Page 15 of Girl, Accused

The comparison rose unbidden in her mind: Luca's steady optimism versus Ripley's cynicism. Her current partner and her former one. Luca would be trying to see the good in this situation, looking for silver linings, while Ripley had already cut straight to brass tacks. She’d probably mapped out three different ways to catch this killer the moment she’d seen that footage.

Five months of trying to forget the connection she and Ripley had shared, and now it came rushing back like blood from a reopened wound.

Then the door opened again. Ripley’s outline filled the frame. No crash this time. She must have gotten the theatrics out of her system.

She crossed to the table and slid some familiar objects in Ella’s direction.

Cell phone. Smartwatch. Glock .17.

‘Grab your stuff,’ Ripley said.

Reality hiccupped. ‘What?’

‘What, you suddenly deaf? Pick up your weapon before I change my mind about this whole thing.’

‘Gonna need some context here, Mia.’

‘You got your clothes? Toothbrush? Lip balm?’

Ella nodded at her bag in the corner of the room. ‘It’s all in there. I only got back from Virginia last night.’

‘Need to go home for anything?’

‘Yeah. To see Luca.’

‘Not going to happen. You need to call him and tell him to stay safe. Don’t go back there.’

Ella grabbed her phone off the table. Seven messages and five missed calls from Luca. ‘Mia, what the hell is going on? Why do I need my bag and my toothbrush? You’re not seriously suggesting we-‘

‘Yeah, I am,’ Ripley said. ‘The dream team’s back in business.’

She felt something twist in her chest. Five months of operating without Ripley's shadow at her side, and now here she was, casually reassembling the machinery of their partnership like no time had passed.

And Ella wasn’t sure if this was a good idea or not.

‘Mia, have you lost your mind? There's a killer in D.C. using my DNA to frame me for murder. Two people I knew are dead, and who knows how many more are on this psycho's hit list. And Edis thinks I should just, what? Hop on a plane to chase some other killer while everything burns down here?’

‘So, what? You want to try and find your hair-stealing killer?’

‘Yes.’

‘Too bad. Washington PD has jurisdiction.’

‘For now.’

‘Right. And they won’t let you within a mile of this investigation, but Edis is working to get Bureau jurisdiction, and that’ll take days, maybe weeks. So your options are sit here and wait, or put those brain cells to use somewhere they’ll make a difference.’

Ella exhaled through clenched teeth. ‘And what about the people on the killer's list? What about Luca? If I leave, they're exposed.’

‘They’re exposed whether you’re here or not, and Edis is putting protection on anyone connected to you.’

Ella stared out the window. The logic was sound, but the realization that she had no influence over the D.C. situation gnawed at her.

So maybe it would be more beneficial to get inside someone else's head instead of her own.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Hoover Building spat Ella out onto Pennsylvania Avenue.Seven floors had never felt so far to fall, but here she was, street level, ten AM, finally breathing air that wasn’t recycled through federal ventilation systems. Mia was bringing her car around, then they were heading to Reagan International Airport for a trip to Ohio.

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