As Good as Dead

Dead eyes were a constant companion now, hiding in the blink of an eye, waiting in the deepest shadows. They followed Pip Fitz-Amobi everywhere, a permanent echo of the night Stanley Forbes died in her hands. She saw them in the glassy gaze of a dead pigeon on her driveway, a sight that made the world tilt. Her father's jokes, once effortless, were now a strained attempt to pull her back from the edge. “Pigeon pie for dinner?” he'd say, trying to coax a smile. She gave him one, but it was a ghost of what it used to be, just as she was a ghost of her former self, haunted by the sound of six gunshots hiding in every sharp clack and sudden slam.

The past was a physical presence, clinging to her smartest suit as she walked into a mediation meeting. Across the table, a face she hated more than any other: Max Hastings. He was suing her for libel, for calling him a rapist online after a jury found him not guilty. His lawyer droned on about “irreparable reputational damage,” while Max took long, loud sips from his cloudy blue water bottle, his eyes fixed on her, gloating. “I don't care what the jury believes: he is guilty,” her lawyer read from her post. Pip's rage was a hot coil in her stomach. When she could take no more, she stood, her voice a blade. “Go on then, file the lawsuit, I dare you,” she spat at Max. “We get to re-do your rape trial… Do you really think you can pull it off a second time? Convince another jury of twelve peers that you're not a monster?”

At home, Ravi Singh was the antidote to the dead eyes, his own lit from within. He was her cornerstone, the one good thing she could hold on to. But even his easy laugh and teasing nicknames couldn't keep the darkness at bay when he left. Sleep was a stranger, and to find it, Pip descended into a secret ritual. In the second drawer of her desk, beneath a false bottom, lay six burner phones and a small bag of Xanax, bought from a local dealer. *Just one more time, and then she was done.* It was a promise she kept breaking. The pills were for the nights when the running didn't work, when her tightening chest felt less like panic and more like the cracking of Stanley's ribs beneath her palms.

Then came the new whispers from the dark. An anonymous message, sent again and again: *Who will look for you when you're the one who disappears?* Then small, headless stick figures drawn in chalk appeared on her driveway, moving closer to the house each time. A second dead pigeon was left by the door, this one missing its head. Pip tried to convince herself it was a cat, that the chalk was from her mother's tires, but a new message confirmed her fear: *PS. Remember to always kill two birds with one stone.* Someone was watching her. A stalker.

Pip decided she needed one more case to fix herself - a case of pure black and white, with no moral grey area to tear her in two. But this new threat was too close, too personal. As she and Ravi researched, they stumbled upon an old case: the Duct Tape Killer, or DT, a serial killer who had terrorized the area years ago. His fourth victim, Julia Hunter, had reported similar strange occurrences before she was murdered: dead pigeons and chalk stick figures. And there had been three figures for the fourth victim. Five for the fifth. Now, five headless figures were climbing Pip's wall.

The confessed killer, Billy Karras, had been in prison for years, but his mother insisted it was a coerced confession. The more Pip dug, the more she believed it. The case led her to Jason Bell's company, Green Scene, where Billy had worked. But the most chilling discovery came from an interview with Julia Hunter's sister, Harriet, who revealed a secret friendship she'd had after Julia's death - with Andie Bell.

Pip found her way into Andie's secret email account, and there, in an unsent draft, was the truth. Andie knew who the DT Killer was. She had seen him with Julia Hunter just days before she was murdered. He was someone close to her family, someone who came for dinner, someone she was terrified of. *Of course he'd find out,* Andie had written. *He's practically one of them.* Everything - Andie's desperation to escape, her dealing drugs for Howie Bowers, her blackmailing Mr. Ward, her death - it all traced back to this one, terrible secret.

The calls from a blocked number started soon after. Pip installed an app to unmask the caller, her heart hammering as she waited for the next one. When it came, she answered, her voice steady. “Hello DT,” she said. He didn't speak, but she knew he was listening. “Who will visit you when you're in a cage?” she asked, before he hung up. She had his number now. Game over. She called him back, blocking her own number, a thrill of victory coursing through her. The phone rang in her ear, but the sound wasn't just on the line. It was behind her. Louder. And louder. Before she could scream, an arm snaked around her neck, a hand clamped over her mouth, and the world dissolved into black.

She awoke in the boot of a car, the engine rumbling beneath her. Her wrists and ankles were bound with duct tape, another strip sealing her mouth. Terror, pure and absolute, threatened to swallow her whole. The car slowed, stopped. The boot door opened, and a silhouette stood against the dying sun. A monster in the daylight. He pulled off the cargo cover, and the DT Killer showed her his face. It wasn't Daniel da Silva. It wasn't a stranger. It was a face she knew all too well, a face that had haunted her from the very beginning.

It was Jason Bell.