It was a stupid mistake, one that still humiliates me. But I can’t let any hint of that emotion show on my face.
Hawks watches closely for a reaction. That’s why he gave me a photo of the corpse and not a picture of the girl taken when she was still alive. He’s looking for clues on my face.
Do I recognize her? Am I shocked by the image?
Or, most damning of all:
Am I man surveying my own work?
Am I satisfied?
Am I aroused …
Blandly, I say to Hawks, “I’ve never met her.”
“She was killed in the Mission District. Police saw a man fleeing the scene. He was tall and dark-haired.”
“That only applies to half the men in San Francisco.”
“It applies to you.”
“And thousands of others.”
Hawks takes the photograph back, tucking it into his pocket once more, right against his heart.
He takes this personally. It’s not only ambition for him.
And he is losing patience with my stonewalling. Slowly and surely.
“Have you injured yourself lately?” he demands.
I never visited a doctor when I sprained my ankle jumping from that roof. It’s possible someone saw me limping in the week afterward, when I wrapped my ankle in a Tensor bandage and swallowed handfuls of painkillers until the swelling went down.
“Nothing comes to mind,” I say vaguely.
“Don’t have much of a memory, do you?” Hawks sneers.
“I like to keep my mind occupied with more interesting things than the minutia of my schedule and the time people leave parties.”
“What’s interesting to you?” Hawks asks, his jaw rigid, his hand still resting against the breast pocket of his jacket.
“I’m curious why you’re talking to me, and not to Shaw.”
“You think he attacked Mara? And killed her roommate?”
“That’s what Mara says.”
“You believe her.”
“She’s very perceptive.”
So is this cop. She was right about that.
Hawks knows something is fucked up here. He can sense the links between our strange trio, but he can’t conceptualize what they mean.
He has no evidence—I didn’t leave so much as a fingerprint at the tenements. I’m sure Shaw was even more careful.
How infuriating, to have to work inside the bounds of the law. Your hands always tied by rules and regulations. Only one side playing fair.
I see the strain on Hawks’ face. His impotent anger.
He’s been around enough criminals to know that I’m no law-abiding citizen. But that’s true of most of the wealthy elite in this city. We all flout the rules for our benefit. He can’t decide if I’m just another rich prick, or the killer he seeks.
I’ve already satisfied myself that Hawks has nothing. No evidence against me, nothing but suspicion.
Hawks takes a breath, steadying himself. Getting ready for one last push.
He leans forward, his voice low and steady.
“Was Erin perceptive? Would she have warned Mara about you?”
I snort. “Nobody needs warning about me. It’s well known that I’m an asshole.”
“You’ve made enemies.”
“Only boring people are universally beloved.”
“Take Carl Danvers, for instance.”
Now a chill falls between us, which I have to pretend to ignore with every fiber of my being.
“Who?” I say.
“He was a critic for the Siren.”
“Oh, right,” I say dismissively.
“He disappeared thirteen weeks ago. All his belongings are still in his apartment. No message to anyone.”
“Your point?”
“He was no fan of yours. Wrote a scathing article about you the week he disappeared.”
“People write about me every day.”
“Did you speak to him at Oasis?”
This is a trick. Danvers was already dead the night of the show. His bones resided inside my sculpture, on display for all to see.
Hawks is testing to see if I’ll correct him, to judge how closely I followed the disappearance, and how well I know my own timeline.
“Jesus, who knows. I probably talked to fifty people that night.”
“But you don’t remember,” Hawks sneers, his disdainful expression showing exactly what he thinks about that.
Enough obfuscating. It’s time for Hawks to take a punch in return.
“This is pathetic,” I sneer. “If this is all you have … missing art critics, conversations that nobody heard and timelines that no one can pin down … the SFPD is grasping at straws. Mara will be disappointed. Sounds like you’ve got no fucking clue what happened to her roommate.”
Hawks snaps back, “Our profiler says the person who arranged that body fancies themself an artist and a genius. Sound familiar?”
“Oh, wow.” I roll my eyes. “Did they also guess it was a white male? Hope Captain Obvious isn’t getting a Christmas bonus.”
“You think this is funny?” Hawks hisses.
“Well, you sure as fuck can’t be serious,” I say, pushing back my chair and standing up from the table. “Because this interview was a joke.”
Striding over the conference room door, I wrench it open and call to Janice, “See Officer Hawks out, will you, Janice? Sounds like he’s got a lot of work to do.”
With that, I leave Hawks stewing in my disdain.
I’m a good enough actor that I don’t think I showed any nerves.
But in truth, it rankled me that he connected the dots to Danvers.
Goddamn Shaw for shoving us both under the microscope. This is all his fucking fault. I’ve never had a cop so much as look my way before this. Now they have a fucking description of me. They’ll be watching everything I do.
Usually, I’d head back up to my office to mull this over alone. I feel angry enough to bite the head off anyone who even looks at me.
But I don’t want to be alone—I want Mara. I want to tell her everything that happened. I want to hear what she thinks.
I’m only halfway up the stairs when I collide with her hurrying down.
“I’m sorry,” she gasps. “I couldn’t wait any longer. I couldn’t stand not knowing what was going on.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “Hawks left.”
“What did he say?”
I take her hand. “Come on. Let’s get a drink, and I’ll tell you.”
We leave the building, after a quick glance down the sidewalk to be sure Hawks isn’t still lurking around.
I take Mara to a dingy little pub that serves home-brewed cider, her favorite.
We sit across from each other in a dark and quiet corner, the oak tabletop already sticky long before Mara spills a little cider on it.
Briefly, I recap the conversation between me and the detective. I tell her everything, even the part about Danvers.
“Is Hawks right?” Mara whispers.
“Yes,” I admit. “I killed him.”
Mara’s breath catches on the inhale, then releases in a shaky waver.
“Can he prove it?”
“Probably not.”
The only evidence is enclosed inside Fragile Ego. It was insane for me to sell it. In that moment, my own ego had swelled past all reason.