The detective held up a finger, as though listening for something. “Maybe. It’s possible. But the lights weren’t out for that long. A couple hours, tops. How could they kill a person and string them up in such little time? Something is missing here,” she murmurs.

The phone in Matthias’s pocket vibrates to life causing them both to jump with surprise.

“Yes?” he says, lifting the phone to his ear. His eyes are trained on Detective Smalls, who slowly inspects the books again. One is still missing, bagged up as evidence back at the station.

“Excuse me. What did you just say?” Matthias says to the caller, plugging a finger in his other ear. He heard the words correctly the first time.

“I think you’d better tell that to my boss.” He passes the phone to the senior detective.

“This is Nina Smalls,” she says, in her curt voice, still examining the heavy tomes on the shelves.

“Wait. What?” Detective Smalls spins on her heels, eyes widening at her assistant. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she says. Matthias watches her, as she silently listens to the medical examiner’s findings on the other end of the line. It is too soon for the full autopsy results, but she already has a pretty clear idea of the cause of death.

When Detective Smalls hangs up the phone, she hands it back to Matthias.

“I guess our adventure extends to the pool, then. Now that we know our victim died by drowning,” she says, with a heavy sigh.

In the pale moonlight, the pool water looks dark and inky, like a hideous black portal to another world. It has a mineral smell to it, eggy and clean, but noxious all the same.

The detective walks the perimeter of the pool, getting down on her knees and back up again several times as she studies the water’s edge.

As she reaches the side of the pool nearest to the house, she freezes at one section of concrete. Down she goes, back on her knees, only this time, she holds her face, pressed to the ground, for several long minutes.

Matthias is getting antsy, uncomfortable with the silence.

Finally, the detective stands, glancing up at the second-story windows above.

“Stay here,” she tells Matthias, then takes off at a jog back inside the house.

Alone by the poolside, Matthias is becoming cold. The wind shifts through the trees, a sticky breeze blowing the leaves and making the hair on his arms stand on end.

“Up here!” Detective Smalls calls, her voice sing-songy in the dark. Mattias looks up from the spot she told him to stand by and sees her there, peering over the balcony at him. The bedroom doors behind her are flung open, billowy white curtains blowing in the wind.

He watches, in horror, as the detective lifts herself up on the railing, testing its strength.

“Be careful,” he warns, voice barely above a whisper.