Page 68 of Girl, Entangled
Ella briefly remembered that yesterday she’d entertained the possibility of these two cases being intertwined, but hadn’t given it any thought beyond that. The only connection was prisons.
‘No.’
‘Don’t disappoint me, Ella. Think harder. Think about everything.’
‘I can’t think… when I’m poisoned.’
‘Oh please, it’s just a tiny amount. Nothing like what we put in the others. We wanted you conscious for this.’
‘We? You mean…’
Doyle came closer, then she crouched about ten feet away from her. ‘Did you really think a disabled mental patient could pull all of this off? You’re more naïve than I thought. How’s your memory holding up? Still perfect?’
Far from it, Ella thought. ‘No.’
‘Clearly, because the answer has been in front of you for ages, and I don’t just mean with my current project. I mean going back months and months. I left you clues everywhere, and you missed every single one of them. I honestly thought you were smarter than this, but we’ve played you like a fiddle.’
‘I don’t… get it,’ Ella breathed. The fuzziness was still there, but her nerve endings were slowly coming back under her control. She reached two fingers down her throat, brought up a pool of vomit and spat it out.
‘That’s it. Get the poison out for you. Then we’ll kill you.’
She hurled up another load of sick, then said, ‘Explain it to me.’
Doyle began pacing the room, looking somewhat frustrated. Ella didn’t know how long she’d been out, and perhaps it had only been seconds between her forced inebriation and waking up here. Mia and backup must be close.
‘Fine. I’m going to throw some names at you. Ready?’
Ella nodded.
‘Gabriel Winters. Maxwell Tanner. Edgar Borden. Do you recognize them?’
Ella didn’t have to think hard. Gabriel Winters as the Greensboro Whisperer. Maxwell Tanner was the Scarecrow. Edgar Borden was the Figurine Killer.
They were the last three serial killers she’d captured.
‘I caught them.’
‘And what did those lovely but damaged individuals all have in common, detective?’
The answer came much quicker than she anticipated. Doyle had given her the links and Ella’s subconscious snapped them together. ‘They all had… connections… to prisons. Like you did.’
‘Let’s give a big hand to the best agent in FBI, folks. She finally got there. It only took her six months.’
Ella spat the last of the vomit onto the flagstones and wiped her mouth on her shoulder.
Her head was clearing. The poison was coming up and out, and the room was holding still now instead of swimming, and into that stillness the thing Doyle had been steering her toward finally arrived.
Connections to prisons.
She’d known something was off. Winters, Tanner, and Borden were too prepared. They’d known things first-time killers had no business knowing. Because somewhere behind each of them had been a steadying hand, a voice telling them how to choose, how to wait, how to clean up after.
A mentor.
‘You taught them.’
‘I pushed them. The prison system gives you access to a lot of damaged men. Some want a God, some want a teacher. There’s a lot of people out with daddy issues, isn’t that right, Ella?’
Ella surged to a standing position on unsteady feet and lunged for Doyle. It could have cost her her life, but instinct was her primary force. Doyle sidestepped her and Ella landed against the wall. Doyle turned the gun back on her.
