Time moved both slow and fast and then not at all. State police and the Bay City detectives arrived about the same time; forensics and the medical examiner shortly after. They had to drag me out of the greenhouse. My head spun with the blur of red and blue lights while they asked a million questions that all sounded the same. My answers were no better. Through it all, Desirae barely left my side.

"We'll know more by the morning, Kirby."

Her voice lifted my head from my hands. At some point, she'd coaxed me into the truck. Beyond the windshield, dark water rippled against the ghostly pale glow of the boats along their slips. We were back at the marina already.

"What happens next?" I asked. "With Miles?"

"Once the ME is done with their investigation, they'll release Miles to whichever funeral home their family chooses."

"Chapman's is the only one in town now." I shook my head, trying to clear it. "Miles is Persian. Their family will want them to go to the mosque." I thought about going to visit their grandma to tell her myself, but remembered what Pino had said about Nanna, how heartbreaking it was to have to keep telling her that Artie was gone.

"Chapman's?" Desirae repeated. "Any relation to Cora?"

"Her parents." My head continued to pound. I cranked the window down to let the night air into my lungs. "You said Greg was tracking Cora down, did he find her?"

She hesitated to answer. "I haven't heard from him."

I leaned my head back into the leather headrest and stared up into the ripped fabric of the truck's roof. "If I had gotten there sooner, I could've done something."

Her hand left the gear shift and softly cupped my leg. "Don't do that to yourself."

"It's true." My voice caught in the back of my throat, but no more tears flooded my eyes. My whole body felt drained. "I wasted time trying to avoid the past when I should've just been honest from the beginning. Instead of running from the truth, I could've gotten to the greenhouse in time."

"Kirby, if you'd have gotten there sooner, you'd be strung up with Miles. I'm sorry to be so blunt, but these tableaus are no longer coincidences. Whoever is doing this is deliberately targeting the models who were featured along the museum banners—which means you. And my gut is telling me you've been the main target all along, even if BCPD and Greg don't see it."

"Me?" I turned my head to face her, but couldn't read her expression in the dark. "Why?"

"Please just trust me when I say you're safer if you don't know. Until I have something concrete."

My arms folded against my stomach as I angled away from her to look out the window.

"Whoever is doing this is escalating, but I think you interrupted them this time." Her thumb rubbed against my skin as she thought out loud. "The scene looked rushed, definitely unfinished compared to the first two. And the first two were already embalmed. This was..."

"Fresh?" I mumbled, glancing back at her. "I don't get it Des. Nothing was out of place, other than the plants being moved and the painting was missing. It didn't look like Miles put up a fight and they definitely would have. I've seen them knockout a six-foot MAGA jagoff long before they even transitioned. This had to have been someone they knew. The client they mentioned, maybe."

Desirae hummed in agreement. "Which is exactly why I don't buy Greg's theory that these murders are some mob-related scare tactic. Yes, I've seen elaborate murder scenes from gangs, my husband's included, but these setups are different. Too personal. Screaming for attention. But Greg and BCPD think it's one of the local groups disgracing Artemisia's paintings to get to her father. Apparently, he came home early."

Pino had seemed slightly flustered when I mentioned the tableaus to him. Maybe more annoyed than anything. Like a father whose kid was constantly getting in trouble. Making him look bad. My eyes panned the edge of the water where it met the cement barrels outside of the dockhouse. If it was Pino's attention this person was seeking by disgracing Artemisia's paintings, then Desirae was right. And maybe she had been right all along. It was personal. Familial.

"I don't think it's gang related either," I replied, carefully considering what I was about to imply. "But what if Pino's attention was still the goal?"

"Then I'm back to my original top three." Desirae's eyes slowly traced over me, her thumb still tapped against my skin. "What made you change your mind?"

As she studied my face, I could see what Miles had meant. She wasn't just looking for an answer, she was looking to see how the answer affected me. "I don't know that it did. The Rafael I know couldn't do something like this, but he also hasn't been acting like himself. I think that's partially why I didn't tell him the truth about Artemisia getting me out early. People change a lot in seven years. Especially after a death."

"Did you?"

"Are you asking if prison reformed me? Or her death?" My half-hearted laugh felt foreign and dry after the tightness in my chest the last couple hours. I thought back to the meeting with Pino and the jobs waiting for me in Europe. "I thought it did."

Pino's final warning echoed in my head, 'Keep Special Agent Venus away from my warehouse.' I hadn't had a chance to tell her he knew who she was. That he knew she was looking into him.

"Des—"

Desirae's watch buzzed against my leg with a call. Her fingers left my thigh as she dug her phone out of her purse and flicked up to answer. Greg's pixelated scowl lit up the screen.

"Where are you?" he demanded before Desirae could say anything.

"At the marina. I just dropped Kirby off."

"She tell you she met with Pino right before the Shirazi kid was killed?"

She didn't dare look my direction, but I could see her teeth grinding.

"I'm telling you, Desirae, she's playing you. She's working with one of the rival gangs. When that kid's nail scrapings come back with her DNA—"

I hadn't even thought about the evidence that was pointing to me, but Desirae brushed him off. "Did you find Cora? Or Rafael for that matter?"

His video lagged, cutting off his answer, but his head shook with a no. "I've got my guys on it."

It was no secret I wasn't a fan of Cora, but the thought of her winding up in a similar fate as Miles made me sick to my stomach.

"The initial tox reports from the body in the pond came back already," Greg continued. "Ketamine. Enough to knockout a horse. Coincidentally, Rafaello Cassini is a known dealer in the party scene. Oh, and it also happens to be your informant's favorite nose candy."

"That's not true," I whispered as loud as I dared, but Desirae still didn't look my way.

"I guess that likely answers how this happened to Miles, then," she murmured. "And the cameras on the property?"

"All offline." His voice cut out as the camera froze. The video call dropped and the screen went black.

"Des, I meant to tell you," I started to say, "but everything unraveled so fast."

"It's fine."

"It's not fine. Pino knows who you are."

Her head bobbed with a nod. "Good. Then he knows exactly what I'm after."

My eyes went to her neckline where her husband's wedding band hung on the chain tucked beneath her dress. "He told me to keep you away from the warehouse."

Desirae twisted her head to look out the rear window. I mirrored her, following the wrought iron railing that lined the bayfront's sidewalk up to the old brick warehouse on the empty corner. My gaze traveled back to her. A restrained desperation filled her eyes. She needed to know if he was in there. And I needed the win as much as she did.

"Come on." I opened the passenger door and went to step down from the truck when Desirae grabbed my arm.

"I don't think you're up for this tonight."

"I can't just sit around and do nothing."

"We need a warrant."

"Oh, please." I tugged away from her and shut the door. Not a light illuminated the inside of the dockhouse to my right. "Greg's looking for Rafael too?"

"Yes." Desirae slung her purse over her shoulder and climbed down from the pickup. "That's why I originally put the tracker on the truck. I wasn't trying to follow you. But I'm glad I did."

"Me too," I admitted, studying her this time. Her long lashes lifted with a slight surprise. "It's nice to know someone's got my back."

She didn't say anything more, just crossed her arms over her chest and turned to walk up the bayfront's hill towards the warehouse. Maybe I'd been foolish to make that assumption. Maybe she was still just trying to keep me at a distance. But that last text from Miles weighed heavy on my mind as I sidled up to her.

Nearing the warehouse, I was surprised to see the side of the streets mostly bare. No mafia goons in parked black vehicles guarded the front. There hadn't been last night either from the little I could recall. If Pino was paranoid, he wasn't letting it show. From the outside, the warehouse looked like the same old shuttered brick building it was when I first strolled up to it for my first sitting with Artemisia.

Trees along the sidewalk cast moving shadows along the upper floors' glass windows. The more I looked, the worse they messed with my head. I continued down the corner towards the alley away from the deceptive streetlights. Desirae followed close behind.

Unlike the renovated apartments, the warehouse's fire escape hadn't been touched. Its rusted metal dangled off the side of the building, ready to collapse onto the loading dock below. Desirae flicked on her phone's flashlight and shined it through a broken window. I walked up the ramp and scoped out the old door we had always used to get into the loft. As I went to check the handle, Desirae grabbed my arm again.

"We're just looking around," she urged.

"What's the point of being a criminal informant if I'm not gonna do criminal things for you?"

"Confidential informant," she corrected with a whisper. "And with your testimony on Pino, I can probably get a judge to sign off on a warrant tomorrow morning."

"Not a judge around here," I mumbled.

But Desirae didn't seem to be listening, her attention was focused farther down the alley. She shined her light past me, highlighting the garage bay where we used to park. The hair on my arms stood up as her light washed over the shine of a new Lexus SUV.

"That's Cora's car."

"Cora's?" I was only slightly relieved.

Desirae whipped back towards me. "Can you pick that lock?"

"I thought we needed a warrant?"

"Exigent circumstances."