The Collective
The kitchen smelled wrong. Not rot, not yet. But something sharper. Disinfectant, maybe. Citrus and bleach layered over something coppery and faintly sweet. Like the air had been scrubbed too hard to hide what wouldn’t wash away.
Nicola stepped inside, bootprints joining the muddy constellation already tracked across the tile. She noted the evidence markers. One perched near the pantry like a forgotten chess piece. The lights overhead flickered, then steadied. The fridge hummed like a throat trying not to clear.
Voices drifted from down the hall. One of them unmistakably Warren’s, too smooth for the setting, like bourbon poured over a crime scene. She followed the sound past the breakfast nook, where a disposable coffee cup wilted sideways on a cushioned bench, still half full.
She found him leaning against the wall just outside the library, grinning at a forensics tech and describing his losing hand from last Friday’s poker game.
“Three queens, two bluffers, and not a damn heart among ’em. Story of my life.”
“Warren,” Nicola said, flat.
He turned. His face lit up in that practiced way of his, all teeth and feigned surprise.
“Well, look what the bayou dragged in. Detective Knight, back from the land of the ghost hunters and coffee-stained case files.”
Nicola didn’t return the smile. “Save it. You called me in.”
“Technically, Oakley called. I’m just the pretty face passing the baton.”
She ignored that. Her eyes drifted past him to the room beyond, where a woman paced barefoot on polished floors. Silk robe, bandaged neck. Dark hair pulled into a loose knot. Grace Broadchurch.
“She your victim?”
“One of ’em. Other one’s not feeling chatty.”
He tilted his head toward the hallway. Nicola caught a glimpse of legs crumpled awkwardly on the floor, half out of frame.
Warren continued, voice lowered like he was giving a tour: “Grace Broadchurch. Homeowner. Author. Minor local celebrity. Thinks the world runs on adjectives.”
Nicola stepped past him without permission.
In the library, Grace turned at her entrance. Her eyes flicked down to the grease-stained shirt, the battered boots, the old leather jacket. Then back up. Her gaze lingered just long enough to suggest interest without intent. EXPAND THIS
GLIMPSE OF WHY THEY’RE FIGHTING??
“Why don’t you go fix your hair, Detective?” Grace said without looking at Warren. Her voice was honey over glass.
Warren chuckled. “She’s all yours, Knight. Good luck sorting fact from fiction.”
Grace muttered, loud enough for him to hear: “Arrogant little camera whore.”
He grinned and vanished.
Nicola didn’t sit. She waited.
“Detective Nicola Knight,” she said simply.
Grace arched an eyebrow. “I know.”
Nicola frowned. “Have we met?”
“No,” Grace said, too quickly. “Your mother left behind a lot when she sold the house. Photos. Journals. Margins full of half-finished sentences and warnings. You were in the pictures. Honey-eyed. Younger. But unmistakable.”
Nicola’s expression didn’t change, but something behind her eyes cooled. “Let’s keep focused. Tell me what happened.”
Grace watched her another beat before finally sighing and stopping her pacing.
“I didn’t imagine it,” she said. “I didn’t dream it. And I’m not insane, no matter what that little peacock out there thinks.”
Nicola said nothing. Just nodded once, sharp. Go on.
Grace crossed her arms. “I was working. Research. Novel in progress. It was late. I lost track of time. Got a phone reminder about a trip to Baton Rouge and remembered Derek and I hadn’t finalized the itinerary.”
“Derek?”
“My assistant.”
Nicola nodded. Grace kept going.
“I texted him. Told him to come inside and quit pretending I couldn’t smell it. He always smokes on the porch when he thinks I’m too focused to notice.”
Nicola watched her talk. Sharp details. Selective memory. Grace was giving a performance, but not without substance.
“He didn’t answer,” Grace said. “So I got up. Lights flickered. Once. Twice. Then out completely.”
“Power failure?”
“No idea. I stumbled back to the desk, found my phone, and turned on the flashlight. I walked out to the hallway, calling for him. Then I saw…”
She swallowed.
“He was at the bottom of the stairs. Crumpled. Wrong. Like something bent him before he fell.”
She shivered then, the memory rolling over her like cold water. Her arms wrapped around herself before she could stop them, fingers digging into her elbows, as if anchoring her body against the chill of what she’d seen.
Nicola said nothing. She took a slow breath, then stepped forward.
“You’re cold,” she said quietly, almost to herself.
Grace blinked. “Excuse me?”
Nicola reached up, tugging her jacket off. She stepped in close and draped it over Grace’s shoulders, fingers brushing the collar to straighten it. Her knuckles nearly skimmed Grace’s breast. Both women stilled.
Nicola’s hand froze mid-motion. Grace inhaled just slightly, like the air had shifted.
Then Nicola pulled back.
“Better?,” she said. Grace nodded.
“Keep going,” Nicola added.
Grace slid her arms into the sleeves slowly. The weight of the jacket changed her posture, made her smaller.
“Vanilla,” she said. “And motor oil?.”
Nicola raised a brow. “Keep going.”
Grace settled on the settee.
“I started to call 911,” she said. “And someone knocked the phone out of my hand.”
Nicola stiffened. “Describe them.”
“I couldn’t. They were behind me. Close. I felt—” She shivered. “Breasts. Against my back.”
“Then?”
“Teeth. Like a cat. Sharp. Fast. Right here.”
She touched the bandage on her neck.
Nicola stepped forward, slowly. “So you were bitten.”
“Yes. I lost consciousness and they were gone.”
Nicola’s eyes narrowed. “No forced entry. No screaming. One clean kill. One maybe bite. Doesn’t add up.”
Grace stood. “You think I’m lying.”
“I think you like to play with words a little too much.”
GRACE SHOULD BE MAD, explain…
Grace stepped in close. “You’re not just here for the case. You’re here because of this place. It’s in your blood.”
Nicola’s jaw tensed. “Lot of things in my blood. None of them your business.”
Grace nodded toward the desk. An old book sat open. Nicola’s breath hitched.
Her grandmother’s book. The one she was never allowed to read.
“Your mother left it here,” Grace said. “And photos. I recognize you. Honey eyes. Fire under the surface.”
Nicola stepped closer. “You think you know me.”
“I know this house knows you. I know something odd happened here tonight, and you’re acting like it’s just another body.”
“What I know,” Nicola said, voice low, “is that a man is dead, and you’re in your silk robe giving ghost stories to the police.”
“Don’t you dare condescend to me.”
“Then stop acting like a playwright and start acting like a witness.”
Grace flushed. Her hands curled into fists. “I let you in. I told you everything. And now I’m just another hysterical woman to you?”
“I don’t know what you are yet,” Nicola said, stepping forward again. Close enough to smell Grace’s perfume. Gardenia and summer heat. Familiar. Unsettling. “But your story’s got holes, and I don’t trust patchwork.”
“You don’t have to trust me. Just don’t insult me.”
“That’ll depend on how many lies you tell.”
Grace turned on her heel and stalked from the room, her bedroom door slamming upstairs like punctuation.
Nicola let the silence settle. She moved down the hall. Found the body.
Derek Peabody. Mid-twenties. Slack jaw, broken neck. One arm beneath him, twisted wrong. No blood. No sign of a struggle.
Warren reappeared, laughing at something with a forensics tech. He spotted Nicola crouched.
“Thought you’d be halfway through a heart-to-heart by now,” he said. “Or is she too much for the great Detective Knight?”
Nicola didn’t answer.
“Chief wants you to call when you’re done playing who’s-wittier-with-the-witness.”
She stood. Checked her pockets.
No phone.
Warren peered back around the corner. “Problem?”
“My phone’s in my jacket.”
“So get it?”
“Miss Broadchurch is wearing it.”
Nicola turned, sharp, her boots striking the floor like a challenge, and started up the stairs.
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