Page 67 of Girl, Deceived

‘Any actual evidence?’ asked Ripley.

‘Not yet. Forensics are gonna sweep the place for DNA from the victims. Sit tight.’

‘Come on Mia, we need to get in there quickly.’

‘What’s the rush, Dark? Let him stew. It’s what he deserves.’

‘I need to hear it out of his mouth. He needs to confess.’

‘You didn’t hear the crap he was talking back in the car? I was close to shutting him up myself.’

‘Yeah, but it was… grandstanding. Pretentious nonsense. He didn’t give us anything we could actually use.’

Ripley breathed an exaggerated sigh. 'Fine. The sooner he confesses, the sooner we're out of LA. Got your case file?'

Ella tapped her folder. ‘Always.’

‘Then lead the way.’

Ella moved from the corridor into the interrogation room, welcoming the sudden temperature drop. Less chance of breaking a sweat in a freezing cold room. Harry sat like a statue, still inhabiting the role as an old crone for reasons Ella was yet to understand.

‘Harry Faulkner,’ Ella began, placing a file on the table. It was heavy, filled with evidence against him. ‘You've been quite busy.’

He sat there, the embodiment of arrogance and entitlement. His fingers were steepled in front of him, his posture one of feigned relaxation. But Ella could see the tension in the set of his jaw, the barely-there twitch in his left eye.

Harry grinned, revealing unnaturally white teeth. ‘Every artist needs his portfolio.’

Ella clenched her jaw, fighting the urge to reach across the table and shake some sense into him. ‘Art? Is that what you call it? Those were real people, Harry. People with lives, families, dreams.’

‘Okay,’ Ripley jumped. ‘I can’t focus with this distraction. Faulkner, why are you dressed like an old woman?’

Harry grinned and said, ‘You caught me at a moment of introspection, and I thought I’d use it to my advantage. Sometimes, you have tofeelthe characters, you know?’ His gaze didn't waver. ‘But these women? To the world, they were inconsequential. But in my films? They became immortal. They became stars.’

Harry’s words were as close to a confession as one could get without actually confessing, Ella thought. But even so, something about it seemed off.

'Okay, Harry, I'm going to go through this piece by piece, and I want you to stop me if I get anything wrong.'

‘Ooh, a game,’ Harry grinned. ‘I like playing games.’

Ella ignored the comment and got to the task at hand. She was going to lay everything out while she analyzed Harry’s reactions. At the moment she saw authenticity, she was going to capitalize.

‘Last year, you posted a casting call on the Dread Pages for a film you were directing called In Hell. Correct?’

‘Correct.’

‘About six months ago, production began on your little slasher flick, but then halted three months later.’

Harry shifted slightly, ‘Budget issues. Real art is dead. It’s all superheroes and franchise prequels these days.’

Ella resisted the urge to question a low-budget horror movie as real art. 'Cut to three days ago, a woman named Kathleen Carter shows up dead in an abandoned cabin. The next day, Jessica Owen is slaughtered outside her home. Last night, Ginny Mathers was killed whilst babysitting.'

Ella watched Harry’s expression. To Ella’s surprise, he remained Stoic. Until now, she assumed that someone of his psychopathology would relish the details.

‘Tragedies, all of them,’ Harry smiled. ‘And what do those dead girls have to do with In Hell?’

Ella slid her phone across the table, showing a picture of the message at Kathleen Carter’s crime scene. Harry leaned closer, eyes squinted.

‘I am in hell, help me,’ he said. Harry shifted again, uncomfortably this time. His shoulders tensed, blink rate shot up.

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