Chapter 14

FOURTEEN

XERO

I spend the next twenty-four hours under mild sedation, barely able to focus on watching recorded interrogations conducted by my team on my behalf. My eyes droop as Jynxson grills Dr. Saint about Amethyst’s past, and I snooze through her answers. When I’m lucid, I stare into the mirror of Reverend Thomas’s computer.

Another day has passed, and I’m no closer to locating my little ghost.

Tyler has a person stationed at the vicarage, ready to transfer funds to Father the moment he replies to the reverend’s request to pay for a place as an investor.

A small team is monitoring X-Cite Media’s downtown house where I met their content manager and recruiter, Harlan Stills.

Jynxson conducted another interrogation of the man, which confirmed what we learned about the membership site being invite-only. Stills also told us where we’d find a database of everybody who joined X-Cite Media’s inner circle, as well as those who rented its movies.

We’re making progress, but not quickly enough. Nobody knows the location of the next shoot. According to Stills, Amethyst and Father could be anywhere within the continent of North or South America.

I run through my last twenty-four hours with Amethyst, still unsure whether she attacked out of a sense of betrayal or loyalty to Father.

The next morning, Father replies on the forum, the message containing an acceptance of Reverend Thomas’s offer to fund the shoot along with the payment details. Using the credentials we took from our newest prisoner, Tyler transfers two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to Father from the centralized bank account shared by all the churches in the denomination within Beaumont City.

He’s also packed away the Reverend’s clothes, passport, and suitcases, leaving behind traces of a man addicted to pornography and gambling. When the bishop comes searching for the missing priest, he’ll assume Reverend Thomas has absconded with the church funds.

Hours later, Isabel walks in. “Your vital signs are stable, your respiratory symptoms have improved, and your lung function is normal.”

“Then you’ll turn off the sedation,” I say.

She nods. “I’ll taper it off. You’ll be fully alert within an hour.”

“And the restraints?” I ask.

“They stay in place until you’re cleared by Dr. Dixon.”

The only thing keeping me from tearing through the restraints is the need to maintain the appearance of cooperating. Isabel can and will increase the sedatives if she thinks I plan on escaping.

When she leaves, Jynxson walks in. “What do you want to deal with first, the new lead I squeezed from Dr. Saint or the raid on X-Cite Media’s HQ?”

“What did she say?” I ask.

“After I showed her the crime scene photos, she finally admitted Amethyst was referred to her by the Salentino twins who run the Newton Crematorium. Apparently, she’s their niece.”

“Why do I know that name?”

“They’re the second cousins of your fellow inmate, Roman Montesano. That explains how her house on Alderney Hill was purchased from Enzo Montesano’s real estate company.”

“All very interesting, but what else did the psychiatrist say?”

“Dr. Saint still can’t remember the name of Amethyst’s institution, but she said Amethyst arrived already addicted to a cocktail of anti-anxiety medication and antipsychotics, which had caused her to hallucinate. Her mother wanted her well enough to attend boarding school.”

I stare at Jynxson for several seconds, my mind reeling. “That’s it?”

“That’s all she could tell me about Amethyst’s background, but she confirmed increasing the doses after Amethyst killed the teacher, and again after she killed the Reed brothers at her college dorm.”

“Can she account for Amethyst’s time at the Greenbridge Academy?”

He nods. “There were bi-weekly visits and no talk of her being forced to appear in videos. I’ve sent someone to Dr. Saint’s office to pour through her records, but I don’t think Reverend Thomas is lying about the little doll.”

I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to fit together these contradictory stories. It’s the same level of frustration I get when I consider the impossibility of that graveyard video. Nobody, however well trained or steeped in delusions, could shrug off the physical effects of multiple assaults.

“What if there are two of them?” I crack open an eye.

His brow pinches. “Come again?”

“One woman can’t be in two different places at the same time,” I snarl. “They also can’t live two parallel lives. Dolly is the twin who married my father. Amethyst is the twin whose memory was altered—for whatever reasons—and kept under a regimen of drugs and partial house arrest by a neurotic mother.”

Jynxson rubs his chin. “Say I believe they’re twins. Which one tried to burn you alive?”

My jaw clenches hard enough to crack my molars. I have my suspicions it was Amethyst, infuriated at seeing a video of me inviting other men to violate her while she was unconscious, but that line of thinking leads me to a harsh truth.

Amethyst didn’t trust me enough to believe I wouldn’t do something so heinous. All the months we spent together meant nothing, and my love for her was unrequited. I was nothing more than a threat to be neutralized.

“We’ll find out when I catch up with them at the shoot,” I reply.

“One more thing,” he adds.

“What?”

“If Dolly was at the airport with the blond, where was Amethyst?”

My phone buzzes with a message from Tyler. It’s a link to a video on the social media platform where Amethyst used to post content.

Title: XERO SIMP CAUGHT BY COPS FLEEING THE COUNTRY

A woman with Amethyst’s hair is at an airport ramp, running toward the camera, her features hidden beneath a mask. Her arms are encased in a straitjacket, and she’s fleeing from a burly man in a flat cap and navy-blue uniform.

He tackles her to the tarmac and wrestles her onto her back before picking her off the ground and slinging her on his shoulder like a rucksack. Then he charges the camera, and the video ends with a thud.

There’s no way Amethyst was the woman willingly boarding a plane with a blond man and also the bound woman at the airport, desperately trying to escape.

I shove my phone in Jynxson’s face, knowing even my devil’s advocate has to admit this truth. “Tell me again why you think my twins theory is bullshit?”

His eyes widen. “Fuck.”

“Twins separated around the age of ten. One goes to school, while the other survives multiple snuff movies. Don’t you think there’ll be some resentment?”

Jynxson gulps, finally seeming to agree with my theory. “What do you want me to do?”

I send a message to Tyler, demanding the flight information for all the private jets that left the airport at the time of takeoff.

“Help me out of this bed. Then ask Isabel for my meds while I’m out of shooting range. It’s time to get Amethyst back.”