Page 32 of Girl, Unmasked (Ella Dark #28)

In the interrogation room, Roger Blackwood looked a lot less threatening with chains around his wrists and black pit beneath his right eye.

His tweed jacket was rumpled, and there was a small bloodstain on the collar where he’d hit the ground.

Ripley was still in the tech guy’s office, Ella guessed.

She’d hauled Blackwood here and went straight into the interview process solo.

Ella took a seat opposite him, laid out her casefile on the table and said, ‘So, Mr. Blackwood, want to tell me what that little stunt back at school was all about? From where I’m sitting, it looked a lot like resisting arrest, with a side of assaulting officer thrown in there.’

Blackwood squirmed in his seat and tried to separate his hands. It was funny, watching suspects get used to life in handcuffs.

‘I panicked, okay? I… thought I was in trouble.’

‘No kidding, Sherlock. You are in trouble. Running from cops and taking a swing at one tends to have consequences.’

‘I didn't mean to... It was an accident!’

‘An accident? Did you accidentally just run away? Come on, Roger. Do better.’

Blackwood seemed to deflate. He had the look of a man who knew his time was up, which meant it now became a waiting game.

On a long enough timeline, guilty people with nothing left to lose ended up confessing every little detail.

And if Blackwood was her man – which was becoming more likely with every minute – he wouldn’t be able to stop himself spilling the whole grim truth.

Once Ella could establish a link between Blackwood and Sophie Draper, the higher-ups would be itching to charge him.

‘It looks bad. I know.’

Ella stood up, planting her palms on the table as she loomed over Blackwood.

‘Let me lay it out for you, professor. I’m looking for someone who’s committed multiple homicides, someone who’s targeting people in the literature world, someone who has a thing for religious imagery. Sound like anyone you know?’

Blackwood's face crumpled like wet paper. He raised his cuffed hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘Fine. Look. I know about Martina. It’s been all over the news, and when I saw those pictures, I was sick to my stomach. But I swear, I didn’t kill her.’

‘That all you got? I’m gonna need more than that.’

‘What else do you want? I did nothing wrong.’

Ella pressed her palm to the side of her skull. ‘I’ve got a concussion that says otherwise. If you’re so innocent, why’d you try and escape?’

Blackwood took a shuddering breath. ‘Okay, I’m going to start from the beginning, okay? But you have to trust me on this.’

She didn’t know whether to laugh or punch him again. ‘Trust is earned, so earn it.’

‘Right. Martina and I… we had a thing. Or I thought we did.’

‘A thing?’

‘Yes. I just couldn’t help myself. Martina was beautiful, passionate. She had this way of looking at the world that just… lit me up inside.’

For the first time since laying eyes on him, Ella saw something in Blackwood that looked like real emotion. But his talk of a lack of impulse control gave Ella more fuel for the fire.

‘You were into her.’

‘Yes. But that attraction only went one way. I came onto her, got a little too friendly.’

‘How friendly?’

‘Physically friendly.’

‘We talking a hand on the knee in the break room? Or another kind of physical?’

Blackwood’s head hung low. ‘I grabbed her. Tried to kiss her. She shoved me off. But I… persisted.’

Ella felt her lip curl in disgust. Guys like Blackwood, they never could take a hint. Always had to push and prod and take what they wanted regardless of the consequences.

‘Right. And then?’

‘Martina went to the principal, told him I’d assaulted her. Groped her, propositioned her.’ Blackwood’s voice was thick with self-pity. The kind of wounded male pride that made Ella wish she’d punched him twice as hard.

‘Were the police involved?’

‘No. The principal was on my side, because she didn’t want to lose me. If I ended up with a criminal record, I couldn’t work in a school. So we solved the whole thing out of court.’

‘My heart bleeds for you.’

‘Look, I’ve seen how these things go. Mud gets slung, reputations get ruined. Even if I'm innocent, even if I didn't lay a finger on Martina beyond what she claimed, it wouldn't matter. I'd be tagged as a predator forever.’

‘So your plan was to assault me, run away and then… what?’

‘I panicked, alright? Is that what you want to hear? I ran because I knew how it would look. The cops come knocking, asking about a dead woman who just happens to be the same one who accused me of touching her. For whoever keeps the whole law yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. James, two-ten’

Ella went silent and ruminated on Blackwood’s comments – or excuses.

It made sense, in a strange way. He wasn’t the first suspect who’d bolted as soon as the police showed up on his doorstep.

If Blackwood was telling the truth, and that was a big honking if, then he wasn't so much a mastermind as he was a moron.

But a moron with motive, and opportunity, and a healthy dose of sheer dumb luck.

But something still didn't sit right. That niggling sense of wrongness, of a picture that wasn't quite in focus.

Because Roger Blackwood might be a creep, and a letch, and a few fries short of a Happy Meal.

But was he really cold-blooded enough to orchestrate the kind of carnage they'd seen?

To gut Sophie Draper like a trout and string Martina Payne up like a macabre marionette?

Ella opened up her casefile on the table and pulled out a picture of Sophie Draper in full angel form. She spun it around to show Blackwood.

‘Recognize her?’

Blackwood glanced at it, winced, then turned his head away. ‘Good Lord, what is that?’

‘It’s an angel. Or a fallen angel.’

‘That’s not an angel, detective. That’s sacrilegious.’

‘Maybe. You don’t know the woman in this photo?’

Blackwood shot another cautionary look at the photo, narrowed his eyes then shook his head. ‘I do not. Sorry.’

Ella didn’t see a whole lot of guilt or remorse in his body language, but anyone capable of killing two women would be sorely lacking in both.

Blackwood continued, ‘I know how this looks. I know I'm not exactly winning any prizes for congeniality right now. But I swear to you, on everything I hold dear... I didn't kill anyone. I'm not the man you're looking for.’

Ella had stared into the eyes of evil before, and what she saw in Blackwood's gaze was more weasel than wolf.

But the facts remained. He had a history with Martina, and he'd hauled ass during initial questioning. Maybe he wasn't the mastermind, but he knew something. And she'd be damned if she let him wriggle off this hook until she had the truth.

Before Ella could launch her next salvo, the door banged open and Ripley stuck her head in.

‘Dark. A word?’

Ella shot Blackwood a look that said ‘don't go anywhere’ and stepped out into the hall. Ripley was standing beside their new friend Ryland, who looked like a fish out of water.

‘This better be good. I was about to put the screws to that guy.’

‘I found something,’ Ryland said, full of nervous energy. ‘Something you need to see.’

‘Is it good or bad?’

‘On the dark web, I found a… picture.’

Ella’s heart rate doubled. ‘What picture?’

‘A picture of… Drago LaChance.’ Ryland looked through the one-way glass at Roger Blackwood. ‘And it’s nothing like that guy in there.’