Chapter 4

The courtroom was full when I arrived. Media, Nina's family, people who'd followed the case online. Everyone waiting for the verdict.

Walsh stood in the dock, head down, resigned.

I pushed through to the public gallery just as the judge began reading the summary of charges.

The sentence was coming.

"— the defendant Victor Walsh, having committed acts of extreme violence — "

"Stop."

My voice came out louder than I intended in the silence. Every head turned.

"You can't sentence him yet."

Nina's mother stared at me, her eyes swollen. "Mia? What are you doing?"

The gallery erupted.

"Who is she?"

"Isn't that the victim's best friend? Is she trying to defend him?"

"Order! Order!"

The judge's gavel came down hard. He looked at me steadily. "You are Mia Holloway? You have an objection to proceed with this sentencing?"

Detective Pierce was in the gallery. He stood up and hissed at me: "Mia. Don't do this here. If you think the sentence is insufficient, we appeal after. We request a second hearing. Not now. Sit down — we need to give the public a result."

I didn't sit down.

The judge's eyes narrowed slightly. "Ms. Holloway, if this concerns the level of sentence — the court believes the evidence supports a proportionate verdict. Should you wish to appeal, the process is available to you. The likelihood of reversal on appeal is, in our assessment, very low."

I lifted my phone. Held the screen toward the bench.

"I'm not here to argue for a harsher sentence," I said. My voice was shaking, but it was clear. "I'm here to ask the court to set aside this verdict entirely. Victor Walsh cannot be convicted today."

The room erupted.

"She's defending him —"

"She's lost it. She's having some kind of breakdown."

"This is the victim's closest friend! How can she —"

The gavel again. Twice.

Sebastian had moved through the gallery and reached me. He put a hand on my shoulder, his face full of a familiar devastated concern.

"Mia. You need to stop. I know how much you loved her. I know you haven't been sleeping. But this —"

He lowered his voice, urgent, tender. "Come with me. Let's go outside. I'll explain everything. You don't have to do this."

He took my arm.

I wrenched free.

"Don't touch me."

I turned back to the judge, the gallery, the room.

"I'll explain what the bubble tea means."

"A bubble tea," said Detective Pierce flatly. He'd gone very still. "Mia. I have twenty-two years in this job. Not once have I seen a disposable cup overturn a complete evidence chain. If you don't make this clear — right now, in this courtroom — you're looking at a contempt charge. Do you understand me?"

I met his eyes.

"Detective Pierce," I said, "do you actually believe Victor Walsh is the person who killed Nina Sterling?"

He didn't answer.

"And doesn't it feel to you like everything was just a little too —" I paused "— convenient?"

I held up the screenshot.

"The dashcam. The car. The confession. Walsh's polygraph. All of it could be arranged. Could be staged. Evidence can be planted. Confessions can be coerced."

"But this cup — this large bubble tea, almost empty, that Nina was holding in the last minutes of her life — that you can't fake. That's just there. The dashcam caught it, and no one thought to ask why."

I looked at the judge.

"Nina texted me at eight fifteen to say she was going out for bubble tea. A taxi dropped her at the junction at eight thirty-five. The accident happened at eight thirty-eight. Twenty-three minutes, start to finish."

"Nina drank bubble tea slowly. Always. That was one of the most consistent things about her. A large cup took her forty minutes at minimum. She always sat somewhere while she drank it."

"In twenty-three minutes — factoring in the journey — she could not have bought that cup and drunk it to almost empty. Not alone. Not walking."

"Someone was with her before she sent me that text. Someone who'd been sitting with her long enough for her to drink most of a large bubble tea. Someone who then dropped her at that junction and drove away — and then sent me a message from her phone to make sure I'd think she'd just stepped out by herself."

"That person knew the cameras were broken. Knew the rain was forecast. Had already arranged for Walsh to be there — or to believe he'd been there, or to be prepared to take the blame for being there."

"And that person — on the day Walsh is convicted, the day this case is sealed — walks away. No one looks any further. Whatever Nina was trying to tell us with those lilies gets buried with her."

I swept the room.

"The real killer is here."

I let the silence run for a moment.

"It's Sebastian Mercer."

The room went off like a grenade.

"Sebastian? That's insane —"

"He's been looking for the killer for two months —"

"He nearly destroyed himself over this —"

Sebastian stepped back. All the blood had left his face.