The sister-in-law is angry, pacing the floor of her room. Her anger booms inside her chest, harder than the thunder. And much more powerful.

The cousin does what she always does when she is anxious. She reaches for the one thing she loves and knows—literature. The windows of the house rattle in their frames as she leaves her room, carrying her book. Shortly after, the power goes out.

The groom’s friend is crying in the dark. She forces herself to read all the messages on her phone before the battery dies out completely. Every angry line and every threat. She knows she deserves what is coming. After all, she’s responsible for taking a life.

The best friend is drinking, taking long pulls from a bottle of tequila she found in the kitchen cupboard earlier. It’s the kind of tequila that has a worm in the bottom of the bottle. She wonders what would happen if she drank it all, swallowed that ghastly creature whole. Maybe she would transform into something better, someone resembling a human being, not this wasteful shell she’s been stuck in.

All the ladies are stewing separately, not realizing that they will soon be brought back together with a death…

Part Two

“Keep quiet and the enemy will reveal himself.”

— Bangambiki Habyarimana

Chapter Twenty-Three

Interview: Suspect #1

Detective Nina Smalls wasn’t what anyone would consider ‘old’, but she had been around the block a time or two, as her father used to say. She grew up as the daughter of a prominent beat cop, who was eventually promoted to detective and retired as the head police chief just as his daughter joined the academy.

She was eight years old when she attended her very first crime scene. Strangely enough, that day also happened to be her birthday. Detective Rod Smalls had promised her a birthday cake with police cars on top of it and a trip to the arcade. He had managed to get her the cake but the trip to the arcade was thwarted by an emergency call.

As a single father, finding last-minute babysitters wasn’t an easy feat. And he couldn’t leave his precious Nina on her birthday… but duty called. Family, duty, community, and honor. The four most important pillars in life, according to him.

“Take me with you,” she had begged.

Detective Rod Smalls knew it was wrong, but he didn’t have much of a choice. Sometimes choosing between his four pillars was hard—he loved his daughter, but he also had a responsibility to his community. He had to keep all of them safe, or at least work to right the wrongs when he failed to do so.

When he arrived at the scene of a recent shootout, he had instructed one of his deputies to keep an eye on Nina. Don’t move. Stay right here, he had ordered.