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Jessie finished rowing the short distance between the boats in the dinghy she'd been given and tied it off to the ladder that extended off the Bodacious Tata. As she gripped the rails and started up, she still wasn't sure how she'd managed to get on board.

“Monica,” she had called out over the speaker not ten minutes ago, “This is Jessie Hunt with the Los Angeles Police Department. We know why you’re out here. We know what Joel Cisco did. And we want to get justice for Heather. But for that to happen, you have to let me come over there and talk with you. I’ll come over alone and unarmed. I want to help.”

She hadn’t really expected it to work but somehow it had. After twenty seconds that felt like sixty, a hand had extended from the companionway of the boat, waving her over. It had all happened so suddenly that the Coast Guard crew barely had time to strap her into a life jacket before dropping her into the dinghy and pointing her toward her target, the ladder.

She was just reaching the top of it when a female voice called out.

“Take off the life jacket and lift up your shirt so I can see that you don’t have a weapon.” Jessie did as instructed.

“Now walk backward toward the stairs.”

She did that too. As she moved, she noticed a red wig lying in a heap on the deck.

“Now come down, still facing backward.”

The voice was much clearer now. It was hard to be sure, but from her tone, Monica Silver sounded very much in control of herself. There was no panic in her voice, and she spoke with authority and confidence. When Jessie reached the bottom of the stairs. Silver gave another instruction.

“You can turn around now,”

When Jessie did, she clenched her jaw so that she wouldn’t visibly react too strongly to whatever she was about to see. Sure enough, it wasn’t pretty.

Joel Cisco was facing her, tied to a chair that was bolted to the floor. He was wearing loose khakis and a light blue short-sleeved button-down shirt. Both were covered in blood. The shirt had been cut open to reveal Cisco's chest, which had several gashes across it.

Jessie looked at his face. If not for the many photos of him that she’d seen, she might not have recognized him. His face was also covered in blood, a result of several cuts that were still seeping, including one on his forehead and on each cheek. His mouth was stuffed with a dishrag. His brown eyes were wild with fear.

Behind him, with a six-inch kitchen knife pressed against his neck, was Monica Silver. This was the first time that Jessie had seen her without any disguise. Her brown hair was tied back in a ponytail. She was wearing a sarong and a loose white shirt over a bikini top.

It was stunning how much she looked like her older sister. No wonder Oliver Stanton had thought he’d seen a ghost. The fact that even hiding her looks, Cisco hadn’t noted the resemblance between the sisters, was an indictment of him. Either he was too oblivious to have made the connection, or he’d never paid enough attention to Heather Silver when he was with her to care.

The woman’s expression was placid, as if nothing about this situation struck her as unusual. Jessie tried to think about how best to begin a conversation that wouldn’t end with Cisco dead. As she wracked her brain, an unexpected epiphany came into it. She didn’t really care if the man lived or died.

This was a person who had used women all his life, often hurting them, and maybe doing more than that. Because of his wealth and power, he’d never faced any consequences for his actions. Now—finally—someone was holding him to account.

Jessie knew that she was supposed to protect victims, even imperfect ones, but this felt like a stretch. Joel Cisco was a predator. In fact, Jessie wondered what would happen if she was the one holding the knife to his throat right now. Would her desire for bloodlust win out over her sense of duty?

She pictured Hannah in Heather’s position and herself in Monica’s. Could she really say that she would do anything differently? If anything, she suspected she might have already done what Monica intended.

Here was a chance to allow someone else to take their vengeance. Maybe she should just let Monica cut him open and savor the pleasure of watching the man bleed out. She wouldn't be personally responsible for it. She would simply have been "unable" to prevent it. That was totally defensible if she was questioned later.

What did it matter anyway? Monica Silver was already going to prison for three other murders. In the grand scheme of things, what was one more? Would it really be that bad to let her finish off this guy, who was by all measures the most culpable of the yacht bros? Jessie fought back a snicker as a random thought entered her head: the medication she'd taken to curb her urges had definitely worn off.

Apparently she hadn’t hidden the near-chuckle well enough, because Monica’s calm expression changed. She looked confused.

“What’s so funny?” she asked.

Nothing,” Jessie said. “I guess I’m just trying to think of a way to talk you down. The problem is—I’m coming up empty.”

“Why would you want to talk me down?” Monica demanded. “You said over the speaker that you knew what he did and wanted justice for Heather. This is justice. Why would you even consider getting in the way of that?”

Jessie realized that her hands had been up the whole time they’d been talking.

“Do you mind if I put these down?” she asked.

“Only if you answer my question,” Monica said.

“It’s a fair question,” Jessie conceded as she rested her arms at her sides. “Give me a second to come up with a good answer.”

She was quiet for a moment as she really pondered it. A big part of her wanted Monica to tear the knife across Cisco’s throat so she could watch his blood spurt everywhere. That part of her was so all-consuming that she wondered if there was space left for anything else. She was tempted to just whisper, “do it” and enjoy the show.

She closed her eyes and exhaled heavily. When she opened them again, she decided she owed it to her professional self, if not to Cisco, to at least try to make a compelling case. She wasn’t sure if even she would find it convincing.

“I can think of one reason,” she said.

“You have to follow the law, even if you don’t agree with it?” Monica offered sarcastically.

Jessie shrugged.

“I guess I should say yes to that, but no,” she replied. “The reason is that if you kill him now, we’ll never know the truth about what happened to Heather.”

That wasn’t entirely true. There were two other men that might be able to solve that mystery. But that detail wouldn’t help her right now, so she didn’t mention it. Instead, she continued.

“I assume that’s why you’ve been methodically cutting into his flesh, to get him to come clean. Or is it just for the fun of it?”

“Can’t it be both?” Monica wanted to know.

“It can,” Jessie conceded. “Has it worked?”

“Not yet,” Monica admitted, “but until you showed up, I planned to take my time.”

"Well, maybe we can still get some answers from Joel in the time we have left," she said before focusing her attention on the bloodied man before her. "What do you say, Joel? Are you ready to be honest?"

The fear in his eyes hadn’t dissipated, but Jessie sensed something more than just fear of more pain in them. She also saw hopelessness. He thought he was going to die, no matter what he said. She needed to change that.

“I have a deal for both of you,” she said, a surge of adrenaline rising in her as the perfection of it became clear to her. There was a way to feed both her bloodlust and her sense of duty and come out unsullied on the other side. Well, maybe not unsullied, but mostly unscathed.

“What is it?” Monica asked.

“Here’s what I propose,” Jessie said. “You remove the rag from Joel’s mouth. He describes what happened that night with Heather, in full, without excuses. I will record him on my phone. In exchange for his honesty, you let him live. Then he faces responsibility for his actions. Unfortunately, Monica, so will you. But I get the sense that you’ve made your peace with that. That’s one option.”

“Or?” Monica said.

“Or,” Jessie continued, “you remove the rag, and Joel declines to be honest about the events of that night. He denies responsibility entirely, or tries to pass the buck, or just refuses to say anything at all.”

“What happens then?” Monica wondered.

“Then,” Jessie said slowly and with total conviction, “I imagine you’d kill him.”

Other than the waves lopping up against the hull outside, there was total silence. Monica’s jaw had dropped open in shock. Joel’s eyes were on the verge of popping out of his skull. Jessie went on.

"I can't really do anything to stop you," she explained. "If you slit his throat, no one would find it hard to believe that I tried to talk you down and failed. You were just too far gone. He'd bleed out, and those wild eyes I'm looking at would go dull forever. I'd take you into custody, and you'd spend the rest of your life in prison. And that would be that. You'd never know the truth, and he'd be dead. That feels like a lose-lose for both of you, but I'd be okay with it. The question is, would the two of you?"

Cisco tried to spit the rag out.

“I think he wants to say something,” Jessie noted.

Monica yanked the rag out of his mouth. He coughed for several seconds, then swallowed a few times. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse.

“How do I know she won’t kill me anyway after I talk?”

Jessie shrugged.

“I guess you don’t,” she said. “But I’d imagine that after three years of injustice, Monica would like to finally see someone pay for what was done to her sister. I’m hoping that her need for the world to acknowledge Heather in a court of law would trump her desire to gut you. Plus, in my experience, men like you don’t fare too well in prison. That means that your suffering will continue, rather than just ending here on this boat. That should offer her some solace.”

“Then why should I say anything?” he snarled. “If my only choices are die now or get raped in in prison for the next fifty years, that’s no choice at all.”

"There's always the chance that you could beat the charges," Jessie proposed. "You could claim that your confession was coerced. Maybe a jury will see it your way, and you'll walk free. But if you don't talk now, you'll never know."

Cisco closed his eyes in concentration. He had a big decision to make. Behind him, Monica had an appalled expression on her face, clearly horrified at the prospect of him escaping punishment after all this.

Jessie smiled back at her and shook her head, as if to silently say, “don’t worry, that’s not going to happen.” Of course, she couldn’t really make that promise. Anything could happen at trial. But admitting that in this moment felt counterproductive. Cisco opened his eyes.

“Aren’t you supposed to be a law enforcement officer?” he balked. “How can you just stand by and let her commit murder?”

“We’re well past that,” Jessie said coldly. “You should worry less about what I should be doing and more about whether you ever want to do anything ever again.”

Cisco went quiet. After a few seconds, Monica lowered the knife slightly and moved off to the side so that she could see the man’s face.

She was still too far away for Jessie to get to her before she’d be able to lift the knife to his neck again. But that might be a moot point. Jessie wasn’t sure if she even wanted to stop her. In this moment, it appeared that Joel Cisco would decide how this played out.

“Turn on the recorder,” Monica whispered.

Jessie pulled out her phone and hit record.

“It’s on,” she said.

Monica turned her attention back to Cisco. “Go ahead.”

Jessie looked at her phone, watching the seconds tick by. When it reached 14, Cisco finally opened his mouth to speak.