I’ve known two incredibly strong personalities in my life. My grandfather and Damian. My own father was a shadow in the presence of my grandfather. Even when we lived on our own, Grandfather was still the patriarch of the family. My father always felt like acting on his own was being defiant to his father. I transfer a lot of paternal feelings and rebelliousness toward my grandfather because of that. I wanted to pull away from his influence more than anyone else.

With Damian, it’s the way he sees right into me. I’m still that awkward teenage girl he met at the magic convention. He knows the woman is an act. I’ve never known anyone who could read me as well as he can. And it’s scary because he’s the most unpredictable, impossible person I’ve ever met.

Unpredictable. Impossible.

These are the same words people are using to describe the Warlock.

They’re also the same words you could use to describe my grandfather if you didn’t know him like I did.

I guess that’s what’s nagging me. Unlike everyone else in this building, I know men like Damian and my grandfather. My life is filled with unusual, impossible men. Men from the same world as the Warlock.

When we’re inside the elevator, Ailes notices my frustration.

“Something on your mind?” he asks.

“I’ve told them everything I know,” I say defensively.

“And?”

Ailes has proven he’s earned my trust. “Well, not everything I suspect. I just don’t want to send us off into any wild-goose chases.”

Or expose Damian for the thing he did to protect me.

“If you’re sure it’s not relevant and it’s only speculation, then keep it to yourself. I don’t need to know.” We reach the bottom floor. Before we exit, he turns to me, “On the other hand, you better be damn sure he doesn’t have anything to do with this.”

The thing I’m dying to know, if Damian did it, was under what circumstances he killed my attacker. The coroner’s report said there was a struggle. Bruising on his knuckles and signs that he fought back. The bruising suggests that Damian came at him head-on and not from behind.

Did Damian just try to talk to him and it escalated from there? Was Damian acting in self-defense? The forensic evidence doesn’t dispute that. It also doesn’t say that’s the way it happened either. Damian could even have provoked him into a fight, knowing he was going to kill him. Or Damian could have just arranged it from hundreds of miles away. Anything is possible with him.

By the time I reach the bullpen, I know the right thing for me to do is to cooperate as fully as possible. If someone pushes me about my suspicions, which nobody did, I’ll tell them that I think he may have acted in self-defense in a crime I have no proof he was ever involved in.

Gerald and Jennifer are waiting for us when we walk into the room, with grave expressions on their faces. They’re standing in front of a video projection of an image of Chloe. It’s a photograph of her I haven’t seen before.