The city, still thick with the aftermath of rain, felt like a pressure cooker. Alex drove aimlessly for an hour after leaving Sterling's office, the air thick with her own silent fury. His confession—or rather, his pathetic, terrified admission—had broken through the last of her self-imposed barriers. The pain of Ben's death, the frustration of the unsolved case, the decade of suffocating guilt… it wasn't just a tragedy. It was a lie. A systemic cover-up orchestrated by the very people sworn to protect and serve. She couldn't go to the FBI. She couldn't trust the police. She was a lone operator, with nothing but her own instincts and a growing desperation.
She needed to find someone who lived in the shadows, someone who understood the dark underbelly of power, someone who was just as cynical about the official narrative as she was. She needed Marcus Thorne.
Marcus was an anachronism. A real journalist, the kind who still believed in paper trails and shoe leather, in truths that couldn't be found in press releases. He had worked the crime beat for the Boston Globe for years, but his relentless pursuit of a story had made him too many enemies. Now, he wrote for an obscure online publication, a digital ghost in the machine, and supplemented his income with freelance investigative work for anyone who could afford him. Alex knew him from the old days, from the crime scenes and the press conferences where he would ask the uncomfortable questions no one else dared to. He was the only one she could think of who might have seen something she hadn't.
She found him not in a sterile office, but in a grimy, dimly lit bar near the waterfront, the kind of place that smelled of stale beer and desperation. The television in the corner was muted, showing a looping news report about the "Copycat Killer." Marcus sat in a booth in the back, hunched over a battered laptop, a half-empty glass of whiskey beside him. His face was a roadmap of a hard life—lines etched around his weary eyes, a permanent stubble that looked as if he had given up shaving years ago.
He looked up as she approached, and a flicker of recognition crossed his face, quickly replaced by a resigned sigh. "Alex Finch," he said, his voice a low, gravelly rasp. "I heard you were back in town. And here I thought the dead stayed dead."
"Not always, Marcus," she replied, sliding into the booth across from him. "Sometimes, they come back to haunt you."
He took a long swallow of his whiskey. "I'm not the FBI, Alex. I don't give out information just because you flash a pretty face."
"I'm not FBI anymore, either," she said, her voice dropping to a near whisper. "I'm a PI. Just like you, I get paid to find what other people have lost." She paused, letting the statement hang in the air. "I'm looking for a ghost."
He raised an eyebrow, a clear sign of skepticism. "The Collector. Everyone's looking for him. The cops have a task force. The media has a field day. It's a goldmine for my website. What can I possibly tell you that you don't already know?"
Alex leaned forward, her eyes locking onto his. "You know something, Marcus. You always did. Back then, you were the only reporter who didn't buy the official story. You had a source, someone who knew something wasn't right."
He flinched almost imperceptibly at the mention of her old case. "I wrote a few articles. They were quickly buried. No one wants to hear about a conspiracy when a serial killer is on the loose. It's bad for business."
"I'm not asking for a favor," she said, a new tactic forming in her mind. "I'm asking for a partnership. I have a detail that only the killer, the cops at the scene, and I know about. A tiny key necklace on the victim's throat. It was not in the official report. It was meant to be a secret. And I just came from a meeting with the man who helped cover it up."
The words hit him. His weary demeanor evaporated, replaced by the sharp, intense gaze of a seasoned predator. He studied her for a long moment, a thousand calculations running behind his eyes. The key necklace. It was a detail only a select few would know. It wasn't the kind of thing an outsider could fake. It was the truth.
"Sterling," he said, his voice flat. "He always reeked of a cover-up. The official report on the case was a masterpiece of misdirection. But what does he have to do with this new killer?"
"The killer isn't new," Alex said, the words a bitter pill. "He's back. Or maybe he never left. And Sterling knows it. He tried to warn me off, but it felt more like a threat. I think he's part of the conspiracy, or he's protecting someone who is."
Marcus sat back in the booth, a slow grin spreading across his face, revealing a glimmer of the man he once was. "You've just given me a gift, Alex Finch. A whistleblower, and a personal threat from a high-ranking ex-FBI agent. I'll make a deal. You give me everything you find on Sterling, and I'll open my files to you. A partnership. Just like you said."
It was a risky proposition. Marcus was a journalist; his loyalty was to a good story, not to her. But he was her only shot. "Done," she said, sealing the deal with a firm nod.
Marcus pulled a tattered, coffee-stained notebook from his bag. He flipped through the pages until he found a specific entry. "The old case was full of contradictions," he explained. "There was a rumor back then, a ghost story that floated around the internet for a while. It was about the victims. They were all connected to a high-end social club, a place for the city's elite. But the FBI shut down that angle immediately. Said it was a dead end."
He slid the notebook across the table. "I never believed them. I did some digging on my own. It was all unofficial. I managed to find one name that was conspicuously scrubbed from every database. A guy who was at one of the same events as three of the original victims, and who had a private meeting with Ben the day before Ben was killed."
Alex's heart hammered in her chest. A new lead. "Who?"
"Elias Vance," Marcus said, his eyes glinting in the dim light. "He's a ghost in plain sight. A reclusive tech billionaire. He owns a dozen shell companies, but his name never appears on any of the corporate registries. The guy is a goddamn shadow. No photos, no interviews. He vanished from public life after Ben's death."
"But what does he have to do with the new case?" Alex asked, a cold sense of dread crawling up her spine.
"He doesn't," Marcus said with a shrug. "Not directly. But the new victim? Maria Sanchez? She was an intern at a tech firm that just happened to be acquired by one of Vance's shell companies last month. Call it a coincidence. I call it a pattern. You just need to figure out how to prove it."
Alex felt a surge of energy course through her. The world had gone from a confusing web of lies to a clear, terrifying conspiracy. Sterling was protecting someone. That someone was part of a secret society. And at the heart of it all was a reclusive billionaire who had vanished after Ben's death. This wasn't just a simple murder case. It was a vast, sprawling puzzle, and she had just found the first piece.
She left the bar and walked out into the humid Boston night, the weight of the new information pressing down on her. The partnership with Marcus was a shaky one, built on mutual distrust and a shared desire for the truth. She was about to go after a man who had vanished from the world, a man who was powerful enough to have an FBI agent cover up his tracks. The game was no longer a personal one. It was a hunt, and she was the one being watched. She had to find Elias Vance before the Collector found her.
The hunt for Elias Vance would take her into the heart of Boston's elite, into a world of wealth and privilege where secrets were currency and lives were expendable. The game was on. And this time, she was no longer alone.