“Really? Are you serious with this shit?” Ronan asked over the applause that came when Shauna and Zach entered the squad room.

Zach was back to business, and he could feel the same intensity thrumming through Shauna beside him.

Hutch raised his hands, as if in surrender, behind them. “I tried but these two wouldn’t hear it. They were coming in whether the docs said they could or not.”

Ronan rolled his eyes. He didn’t have time to answer before the captain called out. “Reynolds! O’Rourke, my office!”

They followed Captain Calhoun into the office, but not before he yelled to Ronan that he owed a dollar for swearing in the building.

“You want to tell me what you’re doing here?” The captain didn’t even bother to sit, which told Zach this was a courtesy chewing out. He had to bitch and moan about them being here when they should be in the hospital but he would make it quick and let them get back to work.

“We still need a confession,” Shauna said and Zach was proud of the calm edge to her voice.

“And if you pass out in the middle of that interrogation? What then?”

Zach clamped down on the urge to jump to Shauna’s defense. She’d come up in the ranks dealing with the brass, same as him. In fact, she had more experience than he did. He wouldn’t try to cut in and defend her in front of the captain.

“Then, I’m sure we’ll have backup,” Shauna said calmly.

The captain snorted and went to sink into his seat behind his desk. “I’m going to suggest,” he said, carefully, with a long look at Shauna, “that you let Zach start the questioning and you stay out of sight. Let her wonder if you made it out of the chimney.”

“Why do you say that?” Zach asked.

“I saw them bring her in. She looked proud. My guess is she was still there when the chimney came down. She would have heard it. Let her think maybe she achieved more than she did. Shauna can come in and surprise her if she gives you trouble.”

Shauna nodded and looked at Zach. “Works for me.”

They had to give Liz time to talk to her lawyer, but they let her do that in the interrogation room where they could watch the exchange. This wasn’t the one with the sofa and chairs. She wouldn’t be treated to that one anytime soon.

They didn’t get much out of the observation. Lawyers knew detectives watched through the glass and they did their best to cover what was being said. It looked like Liz Gordon didn’t have much to say to her lawyer. She turned to the glass and spoke, even though she couldn’t see Shauna, Zach, or Ronan from her side.

“I’m ready to talk.” She didn’t look at all like the helpless girl they’d last seen in their station. There wasn’t a hint of vulnerability to her now.

In fact, she was grinning at Zach when he walked in the door.

Zach sat across from her and re-read the Miranda warning, getting it on video.

“Ms. Gordon, I’m going to recommend, once again, that you don’t say anything right now until we’ve had a chance to speak with a doctor about your state of mind.” The lawyer was likely just making sure his performance was on the video in case she tried to say he didn’t do his job later. He also seemed to be setting the stage for an insanity plea. Zach would have a few things to say about that.

Apparently, Liz didn’t plan to heed her lawyer’s advice. She leaned toward Zach across the table. “It was brilliant, wasn’t it? Connecting their bodies to the old killings? I debated for a while about posing them in just the same way, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. They would have looked too peaceful. They didn’t deserve that.”

Most likely, the lawyer was pissing in his pants at letting them talk to her without her parents present, but he didn’t have a choice. In this situation, she only had to be seventeen for them to question her without a parent. Since her parents had informed them they wouldn’t be back for several days, Zach wasn’t about to wait for them to wander their way back into the country.

Zach cocked his head. “What did they deserve, Liz?”

Her eyes blazed with what he had come to recognize as pure hatred. Pure unadulterated rage. But then she seemed to be able to cool the rage and put on the false face she showed the world.

She was a hell of an actress. “They deserved to be taken down off the pedestal this world has put them on. To be shown that underneath it all, they’re just the same as every one of us.”

She tipped her chin in pride. “I did that and more. They were humiliated in death. I did that. Me.”

The lawyer cut in. “Liz, I really must stress that you should—”

“No, thank you,” she said, almost sweetly to the man, whose jaw dropped in response. Maybe someone had forgotten to tell him his client was bat shit crazy.

Zach had her. He had what he needed on video to convict her, but he wanted more. He wanted all the details, all the reasons. He was experienced enough to know you didn’t always get that. Sometimes, you didn’t get reasons and answers. But, damn, he wanted them this time.

“Was Candice on a pedestal?” Zach wanted to understand what made her choose her victims. Was it simply that they were there in Sawyer’s clubhouse or was there something more to it?

Liz shook her head. “No, Candice was just my way of making sure Sawyer didn’t get to take the credit for my work. I knew you were watching him, so you’d know he couldn’t be responsible for her. I couldn’t grab anyone at Elmhurst. There were too many people watching there.”

“Why Candice?”

“Wrong place, wrong time. She was walking home, there was no one around. I pulled my car over and pretended I needed help.”

“You used Rohypnol on her.” Zach put the information out there and waited to see what she’d say.

“Yeah, I had to buy something since Sawyer wasn’t around for that part of it. I found someone to sell me the drugs, but he could get Rohypnol and Ketamine, but not GHB.”

Zach nodded. “Why did you beat her after you killed her?”

Dead eyes flashed and she gave the smallest hint of a shrug. “Why not?”

That was the thing about her, he realized. So much of what she was saying had a why not quality to it and he was struck by how little she seemed to care—or maybe even grasp—what she had done.

He wanted to know why she’d gone after Shauna. What she’d planned to do with her.

As if reading his mind, she switched gears. “Where’s your girlfriend?”

Zach didn’t bat an eye. He’d worked like hell over the years to contain his anger in the interrogation room. He never let it come in here with him. If it showed up uninvited, he sent it packing, plain and simple. She wouldn’t get to him.

He let her see a frown on his face. “Let’s talk about you. How long have you known your uncle was a killer?”

Eyes dancing, she leaned in and pouted. “Oh no. Was she under that chimney when it came down? We could hear it outside, you know. Hell of a racket.” She laughed now. “I couldn’t have planned that better if I tried. What made it come down?”

Zach calculated in his head. He’d give her a little information, play her game. “The pulley anchored in the top of it.”

“Damn. That was handy.” She spoke like she might be going back to the house someday. She was evil. Pure and simple.

“Tell me about your uncle.”

She sat back with a sigh. “Uncle Herschel is legendary in my family. Although I didn’t know for a long time that he was a killer. I suspect my mother doesn’t know either.”

Zach waited. He could tell she was warming up for a story.

She didn’t disappoint. “He was always off. That’s how they put it. Off. I was never really sure what that meant. Then I heard my dad talking to my grandfather one day about four years ago. My grandfather was dying.” She rolled her eyes. “God, how he smelled. They brought him home to stay with us for those last months instead of leaving him at the nursing home and the whole house stunk like that minty crap old people rub into their skin. That and shit. He couldn’t stop shitting his pants.”

“You have a heart of gold,” Zach said.

“Whatever.” Another eye roll. “The day before he died, my dad was talking to him and my grandfather told him everything. The whole family always knew there was something wrong with Herschel, but they didn’t realize how far it went until they found out he’d been the one killing those girls. His father found him in the chimney room.” Her eyes lit. “I’ve never been able to figure out that room. I know the tunnels were put in when the house was built to let servants travel from room to room quickly. There are others, you know, not just the chimney one. There’s another channel of tunnels on the west side of the house. But the room was added later, I think. It wasn’t really a room. It was a shaft of some sort that they just sealed off, I think. But I couldn’t figure out why. Turns out, they made that room for him.”

“For Herschel?” Zach asked.

She nodded. She was so excited to be talking about him. “My grandfather said he would go into rages, screaming and throwing things, even hitting him sometimes. So, they built that space. My uncle was sent there when he was acting out. Sometimes for days. It sounded like my grandmother wanted to make him disappear—she was like that. She cared more about appearances than about anyone or anything. She likely put him in there so no one could hear his ranting. Eventually, he began to seek it out. Made the chimney room into his own space.”

“What did your grandfather find in the room?”

She seemed pleased that Zach wanted to know. “The rope, the lipstick. I bet you guys never knew he kept trophies.”

Zach kept his face blank. “Oh?”

“Yes. hair.”

Zach ran through the information in his mind. There was nothing about that in the file. If he’d cut a piece of the victims’ hair, wouldn’t the medical examiner have found evidence of that? “He did?”

The look of triumph on her face told Zach he might have made an error. He held his face steady and waited for her response. “Your girlfriend didn’t know, did she?”

“I guess not,” he said mildly.

“He did. He might have been off, but he was smart enough to do it without leaving evidence. Just a few strands pulled from each girl. He had them wrapped in little cloth pockets.”

“And your grandfather found all this?”

She nodded. “At the time, you couldn’t live in the area and not know all about the girls being killed. Everyone knew about the rope and the lipstick.”

She was right. They hadn’t held those details back from the press back then.

Liz continued. “Rather than turn him in, they hospitalized him. My grandfather cried to my dad on his death bed. Said he shouldn’t have done it. Then my grandmother and the doctor talked him into allowing the lobotomy. I don’t know what happened after that. Herschel came home for a short time, but went back to the hospital and stroked out and died. My grandfather ultimately died from a stroke, too, you know? Twisted, huh?”

“So you went and found the room yourself after that?” Zach asked.

“Yes. My dad and mom traveled more than ever after my grandfather died and none of the staff ever cared what I did.”

Zach did the math. She would have been thirteen. If ever there was a time a girl needed her parents. Then again, he wondered if anything would have changed what this girl was. She showed no remorse for what she’d done. In fact, she seemed to take pleasure and pride in what she was. Surely, she had to be born like that, Zach thought. Could evil like this be made?

“So, you used the same materials?”

“Not his knife. It was gross. All rusted. I cut the rope with one of the kitchen knives. But, yes, you have to admit, it was brilliant bringing out his things. Making the killings look like the Marsh Killer was back?”

Zach didn’t tell her they’d realized right off the bat that it very likely wasn’t the same killer. That they were dealing with an apprentice or someone with a connection to the original Marsh Killer. He would save that for later. Right now, he wanted her to think he respected her a little, even if only grudgingly.

Instead, he focused on getting some of the why answered. “But why did you need to bring him back at all? What did the girls do?”

Her whole face pinched. “They thought they were so much better than everyone.”

“Don’t you mean Sawyer thought they were so much better? So much better than you?”

“Shut up!” She covered her ears and screamed. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!”

When she stopped, there was only the sound of her breathing.

Zach waited.

She made a show of calming herself, hands pressed to the table before speaking again. “I gave him everything. Everything. But he drugged them, so he could fuck their high and mighty little brains out. He had to have those tight-assed little bitches.”

“So, what? You went over to the clubhouse after he’d drugged them? Raped them?”

She shrugged one shoulder in a way that said, of course she had. “He left them there. I took advantage.”

Zach nodded his head, but then shook it, like he wasn’t getting the whole story. Because he wasn’t. “But that only could have been with Adrienne and Carrie.” It killed him talking about the girls so callously. “Hillary was there first. You didn’t want to kill her?”

“I almost started with her,” she said. “He started with her, you know. He drugged her first.”

“Why didn’t you start with her, then, if he started with her? Clearly you thought about it?”

He was surprised to see her falter, her cheeks turning red. “I tried, but I...”

“You?”

“I couldn’t do it. I wasn’t ready. I needed more time.”

“Time to plan?”

“Don’t answer that,” the lawyer instructed. It was a ridiculous effort to protect against any argument of premeditation, but they were so far past that, it was silly. Still, Zach supposed the man felt he needed to earn his keep.

Zach backed off. He didn’t need her to say it. She’d demonstrated already that she’d planned this out. “So, you didn’t have Sawyer to do the drugging for you with Candice. How did you do it then?”

He was circling her back, getting her to say things more than once. Locking her in.

“She thought my car was broken down and my phone was dead. I asked to borrow her phone, then I used Rohypnol. She sank right down into the seat and I did it right there. I killed her right in the front seat of my car, then drove away with her.”

“Where did you get the Rohypnol?” Zach asked, knowing this was key to showing that at least Candice’s murder was pre-meditated.

“There’s a guy at a school nearby. He gets people things like that. I don’t know where he gets it.”

“Tell me about Detective O’Rourke,” he said. “Why did you kidnap her?”

She sneered. “She was supposed to watch over me, the way she helped Kate when Kate went to tell you guys about Sawyer. It was perfect, making myself one of his potential victims. I thought maybe I could find out some of what was going on with the case. But instead of talking to me, Detective O’Rourke saw a picture of my uncle.”

She leaned toward Zach now. “There’s one tiny little picture of him in the whole damned house. It’s the size of a piece of bread. But she spotted it.”

“And?”

“She asked me where he was. If he lived in the area.” Liz looked shocked that Shauna would have caught her in that way.

“You could have simply lied to her,” Zach suggested.

Liz pursed her lips now in frustration. “I wasn’t expecting the question.”

“So you told her the truth?”

“No, I said he died, but she looked like she would press it. There was just something in the way she looked, but she tried to play it off like she wasn’t suspicious. We went to eat dinner and she asked about it again, asking how he died. I knew then that she wouldn’t stop, so I put the Rohypnol in her soda.”

“Rohypnol wouldn’t have had her out for long.” Zach didn’t say it, but he worried about how much she would have had to give Shauna to get her to be completely out for any period of time. But even so, that period would have been short. Too short to haul Shauna up the chimney as she did.

“Ketamine,” Liz said, that strange grin back on her face. “I would have killed her right then, but I knew someone would be coming to take over for her or to check on her, and I couldn’t kill her right away. I needed to stash her.”

“Why?”

She looked surprised that he wouldn’t know. “To question her. I needed to know how close you guys had gotten.” She stopped for a minute, as if thinking, then went on. “No, not needed. I didn’t need to know. I wasn’t worried about you catching, me, really. But I wanted to know. I wanted to hear from her what you knew and when you knew it and how far ahead I had stayed.”

By the time they wrapped up, Zach’s head was pounding and he was sick to his stomach at the sight of this twisted girl in front of him.

Shauna never needed to come into the interrogation room, but she did come out of the observation room as Liz was being led from the room. When Liz caught sight of her in the hallway, she’d raged and spit.

Zach wasn’t sure he’d gotten the full story out of Liz on Shauna. He suspected Liz honed in on Shauna when she came in with Kate and saw Shauna as a sympathetic protector of Kate. Maybe Liz was attempting to draw Shauna’s attention her way, and instead, she ended up tripping herself up. It seemed to Zach that was the kind of thing that would have drawn the sort of anger he saw in Liz as she was hauled past Shauna in the hallway.

And still, the girl’s parents hadn’t arrived. Zach shook his head at that, unable to fathom the kind of life that family lived.