Riley didn’t feel well at all. 

In fact, in the pit of his stomach he felt a type of nausea that made throwing up a distinct possibility. He always got nervous like this when he was working an important case; only this one had some unique qualities to it that made his anxiety even more acute. 

In some ways tonight was going to be Policing 101. He’d be undercover, working with a partner, and trying to catch a killer. There was nothing unique in any of that. But what made this case different was the nature of the crime and the timeframe of the killer. It was all but guaranteed that he was going to strike tonight, killing another sex worker in the most brutal of ways to pay some sick tribute to Jack the Ripper. Knowing that made Riley feel even more pressure, because not only would failure result in the horrific death of a young woman, but it would mean that it was his fault. At least that’s how he felt.

He’d had an early dinner and headed to Staten Island around seven so that he could coordinate with Emily, who looked stressed and nervous herself. He met her at her place, and she was already in mid transformation from mild mannered police detective to Staten Island sex worker. When she answered the door Riley didn’t recognize her. She was wearing enough makeup to be seen a mile away, fishnet stockings, black boots, and a tight, low cut shirt that left little to the imagination. “Well, hello,” he joked. “How much?”

“Shut up.” 

“Did you have to go shopping for those clothes?”

“Sadly I had some of them in different parts of my closet. The fishnets I bought, though. It’s like a hooker cliché, gotta have them. Come in, I’m finishing up my hair and makeup.”

Riley followed, and Emily excused herself to go up to the bathroom and finish getting ready. Riley still felt sick. In fact, he’d felt like that the entire ferry ride over, and it was no better now. He wore plain clothes because he needed to blend in. He was playing his own fake role, that of a drug addict looking to score. He wore the shittiest looking clothes he could find in his closet, which weren’t that hard to find, and he hadn’t bothered to shave or comb his hair, to make his scumbag look fully authentic.

A few minutes later Emily came down looking very convincingly like a prostitute. “How do I look?” she asked. 

“I’m honestly not sure how to answer that, detective. If I say you look good, would you take it as a compliment or an insult?”

“I’m not sure,” Emily answered, smiling for the first time since Riley got there. “A compliment, I think.”

“Oh, then you look slutty as all hell.”

“Too far.”

“Is it?” he joked. 

“Let’s work out our game plan.”

They sat at the large table again, only this time there weren’t boxes of case files and photos strewn about. This time it was just tactical work. Riley was impressed with Emily’s mind as a cop. She was sharp, knowledgeable, and she’d clearly thought this out. The other girls had been killed within a half mile radius of one another, she told him. She was planning on ‘working’ that area in particular, making sure to keep herself moving so that she could cover the whole area. There were two pimps who worked that area, and about ten girls in total, and she was going to navigate the area while Riley stayed close in an abandoned store front. She’d have a small weapon on her, hidden in one of her boots, and she’d have a small mic in her ear to call out for help.

“I’m not going to lie to you, there are a lot of things that can go wrong here. A lot.”

“I’m aware, detective,” she said. “But there’s more that can go wrong if we do nothing.”

“Agreed. I love your conviction.”

“Admire me later,” she joked. “For tonight, just keep me alive.”

“Deal. Let’s go.”

A tense car ride later and they were back in the part of town that was the new Ripper’s playground of choice. At that hour it was dark, and the criminals were out in even greater numbers than they had been the other day. First they drove past the area where Emily decided was their best chance to get picked up. It was swarming with way more than ten girls. “Shit,” Emily said.

“What?”

“I have to figure out how to keep my eye on all of the Johns that show up, not just the ones that approach me. This is going to be hard on our own. We could miss something.”

“Yeah,” Riley agreed. “We could. But you have a sharp eye, and remember, we’re not looking for any old John. Your profile said that he would be a white man, between 30 and 40 years old. So you only need to look out for men who fit that description.”

“True. Let’s find a place to park and set up.”

A few minutes later they found a place to park a few blocks away. They left the car far enough away to not attract attention and headed off. Emily went first, and a few minutes later Riley went to his spot. He was nervous about this whole thing, and even though she couldn’t speak to him without being given away, he kept talking to her. “Just yell if you need me and I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Thirty minutes passed with no activity. Riley kept checking in with her, and when she could, she’d answer back. Then another thirty minutes passed. And then an hour. Nothing. Riley started to get nervous again, and he wasn’t sure why. His intuition had always served him well in the past, and the feeling of anxiety made him hyper alert and ready for whatever might come next. 

What came next was a blood curdling scream. It was Emily. The second he heard the sound he was up and out. He knew that she was close, only a few blocks away, and she wasn’t the type to yell out. He moved his body at full speed, his brain not even operating any more. He was moving on pure instinct. He’d put a GPS tracking device on her so he’d know exactly where she was, and what route to take to get to her. 

When he got to where she was he couldn’t believe his eyes at first. Emily was on the ground, yelling and fighting with a large man who was on top of her, trying to punch at her face. “Hey!” he yelled. “Get the fuck off of her! Police!” Riley jumped on the guy and they both collapsed on the ground. Riley ended up on top, and he threw a bunch of punches to knock the guy out. As soon as he landed his third shot, the guy, who was clearly a pimp, turtled up and turned his back. Riley slapped the cuffs on him and jumped off the guy to check on Emily. She wasn’t moving. “Emily, Emily!” There was blood pooling around her and she was barely conscious. Riley looked down and saw a knife wound on her side. 

“Hold on!” He called into the police department that an officer was down and needed medical assistance, and then tended to her wounds. The pimp laid on the ground as the working girls stood around, gawking at the whole scene. Riley’s mind was racing, and split in twelve different directions. First he was thinking of Emily and her safety, and then of arresting the pimp. But his mind was also on the new Ripper, hoping that he wasn’t striking at that exact moment as the chaos ensued.

The cops responded quickly, with the ambulance just behind them. They took Emily to the hospital, and took the pimp away in the back of a squad car. Riley was overwhelmed with emotion, and as he stood there, surrounded by criminals and cops alike, he wondered just what the hell had gone so wrong.