to be in any kinda phase to appreciate Linkin Park. Especially Chester. Chester was like a soul whisperer. At least to the sensibilities of a teenage girl. May his soul rest in peace.
Not that Mara would ever say that out loud. She had a reputation to maintain. Several reputations, actually. Depending on who was looking.
Then she came face-to-face with the door to Room 214.
Mara took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders like she was getting ready to box—which could absolutely be a euphemism. Nudge nudge, wink wink. Then her whole demeanor shifted. Her shoulders loosened. Her face softened. Her expression settled into something warm, and approachable.
Innocence armor equipped.
Perfect.
She knocked twice.
Knock. Knock.
The door opened after a few seconds.
Mara looked up. And up. And up. Christ, this guy was tall. She felt like a kid staring up at her father, which was not exactly the vibe she'd been going for when she swiped right. I mean, she wasn't exactly opposed to calling him daddy, but that was very much not the fucking point.
The guy was around thirty, give or take. Clean-shaven too, and not in the lazy ran a razor over my face this morning kinda way. His skin was smooth. No missed patches, no rough spots that she could see. He shaved frequently, and he shaved carefully. Most guys his age would've had at least some stubble coming in by this hour. This one didn't.
Then there was the suit. Or part of one, anyway. His jacket was draped over the back of a chair with the lapels perfectly aligned, like he'd taken those extra two seconds to make sure it sat right instead of just chucking the thing onto the bed like a normal person.
His sleeves were rolled up to his forearms. Same height on both sides. Three folds each.
His watch sat on his left wrist and was the expensive kind. Mara couldn't have named the brand if somebody put a gun to her head, but sometimes you could just tell when a watch was expensive. It had an aura. A very smug, I cost more than your bicycle kinda aura. Mara hated it already.
His hands were fucking huge. Mara was reasonably sure her entire head could fit in one. His nails were clean and trimmed short. And there, sitting nice and comfortably on one finger, was a wedding ring.
Gold. Recently polished. So he had a wife. Cute.
And he hadn't even tried to hide it.
That was the interesting part.
Most married guys on the app at least had the decency to slip the ring into their pocket before opening the door. Basic cheater protocol. This guy just... left his on. Which meant either he was arrogant enough to think she wouldn't notice, genuinely didn't give a shit, or had just plain forgotten.
Except no. Not this guy. Not with everything else. He absolutely knew that ring was still on his finger. He'd made a choice. He wanted her to see it.
Some kinda power move, then. What kind, Mara had no fucking clue. She wasn't familiar with this particular brand of mentality yet. Still, she was sure Mrs. Motel Room would be absolutely thrilled to know where hubby was spending his Tuesday night.
Cue the sarcasm.
His haircut was just north of a buzz cut and looked fresh enough that he probably maintained it weekly. His shoes were still on, polished to a near-mirror finish. Real leather too.
Expensive.
Even the room smelled like cologne. Subtle. Applied once, probably touched to the wrists and neck. Two points. Done. Even his scent was controlled.
Mara saw all of this in about two seconds.
And the conclusion?
Meticulous. Obsessively meticulous. Either military background or just a garden-variety control freak who ironed his soul every morning. Probably both. Or maybe just OCD.
But then there was something else. The smell. Faint beneath the cologne, but there. Coppery. Mara knew that smell. She would never forget that smell. Blood. Huh. So maybe military wasn't wrong. Welp. Let's talk to the guy.
Before Mara could even greet him, he beat her to it.
"You're younger than your pictures," he said calmly.
And there it was. Another red flag.
Because most guys would be nervous as fuck right about now, right? Shiver-me-fucking-timbers nervous. Their brains would be running a mile a minute trying to figure out whether they were about to get Chris Hansen'd. Eyes darting around for the hidden cameras. Waiting for a camera crew to jump out from behind the ice machine while their entire life speedran its way into becoming a cautionary tale on some true crime podcast.
You're younger than your pictures. That sentence should've come with trepidation. Hesitation. Maybe a little holy shit, what the fuck have I gotten myself into? Not fucking calmly. Because unless Mara was imagining things—and she generally preferred to assume she wasn't—the guy sounded almost pleased.
Yeah, I don't think I'm getting fucked today, at least not in the way I want.
"I get that a lot." Mara stepped past him into the room without a care in the world, already scanning as she went. The room had the standard motel layout queen bed with an ugly floral comforter, particle-board nightstand with a lamp that didn't match anything, small table shoved into the corner with two chairs. He'd already set a glass of red wine on the table, half full. The bottle sat next to it, uncorked.
She noticed the second glass was empty.
"Have a seat." He gestured toward the chair like a host at a restaurant.
Mara sat, crossing her legs at the ankles the way her grandmother had taught her before she'd croaked. Back straight, hands in her lap, pleasant little smile. Now she looked exactly like a girl who'd been raised "right."
At least, that's what Gran had always called it. What the fuck did being raised "right" even mean? Mara had never bothered questioning her on that one.
"Nice suit," she said. "You come straight from work?"
"Something like that."
That was supposed to be a straight-up yes-or-no question. Why the fuck did people always feel the need to sound mysterious? Mara thought it just made them sound pretentious.
"What do you do for work?"
"Consulting."
The answer came too fast. Not a lie, per se. Mara didn't think he was lying. More like he'd taken a truth, chopped off all the useful parts, and handed her what was left.
"Consulting," she repeated, letting just the right amount of impressed creep into her voice. "That sounds important. What kind of consulting?"
"The boring kind." He smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. "Wine?"
Mara wanted to drown him in the fucking wine. What the fuck kinda answer was the boring kind? First something like that, now the boring kind. This guy apparently treated answering basic questions like they were state secrets.
"Please."
He picked up the bottle and poured, and Mara watched the red liquid fill the empty glass. That was a good pour. His hands were steady. Like, real steady. Not exactly the hands Mara pictured when she thought of some boring-ass consultant sitting behind a desk all day.
Yeah. She was very much leaning toward military now. Maybe ex-military turned consultant + whatever the fuck he was conveniently leaving out.
Then came the second cue. He was between her and the door.
Okay and here's where things got a little iffy on the military theory.
Because he wasn't watching the door. He was watching her. He wasn't positioning himself to guard against any sorta surprise coming through the entrance. His attention wasn't split between Mara and the obvious point of entry. No, he'd put himself between her and the exit.
He wasn't guarding the door. He was guarding her from the door.
Mara didn't think he'd consciously decided to do it. He'd just naturally put himself there. Instinct. Whatever this guy did, positioning himself between someone and their way out had become an instinct.
Yeah. Not creepy at all. Totally normal consultant behavior.
She reached for the glass. Brought it toward her lips. And stopped.
Mara tilted the glass, just slightly, and inhaled. And there it was.
Underneath the tannins—that earthy, almost leathery note that good red wine was supposed to have—and underneath the fruit, the plum-and-cherry sweetness this particular vintage was offering, there was something else.
Something chemical.
A faint bitterness that didn't belong. It was not strong enough to taste, probably. Not unless you already knew it was there. Just strong enough to catch if you knew what you were looking for.
And Mara knew exactly what she was looking for.
This wasn't her first rodeo.
GHB was mostly odorless, which was part of why the shit was so fucking dangerous. Rohypnol—good old-fashioned roofies—wasn't something Mara could reliably sniff out either.
But she didn't need to identify the drug. She just needed to know that something was wrong with the wine. And there was definitely something wrong.
She sighed and set the glass down on the table with a soft clink.
"Haaaaasaaaaaaaaaah." Mara let the sound drag out, genuinely fucking disappointed. "Not again."
She was almost whining now.
The man's expression flickered. Just for half a second. Most people would've missed it. But Mara wasn't most people, and thus, naturally, she didn't miss shit.
"Problem?" he asked.
"Why do you guys always have to spike it? At least let me fucking drink it. This was such a good wine too." Her tone was almost petulant, like a teenager being told to do her homework right in the middle of a good movie. "I just wanted to get laid. That's it. That's the whole fucking thing. Do you have any idea how annoying puberty is? The hormones are fucking insane. I can't sleep, I can't focus, I want to jump anything with a pulse, and then every time I try to scratch the itch, some asshole has to make it fucking weird."
He was staring at her now. His hand had dropped to his side, fingers twitching slightly. He was reaching for something.
"Let me guess." Mara tilted her head, studying every single movement of his as if she were studying a very mundane bug. "Serial killer?"
His eyebrows rose. Just slightly. But that was enough. She hit the nail.
"The suit's too nice for a rapist," she continued, conversational as ever. "Rapists don't usually plan like this. They're impulsive. Opportunistic. But you? You've got a whole setup here. The wine, the atmosphere, the consulting cover story. You've done this before. A lot." She smiled, "And the way you maintain yourself? It's almost ritualistic. Everything neat, controlled, and exactly where you want it. So." Her smile widened just a little. "Serial killer. Am I close?"
For a long moment, he just looked at her. She'd actually put him on the back foot. That was fun. Then he reoriented himself. Whatever surprise she'd caused disappeared almost as quickly as it had come, and he reached behind him. When his hand came back, it was holding a syringe.
Clear liquid inside. Medical-grade, from the looks of it. The needle caught the lamplight and gleamed.
Well then. That was pretty definitive.
"You should have just drunk it," he said. His voice had changed. Colder now. Flatter too. More honest, probably. Like he'd finally gotten tired of pretending to be a normal person. "Would have been less painful for you."
"Probably," Mara agreed. "But then again, I would've missed this part. The part where you explain yourself." She settled back in her chair like she was getting comfortable for a movie. "They always want to explain themselves. It's like an itch."
"Kids should be in school." He took a step closer, syringe raised. "Little girls who try to grow up too fast—they need to learn what happens when they play adult games. Someone needs to teach them."
"And that's you? The teacher?"
"I provide a service." Another step. "I correct mistakes. Girls like you—pretty, reckless, thinking you're invincible—you're mistakes waiting to happen. I just speed up the timeline."
"Huh." Mara uncrossed her legs and planted her feet flat on the floor. "That's a fun speech. Very rehearsed." She tilted her head. "You practice that in the mirror?"
She moved.
The table went up. Mara shoved it hard, edge-first, and caught him right in the shins with a deeply satisfying thunk. In the half-second where he flinched, where his weight shifted backward and his body tried to figure out what the fuck had just happened, she was already inside his reach.
Her first hit landed in his liver. That lovely little soft spot just below the ribs on the right side, where the organ sat nice and vulnerable. She'd learned this in Charlie's gym—learned it, practiced it, then practiced it some more until she could find the thing blindfolded. The liver was a beautiful target. Enough force in the right place and the body just shut down. Didn't matter how big you were. Biology was wonderfully egalitarian like that.
She hit him again. Same spot. And again. And then one more time, just for the hell of it.
Four strikes in maybe two seconds, her small fists pistoning into that same bruised point, and she watched his face go gray. Watched as his grip on the syringe loosened and as his body tried to fold in half because it didn't have a fucking choice.
God, she loved biology.
The syringe clattered to the carpet.
His head came down—he couldn't help it. The liver shots did that, made you curl around the pain like it was suddenly the center of your entire fucking universe—and as his head came down, Mara's knee came up.
Crack.
The sound of cartilage giving way was satisfying as fuck.
Blood erupted from his nose, painting the lower half of his face red. Then he went down. Hard. His shoulder hit the carpet, then his hip, and he rolled onto his side, curling into a fetal position, hands coming up to cup his thoroughly fucked-up face.
"Aghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" he screamed.
"Calm down, boy. Bear with it for just a moment. Mommy will be done in a bit."
He was wriggling around on the floor, which unfortunately for him opened up that lovely little liver spot again.
Mara kicked him there.
"There. Mommy's done."
She chuckled, then stepped back and smoothed out her skirt like she'd just finished some mildly inconvenient household chore. Checked her reflection in the window—still presentable. Hair a little mussed, but not a drop of blood on her. Excellent. The whole thing had taken maybe eight seconds.
She looked down at him. He was still making those wet, gurgling sounds, blood and spit mixing together.
Sigh.
"Well," she said. "So much for a quick fuck."
-x-
She called 911 from the motel phone, keeping her voice steady and just the right amount of scared. "There's a man... he tried to drug me. I think he's hurt. Please come quickly." The operator told her to stay on the line. Mara stared at the phone in disbelief. Of course. Of course, I'll stay right fucking here, next to the fucking serial killer. Great fucking advice. She slammed the phone down hard enough that she briefly hoped the sound somehow traveled through the line and made the person on the other end go deaf.
She sighed and then sat on the edge of the bed and waited.
The man—the suspect now, she supposed, if she was being all technical about it—kept trying to get up. Every time he managed to drag himself onto his hands and knees, Mara would sigh, get off the bed, walk over, and kick him in that same lovely little liver spot before sitting back down again.
Not hard enough to break anything else. Probably not. She wasn't actually sure. Just hard enough to remind him that getting up was a very bad idea.
"Stop," he groaned after the third time. His voice had gone all nasally. Broken noses tended to do that to you. "Stop doing that."
"Then stop trying to get the fuck up."
He stopped trying to get the fuck up.
See? Communication. Mara was fucking excellent at conflict resolution.
Mara returned to the bed, pulled her knees to her chest, and stared at the water-stained ceiling. Her mind wandered, same as it always did when she didn't have anything to do. She thought about how close she'd come to actually drinking the wine. If she'd been a little less paranoid, a little less careful. She thought about what would've happened next. The needle in her neck. The darkness. Waking up somewhere else.
Or maybe not waking up at all. But would that have been so bad? A slightly deranged smile worked its way onto her face. At least life would've been fucking exciting. One hell of a way to go, too. But then again, Jules would've been sad. Mara's smile faded a little. Yeah. Couldn't have that.
Then again, maybe this was the universe sending her a sign. A great big cosmic fucking billboard saying, Stop doing this. Get help.
Because this was the third time something like this had happened. Third. As in three separate fucking occasions involving drugged drinks. What were the fucking odds of that? Seriously, was she giving off some kind of victim pheromone? Did she have an invisible sign stamped across her forehead that said kidnap me, I'm small and blonde and nobody will notice?
Maybe she should actually take the hint.
...
Nah.
Or maybe she was just lucky. Or unlucky. Depending on how you looked at it.
"You know what really sucks?" she said to the room. The man didn't respond, just kept making those moaning noises, which were kinda yucky, but whatever. She'd made her bed, and now she had to lie in it. "Jocks. Like, objectively. The dick-to-ego ratio is absolutely insane. You'd think all that testosterone would translate into something useful, right? Like, I don't know, stamina? Technique? Basic awareness of where the clitoris is located? Or maybe even an average dick size."
She laughed, remembering Jacky's face. Jacky with his letterman jacket and his carefully gelled hair and his absolute conviction that he was God's gift to women.
"But no. It's just huffing and puffing and jackhammering away like they're trying to drill for oil. And then they finish in thirty seconds and look at you like you should be grateful." She kicked the man again, almost absently. He whimpered. "Premature ejaculation is one thing. Like, okay, that's a medical condition, I'm not going to shame someone for that. But premature and small? That's just tragic. That's a cosmic joke. And then they have the audacity to talk shit about people behind their backs, like their opinion matters, like they're worth anything—"
She stopped. Breathed.
Okay. So, maybe she wasn't totally over Jacky. Fuck.
The funny thing was, she'd actually fucked him. She was good at everything — languages, fighting, reading people — and yeah, sex too. Ask Jacky. She'd rocked his whole world one night in the back of his pickup truck, made him see God or whatever, and the idiot had taken it to mean something. He'd broken up with his girlfriend for her. Showed up at her locker the next day with flowers, talking about how they had a connection, how he'd never felt like this before, how he wanted to be with her for real.
Mara had laughed in his face.
"You thought that meant something?" She could still remember the way his expression had crumbled, the way hope curdled into confusion which further curdled into humiliation. "You're a premie with a short dick who doesn't know where the clit is. You should be thanking me for the pity fuck, not showing up here like you're worth my time."
He'd grabbed her collar. That was his mistake.
Not the insult. She'd already known about that. She'd heard him call Jules a faggot in the hallway two days prior and had been waiting for exactly the right moment to make him pay—which she had, first by ensuring he broke up with the one person he loved and then with the humiliation. That would've been enough. Probably.
But then he'd grabbed her. His hand closed around her shirt and yanked her toward him like he had the fucking right. Like Mara was something he could just touch without permission.
Yeah.
That was when she'd decided the beating was going to be thorough instead of merely painful.
She'd broken his nose first. Then two ribs. Then she'd kept fucking going until someone finally managed to pull her off him. And even then, she'd been smiling. Not a hair out of place.
The suspension had been worth it. Especially for the look on David's face when he'd had to pick her up from the principal's office—she loved the wonderful combination of exhaustion and confusion he got whenever Mara did something he couldn't quite categorize. It was almost funny. He'd given up calling himself Dad around her by then. She called him Davy now. He didn't correct her anymore.
"Do you know how hard it is to find a decent hookup?" she asked the man on the floor. "On those apps? It's like sifting through a landfill looking for a diamond. Ninety percent of them are either married guys looking to cheat — which, whatever, not my problem — or guys who can't hold a conversation past 'u up?' Or they show up and they look nothing like their photos. Or they smell weird. Or they're you." She gestured at him. "No offense, but your whole murder-girls-for-they-are-bad vibe is really not what I was looking for tonight."
He said something that might've been please or might've been police. Hard to tell with all the blood in his mouth.
Then she heard the sirens getting closer. Well. Took them fucking long enough.
Mara took a deep breath and let her expression shift into something vulnerable. She rolled her shoulders inward, softened her eyes, and made her lower lip tremble just slightly. By the time the sirens stopped outside the motel, she was shaking.
Perfecto.
She heard footsteps on the metal stairs. Voices. Someone calling out LAPD, open up.
She made herself look at the door with wide, terrified eyes. Made herself flinch when it burst open.
Two cops filled the doorway. The first was a man—tall, dark-haired, built like a soldier and, more importantly, held himself like one. His eyes swept across the room with that practiced efficiency soldiers who'd actually been deployed tended to carry.
"LAPD," the man said. "Everyone stay—" He stopped. Looked at the man who was already very much on the floor. Looked back at Mara.
He saw the blood. The syringe. Then the trembling teenage girl. And there it was. That cool, little practiced analysis faltered.
Strike.
The second cop was a younger woman with dark hair pulled back, and her expression was pretty much the diametric opposite of the man's. More expressive. Apparently, she hadn't learned that particular brand of apathy experienced cops seemed to pick up somewhere along the way. A rookie, Mara guessed. Plus, she kept glancing at the man like she was trying to figure out what he was doing and then emulate it. Yup. Rookie.
"He tried to—" Mara let her voice crack. Perfectly timed and pitched. "There was something in the wine, I could smell it, and he had a needle, and I didn't know what to do, I just—"
The woman cop was already moving toward her. "Hey. Hey, it's okay. You're safe now." She crossed the room in quick strides and sat on the bed next to Mara. "I'm Officer Chen. Lucy. Can you tell me your name?"
"M-Mara."
"Okay, Mara. You're doing great. You're doing so great." Officer Chen—Lucy—had a warm voice. The voice seemed practically designed to make scared teenage girls feel safe. "My partner is going to secure the suspect, okay? You don't have to look at him anymore. You don't have to think about him."
Mara nodded, letting herself lean just slightly into Lucy's warmth. And then she watched through lowered lashes as the other cop—Bradford, according to his name tag, which also had a tiny American flag pin next to it—walked over to the man on the floor and cuffed him with movements that were almost bored. Apparently, unconscious would-be rapists didn't rank particularly high on Bradford's list of exciting police work.
"Ribs might be broken," Mara said, her voice small. "I think I — I don't know how hard I—"
"That's okay. That's not your fault." Lucy was already pulling off her jacket, draping it around Mara's shoulders like a blanket. It smelled like lavender fabric softener and something slightly chemical—gun oil, maybe. An oddly comforting combination. "You did what you had to do to survive. That's all that matters."
"Boot." Bradford's voice cut through the moment, flat and all business. "Call it in. I'll start processing the scene."
"She's a minor, Tim. She's scared. Maybe we should—"
"She's also a witness, and this is looking like a major case. The faster we process it, the faster we can get her somewhere safe." Bradford was already bagging the syringe, movements precise and methodical, barely looking up as he spoke. "Get her statement started. Basics only. We'll do the formal interview at the station."
Lucy's jaw tightened slightly — Mara caught it,— but she nodded. "Okay. Okay, Mara, I'm just going to ask you a few questions, alright? Just tell me what happened in your own words. Take your time."
Mara took her time.
She told the story. Well, her version of it, anyway. One, she'd already prepared the moment she realized who was actually taking her statement.
Yeah, Lucy, sorry about this.
She told her how she'd been feeling like shit after a bad breakup—she'd beaten the shit out of Jacky—how she'd thought maybe a date on the app would help—looking to get laid after Jacky's premie performance—how the guy had been intimidating, how scared she'd been—cool as a fucking cucumber, actually—how he'd finally let his guard down and she'd managed to incapacitate him.
Need she say more?
She kept her voice shaking throughout the entire statement, even threw in how she'd genuinely thought the guy was gonna kill her. For the finishing touch, she pulled Lucy's jacket tighter around herself.
It was a good performance.
One of her better ones, if she may say so herself.
While she was busy giving her Oscar-worthy performance, more cops arrived, and the room quickly got crowded. Mara caught snippets of conversation between performances—syringe tested positive, found a bag in the closet, holy shit, are those—
She saw the exact moment they opened his overnight bag. Saw the cop's face go pale, then watched him take a step back like he'd just found a fucking snake inside.
There were fingernails. Like, dozens of them. All of them beautiful, manicured, painted in colors that had probably been fashionable when their owners were still alive. Each one tucked into its own little plastic bag, labeled with what looked like dates.
Mara glanced down at her own fingernails. Glossy black with hot-pink French tips.
Yup. Hers looked like they would've fit right in amongst that collection. Well, sucks for the guy. He couldn't have them.
Mara hid her face behind Lucy for a second, like she couldn't bear to look at him anymore, and while nobody else could see, poked her tongue out at the guy who was still staring at her.
Better luck next time, asshole.
"Jesus Christ." Someone said it like a prayer. "Chen. Bradford. You know who this guy is?"
Lucy's hand tightened on Mara's shoulder. "Who?"
"The Plier."
The name dropped into the room like a stone into still water, ripples spreading outward.
"Serial killer. Case has been open for three years. At least twenty victims. Feds have been going fucking crazy trying to find this guy."
The man on the floor—the Plier—started laughing. It came out wet and bubbling, probably thanks to whatever Mara had done to his face.
"Little girl got lucky," he said. "That's all. Just lucky."
He was playing to the room, Mara realized. He'd noticed her and understood that she wasn't going to contradict him. Smart. Psychopaths were usually smart about shit like this. Reputation mattered to them. It was half the fucking point, really—the legend, the fear, the way people said your name in whispers.
The Plier.
A shit name, by the way. He'd probably picked that name himself, workshopped it in his head while he was pulling fingernails off dead girls. Probably thought it sounded terrifying.
And now some sixteen-year-old girl had put him on the ground in under ten seconds.
Yeah. That wouldn't exactly look great on the résumé.
So he couldn't let that story get out. Couldn't let people know that his big, scary career had ended with a teenage girl's knee buried in his face. Better to make it luck. Poor little Mara had panicked, lashed out, and somehow gotten one over on The Plier.
Mara looked at him. Really looked at him.
His laughter stopped.
"Get him out of here," Bradford said. His voice was harder now, something personal bleeding through his professional facade. "Get him the fuck out of here."
Two uniforms hauled the Plier to his feet. He screamed the second they moved him—ribs, probably, or maybe his liver had finally decided to register the full extent of the damage Mara had done to him—and Mara watched him go with an expression of carefully constructed fear.
Inside, though, she felt nothing but quiet satisfaction settling comfortably into her bones.
Three years. Twenty-something victims. Feds apparently going crazy trying to catch him. And she'd folded the fucker in under ten seconds.
Yeah.
That felt pretty good.
-x-
The ride to the station was strange...
Lucy sat with Mara in the back of the cruiser while Bradford drove, the city lights slid past the windows.
"You're doing so well, Mara. You're so brave."
Mara nodded, letting a small shudder run through her shoulders. Girl, can you, like, stop? Imma trying to break character here, but you won't fucking let me.
"It's almost over, okay? We're going to get you somewhere safe."
Another little nod. Yup. I know.
"You're safe now. He can't hurt you anymore."
Yes, Mommy, yes. Thank you, Mommy.
Lucy's hand found her shoulder again and squeezed gently. Jesus Christ. At this rate, Mara was going to have to keep the traumatized-victim act going all the way to the fucking station.
In the front seat, Bradford was quiet.
Mara watched him through the rearview mirror, catching glimpses of his face whenever they passed under a streetlight.
He wasn't buying it. Not completely, anyway. She could tell by the way his jaw was set, the way his eyes kept flicking back to study her in quick, assessing glances. Something was bothering him. Something didn't add up.
Smart, she thought. Good instincts.
Because the way the Plier had gone down wasn't accidental. It wasn't the flailing self-defense of some panicked teenage girl who'd gotten lucky. It had been surgical. Four liver shots in the exact same spot. A knee to the face timed perfectly with the body's natural fold. That kind of precision didn't come from luck.
And Bradford had noticed.
She could practically see him turning it over in his head, trying to reconcile the trembling victim sitting in his backseat with the aftermath he'd seen in that motel room. But then Lucy would say something comforting, Mara would respond with another perfectly timed shudder, and Bradford's certainty would waver just a little.
Because she really did look traumatized. She really did look like a scared little girl who'd barely escaped something terrible. And that was the problem with being suspicious of a really good liar. Sometimes the lie just looked better than the truth.
Mara saw him glance at Lucy in the mirror, and his expression flickered with something like disappointment. Lucy was too trusting. Too soft. She was seeing what she expected to see instead of what was actually there.
"Almost there," Lucy said, her voice gentle. "The station's just a few blocks away. We're going to get you some water, maybe something to eat, and then we'll take your formal statement, okay? And we'll call your parents."
Would this lady ever shut up, huh?
Though, really, Mara couldn't blame her. Not when faced with a mind-blowing performance like this. Mara internally preened at herself. Narcissism at its absolute fucking height.
"My dad," Mara corrected, something real bleeding in for the first time. "Just my dad. My mom's not around."
Something flickered across Lucy's face—sympathy, maybe, or recognition.
"Okay. Your dad, then. We'll call him."
-x-
The station was exactly what Mara expected—fluorescent lights, linoleum floors, plus every person had that bone-deep bureaucratic exhaustion prevalent in the bones of all those who worked in government buildings.
But underneath the coffee and sweat, there was something else. Something sweet.
Mara's nose twitched.
No fucking way.
She scanned the reception area as Lucy guided her through, her eyes eventually landing on a box sitting right there on the front desk.
Donuts. Actual fucking donuts.
Mara almost broke character.
So much for stereotypes being exaggerated. Apparently, cops really did keep a box of fucking donuts at reception like it was some kind of mandatory requirement. Did they get a budget for this shit? Was there an actual donut line item buried somewhere in the LAPD's annual spending report? Taxpayer-funded glazed?
Because if so, Mara had several questions about government spending.
And also wanted a donut.
She bit the inside of her cheek hard enough to hurt and started subtly scooting toward the donuts, inch by inch, trying to get close enough to steal one without Lucy realizing what she was doing.
Bradford noticed. Because of fucking course, he did. He watched her little operation unfold with something approaching disbelief before finally walking over to the box, picking it up, and holding it out to her.
Mara looked at Bradford like he'd just killed her pet.
The fuck, dude? Half the fun was stealing it. Welp.
Mara reluctantly picked one, then followed Lucy deeper into the precinct, wrapped in Lucy's jacket and nibbling on her donut like a traumatized little chipmunk.
Lucy, meanwhile, had apparently noticed the whole exchange and was already constructing excuses on Mara's behalf. Maybe all the trauma had made her hungry. Maybe she hadn't eaten in hours. Whatever conclusion she reached, she turned and gave Tim a glare.
Bradford stared back at her, genuinely dumbfounded.
What the fuck had he even done?
They put her in an interview room, with a metal table bolted to the floor and two uncomfortable-looking chairs. The room was specifically designed to make you feel small and cooperative. Mara sat down in one of the uncomfortable chairs and immediately made herself look small and cooperative.
See? The room was working already.
Lucy came back with a bottle of water and a granola bar, took one look at Mara still nibbling away at her donut, and awkwardly set the granola bar on the table anyway.
"Just wait here, okay? It won't be long. Your dad's on his way."
Mara nodded around another tiny bite of donut.
The granola bar sat there, thoroughly outclassed.
They then made her give another statement because, well, why the fuck not? Couldn't have her getting five minutes to herself, could they? So Mara told them the whole story again, start to finish, while a detective with tired eyes typed everything into a laptop and Lucy stood in the corner looking supportive. Mara cried at all the right moments. Let her voice crack at all the right places. Said I was so scared enough times that eventually it became sort of background noise.
She signed her name at the bottom of the typed pages with a trembling hand.
And then they made her wait again.
Fucking bureaucracy.
She was studying the ceiling tiles—counting them, for lack of anything better to do. She was up to forty-seven. Because apparently, she couldn't play on her phone and look convincingly sad at the same time, and Mara Vaughn did not half-ass a performance. She'd committed to the traumatized-teenage-girl act, and she was going to take that shit to its inevitable conclusion.
Even if it meant staring at a fucking ceiling for God knew how long. She'd just reached forty-eight when the door finally opened.
Jules came through first.
Her sister stood in the doorway for about three seconds, taking in the whole scene—the blanket wrapped around Mara's shoulders, the tear-streaked face, the cops hovering nearby with their clipboards and concerned expressions. Jules was still dressed from the art thing, in one of her elaborate outfits—high-waisted pants, a crop top, and enough jewelry to catch the fluorescent lights and scatter them around like a fucking disco ball.
Her expression went through several stages in rapid succession. Concern. Confusion. Suspicion. And then—
Recognition.
Jules started laughing. Not a nervous laugh. Not a relieved little thank God you're okay laugh.
Nope.
She took one look at Mara's pathetic little traumatized-victim routine and fucking laughed. She had to grab the doorframe to stay upright, tears streaming down her face as she completely lost her shit in the middle of a police station.
Lucy actually took a step backward, alarmed. The detective looked up from his laptop like he was watching someone have a mental breakdown in real time and wasn't entirely sure whether this required additional paperwork.
"Oh my god," Jules wheezed, barely managing to get the words out between laughs. "Oh my god, your face. Mara. You absolute fucking gremlin."
And then David came in behind her.
Mara could practically read every stage of his emotional journey as it happened across his face. Concern first, because obviously he'd just been called to a police station because something had happened to his sixteen-year-old daughter. Then confusion, because his other daughter was currently hanging off a doorframe laughing like she'd just heard the funniest joke of her life. Then, finally, a kind of weary recognition as he looked at Mara, and slowly put the pieces together.
"Please tell me," he said slowly, "that you did not kill anyone."
"No! Davy, have some fucking trust in your daughter." Mara dropped the scared-girl act like a coat she'd been waiting all night to take off. "But I did beat the shit out of a serial killer. They call him the Plier. He kills girls and collects their pretty fingernails."
"WHAT?" David and Jules shouted in perfect unison, Jules's laughter cutting off so abruptly it was almost impressive.
"Technically, he tried to drug me first, so there's that too."
"WHAT?"
They both turned to look at Lucy, who suddenly found herself the center of attention. She cleared her throat, professional mode kicking in despite the obvious confusion still written all over her face. Apparently, she was still processing the fact that the trembling, traumatized girl she'd spent the last couple of hours comforting had apparently been complete bullshit.
"The, uh, the suspect is a person of interest in a serial murder case," she explained. "Twenty victims over three years. He attempted to drug your daughter, but she... incapacitated him before he could."
"Incapacitated," David repeated flatly.
He knew his daughter. He knew that word was doing some seriously heavy lifting.
"His ribs are broken," Mara offered helpfully. "And his nose. And probably his liver is bruised. I'm not totally sure about that last one."
David and Jules stared at her.
Mara shrugged, completely abandoning any remaining pretense of trauma. Lucy's face twitched through several different responses, apparently not yet having decided what the appropriate reaction was supposed to be. Concern? Relief? Annoyance? Because on the one hand, the traumatized sixteen-year-old she'd spent the last couple of hours comforting was apparently not traumatized at all.
On the other hand... that was probably a good thing?
Right?
"It was self-defense! Mostly." Mara let her real smile spread across her face, which was full of satisfaction. "Okay, maybe I could have just run away. But where was the fun in that?"
David pinched the bridge of his nose.
Ah.
Mara knew that gesture. She'd become intimately familiar with it over the years. The David Vaughn my daughter is going to put me in an early grave nose pinch.
It usually preceded a lecture.
Jules let out a disbelieving chuckle.
Bradford stepped into the doorway, his expression unreadable. He'd been watching. Of fucking course he had.
"So," he said slowly, his eyes fixed on Mara's face. "The scared little girl act. All of it was fake."
"Tim—" Lucy started, but he held up a hand.
"I'm not accusing her of anything. I just want to understand." His gaze hadn't wavered from Mara. "You weren't scared for a single second in that room. Were you?"
Mara met his eyes. There wasn't much point pretending anymore.
"No," she said. "I wasn't."
Bradford nodded once.
"Wait." Lucy held up a hand, her expression suddenly shifting toward alarm. "Wait. The statement. Everything you told us—did you lie? Because if you lied on an official statement—"
"Everything in the statement is one hundred percent true," Mara said, raising her hands in mock surrender. "I went to the motel. He tried to drug me. He pulled out a syringe. I defended myself. All factually accurate. I'm not an idiot."
"But the crying—"
"Also real. I can cry on command."
She demonstrated. Tears welled up in Mara's eyes almost instantly, hanging there just long enough for Lucy to stare before Mara blinked them away.
"See? It's a skill."
Lucy looked like she genuinely didn't know whether to be impressed or horrified.
"Great acting, right?" Jules grinned, slinging an arm around Mara's shoulders. "She's been doing it ever since we were kids. Used to drive our mom crazy. Dad too, before he figured out how to spot it."
"I have not, actually, figured out how to spot it," David said wearily. "I just assume everything she does is a performance until proven otherwise."
"That's very hurtful," Mara said.
David stared at her.
"And also very accurate. Good job, David. You're finally learning."
Her father had by now grown used to the blatant disrespect and just shook his head. There were battles worth fighting as a parent. And Mara calling him David was apparently no longer one of them.
Bradford exchanged a look with Lucy before straightening up, all business again.
"We need to finish the paperwork. Boot, take Mr. Vaughn to sign the parental consent forms."
"It's Boot again now?" Lucy muttered, irritation flickering across her face. "I thought I'd at least earned my name after tonight."
"Sign the forms, Boot."
Lucy's jaw tightened. Bradford remained completely unmoved.
"Come on, Mr. Vaughn," she said finally, gesturing for David to follow her.
David gave Mara one last we are absolutely discussing this later look before following Lucy out. They disappeared down the hallway, leaving Jules and Mara alone in the interview room.
The door swung shut behind them.
Jules turned to Mara immediately, her expression shifting from amused to genuinely concerned. "Hey. For real though—are you okay?"
Mara actually considered the question.
"Yeah," she said finally. "I'm good. Like, actually good."
"You sure? Because that guy was—"
"A serial killer, yeah." Mara grinned. "But honestly? It was kinda fun."
"Fun?"
"The most fun I've had in months. Maybe years. I got to hit someone who really, really deserved it, and I didn't even get in trouble for it." She spread her hands. "That's like, the dream, Jules."
Jules stared at her for a long moment.
Then she laughed. Not out of shock this time. It was something softer, a weird mixture of half amusement and half concern. Maybe even a little bit of fear.
"You're so fucked up," she said.
"I know."
"Like, genuinely. Something is wrong with you."
"Probably." Mara shrugged. "But I'm your fucked-up sister, so you're stuck with me."
Jules pulled her into a hug. Mara hugged her back. They stayed in that position for approximately three seconds.
"Okay, but seriously," Mara said, pulling back, suddenly grinning again, "his nose went, like, cartoon broken. Like, fucking flattened. And he was bleeding everywhere. You should've seen it, Jules."
-x-
David finished signing the forms, and then they finally left the station.
They made it about thirty feet across the parking lot before Mara lost it.
For five solid fucking minutes, Mara laughed hard enough to make her eyes water. Jules lasted maybe ten seconds before she joined in, and soon the two of them were clutching each other next to David's car, howling at the fucking sky while David stood there and reconsidered every parenting decision he'd ever made.
"A serial killer," Mara managed to gasp out between laughs. "An actual serial killer."
"You broke his nose!"
"I broke so much more than his nose."
"Oh my god."
"And his ribs! Jules, you could hear them crack. It was like stepping on bubble wrap."
"That's disgusting."
"It was beautiful."
"You're both insane," David said. But he was smirking. Just a little.
They piled into the car. Mara took the back seat and stretched out, the adrenaline finally starting to fade, replaced by a pleasant heaviness in her limbs.
They drove in silence for a few blocks. Then David spoke.
"We're moving."
Mara sat up. "What?"
"We are moving to East Highland. It's a suburb. Quiet and safe." He kept his eyes on the road. "We're leaving at the end of the month."
"David—"
"No school in LA will take you, Mara. Not after what you did to that boy." His voice was flat, exhausted. "And Jules needs a fresh start too."
Something shifted in the car. Mara looked at Jules and saw the way her sister's jaw tightened and her hands curled into fists in her lap.
"I'm fine," Jules said. Too quickly.
"Jules—" David started.
"I said I'm fine. If we're moving, we're moving. Whatever."
The silence that followed was heavy. Mara watched her sister's reflection in the window for a few seconds. Jules kept staring outside, jaw still tight.
She didn't push. Mara could be an asshole about a lot of things, but she knew better than to push when Jules got like this.
"End of the month, huh?" she asked instead.
"Yes. End of the month."
Mara leaned back in her seat. Outside the window, Los Angeles slid past.
East Highland, huh? she thought. What a shitty name.
For some reason she couldn't quite explain, though, she found herself looking forward to it.