Within the cavernous halls of the Criminal Investigation Department, silence reigned—save for the faint ticking of a pen. Zack Paterson sat motionless in his chair, his gaze distant as he idly tapped the instrument against the paper on his desk. The report before him remained untouched, though not unseen. His mind, ever calculating, was elsewhere.

Across from him, one of the younger officers handed a cup of water to the woman seated in the armchair, her form half-swallowed by the heavy wool blanket draped around her shoulders. The officer had done well—too well, perhaps—his eyes betraying a flicker of pity he dared not voice. Her fingers, pale and trembling, clung to the glass like a dying flame to its final breath. The bruises that marked her skin were unmistakable: deliberate, unrepentant acts of violence. These were not the marks of misfortune. They were the signatures of cruelty.

“You may go,”

Zack’s voice, calm and measured, severed the moment. The officer nodded once before retreating, the door clicking shut behind him with a soft finality.

Now alone with her, Zack laid the pen upon the desk and finally lifted his gaze. She had come to the station alone, soaked by the rain, wrapped in silence and shadows, asking—no, insisting—to speak with him by name.

Zack Paterson was no Sherlock Holmes. He made no such claims of brilliance. But after years as Chief Inspector, his instincts were refined to a scalpel’s edge, and his mind was quick to arrange broken pieces into coherent narratives. He had already assessed her age, her social standing, and the brutal story carved across her body.

The injuries spoke volumes. Uneven bruising. Controlled blunt force. The manner in which her body recoiled ever so slightly with each shift in the room’s silence. The culprit, undoubtedly, was a man—powerful, intentional, and twice her size. He struck not out of rage, but sport. Such men always did.

And still, she had come here—not to trust the system, but to circumvent it. Not to rely on law, but to reach him. Him. As if she had already calculated that ordinary justice would do her no good. As if she knew that some justice required a quieter hand, one that moved behind closed doors. But who, he wondered, had told her he would listen?

Paterson could have sent her away. He knew that. But there were lines his conscience would not cross, no matter how many villains he’d seen walk free with a smile and a bribe.

“You feel strong enough to speak now?”

His voice was low, firm—neither cruel nor kind. His elbows rested on the desk, fingers adjusting his glasses with a practiced motion as he studied her face, her breath, her hesitation. Every twitch and flicker catalogued. Every silence measured.

For in this office, beneath the calm surface of civility and law, Zack Paterson was already at war. Not with the woman before him—but with the beast who had sent her here, broken and unheard.