"So let me get this straight," Milo said, swirling the last of his espresso, "you're ghosting a blonde model who literally cried when you left the bar last weekend?"
Andres leaned back in the booth, his usual smirk barely visible behind the rim of his coffee cup. "I didn't ghost her. I redirected my attention."
"To what? A piano piece?"
"To someone interesting."
They were seated in a dim, upscale café in Greenwich Village—warm lights, dark wood, bookshelves for walls. The kind of place Andres preferred when he wasn't hunting, writing, or performing social theater.
Milo, his best friend since undergrad, didn't know the truth. None of them did. As far as the world was concerned, Andres Nightwinn was exactly what the magazines claimed: a brilliant author, a charming intellectual, the golden son of an international businessman and a late, beloved pianist.
The table was full—Milo, Caro, Naomi, and a few new faces Andres barely bothered to remember. They laughed, shared stories, passed drinks and theories about his next book.
He smiled when he was supposed to.
He laughed when the timing demanded it.
But internally, he was somewhere else. Still listening to that recital. Still thinking about the slight tension in Thana's fingers, the way she held her breath between movements. The kind of detail that could drive a man to obsession.
"Speaking of which," Naomi said, tapping her manicured nail against her glass, "we all know you write what you know. So tell us—what's your latest killer like? Femme fatale? Tortured soldier? Deranged chess master?"
Andres tilted his head thoughtfully.
"A pianist," he said, casually. "Quiet. Reserved. But dangerous in the right light."
Naomi raised a brow. "Oh, moody. Very you."
Laughter followed, but Milo watched Andres a little too long.
"You've been quiet lately," Milo said, more seriously. "You okay?"
Andres smiled. A perfect, practiced smile. "Just thinking."
"About what?"
"Music. And timing."
Later that night, Andres returned to his apartment and stood alone in the silence. The aftertaste of espresso still lingered on his tongue.
He turned on the record player—Debussy this time—and wandered to the windows, staring out at the skyline. The lives below looked like flickering lights. Easy to extinguish.
He opened his journal. Not the one the world saw. Not the one he brought to interviews. This one was leather-bound, aged, and locked. The pages were filled with names, sketches, fingerprints. Descriptions. Observations. Truths.
He turned to a fresh page and wrote:
"To be charismatic is to lie convincingly. To be a killer is to lie intimately."
He thought of Julian's body, now growing cold beneath layers of alley dust and anonymity. He thought of Milo—so loyal, so unsuspecting. Then he thought of Thana again.
Not as a victim.
As a variable.
She didn't fit into his usual pattern. He couldn't define her yet, and that unsettled him. She wasn't a character. She was a question.
And Andres Nightwinn never left a question unanswered.