The Ghosts We Made

13.

Eleanor's cackling echoes off the damp warehouse walls, gutting me from the inside out. I'm on my feet, fists clenched, but for a moment, all I can do is stand there as her cruel amusement fills the space between us.

"Poor, poor Vic," she croons, her voice dripping with mock sympathy. "It must be so hard, realizing that you're the monster in this story."

I shake my head, trying to clear the fog of shock and grief. "Laughing at a broken man, Eleanor?" My voice comes out more bitter than I intend, laced with that edge of acrid smoke and old whiskey. "That's a new low, even for you."

Her smile doesn't falter, red lips curling like she knows secrets the stars haven't whispered yet. "Oh, Vic," she purrs, her tone dripping with mock sympathy, "you think this is about pleasure? No, darling. This is about revelation."

I narrow my eyes, trying to steady my pounding heart, to focus through the fog that's been clouding my thoughts for too long. "What game are you playing now?"

She steps closer, the click of her high heels against the concrete floor, a metronome counting down my sanity. "You've been chasing your own tail, Vic. Chasing memories that slip through your fingers like grains of sand." She pauses, tilting her head, her dark hair cascading over one shoulder. "But what if I told you that it was me, pulling the strings all along?"

"Cut the cryptic crap, Eleanor." But even as I say it, a wintry shiver slithers down my spine. She wouldn't... She couldn't...

"Your precious memories," she whispers, leaning in so close I can feel her breath on my cheek, "I took them from you. Piece by piece, until you were nothing but a shell, a mere husk of the man you once were."

My mind reels, my pulse throbbing in my temples. It's impossible. And yet, as I look into her eyes—those deep pools of betrayal—I know she's not lying. It's there, in the smug lift of her eyebrow, the cold satisfaction in her gaze.

"Remember, Vic." Her voice is a taunt, a serpent's hiss. "Or rather, try to remember. How does it feel knowing it was me who robbed you of your past?"

Anger surges within me, hot and violent, but it's got nowhere to go. Not yet. I'm a loaded gun with a jammed trigger, and Eleanor stands before me, the embodiment of every unanswered question that's haunted my nights.

"Why?" The word scrapes out of me, raw and hoarse, but she just smiles wider, her laughter ringing in my ears once more.

"Isn't it obvious?" she purrs, her voice a velvet cloak draped over barbed wire. "Lily was my half-sister, Vic. Our bloodline, half-Fae, and she... she wanted out. Away from you." She steps closer, her heels clicking like the ticking of a bomb on the grimy floor. "I merely facilitated a reunion at the warehouse—so she could vanish with Reyes."

Her confession strikes like a viper's bite, and my heart hammers against my chest as if trying to break free from the cage of my ribs. Lily, my enigma wrapped in whispers, had secrets deeper than I'd ever imagined. And Reyes... the thought of them together gnaws at me with jagged teeth.

"Revenge, darling," Eleanor continues, circling me like a shark sensing blood in the water. "For Lily's death, I made sure you'd live a fragmented life, always chasing ghosts in the fog."

The accusation coils around my throat, but I shake my head, rejecting her twisted narrative. I can still see Lily's face that night, eyes wide with shock and fear. Not at me—no, never at me—but at something...someone else. Her gaze had pierced through the murky shadows, finding her true assailant.

"You're lying!" My voice is like a thunderclap in the tense silence. "Lily knew her killer—and it sure as hell wasn't me!"

Eleanor's laughter fades into a smirk, a dark omen. "Are you so certain, Vic? Memories can be deceitful, especially when stripped away piece by piece. But believe what you will. After all, what's a detective without his grand delusions?"