When I saw my ex-husband again after six long years, it was in a courtroom. He sat on the judicial bench, wearing the heavy black robes of a judge. I stood in the defendant’s box. As an accused murderer. The moment he recognized my face, the color drained from Thomas’s face, his eyes widening in sheer disbelief. “Bea? Is that… is that you?” I wasn’t surprised by his reaction. After all, nobody would ever connect Beatrice Campbell—a girl who once sobbed at the sight of a harmless spider—with Mercy, the ruthless killer who had systematically snuffed out five lives. Thomas’s knuckles turned white as he gripped the edge of his bench, his jaw tight, his voice trembling with a mixture of rage and grief. “Six years. Five lives. Five families utterly shattered…” He leaned forward, his voice cracking. “How could you do it, Bea? How could you become this monster?” I looked at his anguished face, and a soft, low chuckle escaped my throat. “It’s not just five, Thomas.” I leaned against the railing of the box, offering him a cold, mocking smile. “Your fiancée—my dear childhood best friend, Cassie Knowles—she’s been missing for a week now, hasn’t she?” I leaned in closer, whispering into the quiet of the courtroom. “Care to guess where she is?” … The courtroom erupted into instant chaos. Thomas went entirely pale. His knees buckled, and he nearly slid right off his leather chair. The chief judge banged his gavel with frantic, echoing strikes. “Recess! This court is adjourned. Case remanded to the police department for further investigation!” Bailiffs rushed forward, pinning my arms behind my back. As they dragged me out of the courtroom, a barrage of camera flashes blinded me. Outside the doors, the families of my victims screamed and wept. Rotten eggs and sharp gravel flew over the security barriers, striking my head and shoulders. A sharp stone sliced my temple. Blood ran down my cheek, warm and sticky, but I didn’t care. My eyes remained locked on Thomas, who was being ushered out by court security. Seeing the utter despair in his eyes, as if his very soul had been hollowed out, I finally let out a long, cathartic laugh. I was taken back to the high-security detention center. In the interrogation room, Detective Sean Callahan sat across from me. He was a massive man, radiating a quiet, dangerous authority. “Where is Cassie Knowles?” he demanded. I leaned back against the cold metal chair, letting my handcuffs clink against the table. “Bring Thomas here. I’ll only tell him.” “Not going to happen,” Callahan said, shutting me down instantly. “He is the victim’s fiancé. He has been officially recused from this case.” He leaned forward, resting his thick forearms on the table. “From what I’ve gathered, Judge Barrett is your ex-husband, and the victim was your closest friend for over a decade. Did jealousy drive you to this, Beatrice? Did you kill her because they were getting married?” I didn’t answer. I just stared at him, my expression blank. Thinking he had found a crack in my armor, Callahan tossed a stack of printouts onto the table. They were old photographs of Cassie and me during our teenage years. On the very top was a picture of us in middle school. I was smiling brightly at the camera, while Cassie stood slightly behind me, looking shy and small. “You met her in elementary school, didn’t you?” Callahan’s voice softened, adopting a gentler, coaxing tone. “You were like sisters. You went to the same boarding school. But you were pampered, spoiled, unable to do anything for yourself, while Cassie was independent. She washed your clothes, bought your meals. She even gave up her spot at a top-tier Ivy League university just to go to the same mid-tier state school with you, because your grades weren’t good enough and she wanted to keep taking care of you.” I let out a sharp, bitter laugh but said nothing. Callahan continued, his finger tapping the photos. “During college, Cassie studied law, which is how she met Thomas, her upperclassman. You married him three years after graduation. But after the wedding, you grew insanely jealous of her. You picked fights with them constantly.” He leaned in closer. “And then, six years ago, Cassie tried to make peace with you. You drugged her during a private conversation and set the house on fire. If Thomas hadn’t arrived in time to pull her out, she would have died. You fled the scene and spent six years on the run. During that time, you showed no remorse, brutally taking five more lives using different, horrific methods.” Callahan slammed his palm onto the table, his eyes bloodshot with anger. The photos scattered, some slipping off the edge and landing by my shoes. “Beatrice Campbell, you changed your name to Mercy. You claimed you were trapped in a living hell, but was murder really the only way you could find your ‘mercy’?” “Do you have any idea how much she protected you? Cassie never even pressed charges for that fire. For six years, Thomas and Cassie did nothing but search for you. Thomas only filed for divorce to force you out of hiding. It was only after years of fruitless searching that they finally decided to be together. He wanted to spend the rest of his life making amends for the sins you committed!” I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I threw my head back and laughed until my chest ached. “Making amends? For my sins?” I reached up with my sleeve to wipe the tears of laughter from my eyes. “I knew they were masters of rewriting history, but this… this is a work of art.” Callahan looked deeply frustrated by my reaction. He gripped the edge of the table. “If they were lying, why would they wait six years to get married? Cassie kept every single one of these photos. The very proof of her devotion to you is what we used to track you down. Beatrice, doesn’t your conscience hurt even a little?” I looked down at the two smiling faces in the photo near my foot. My eyes stung, turning red. Seeing this shift, Callahan took a breath, lowering his voice. “Beatrice. Tell me where Cassie is. Let her rest in peace.” “Rest in peace?” I raised my eyes, looking past Callahan, staring directly at the large one-way mirror on the wall behind him. I knew who was standing on the other side. “Thomas,” I whispered, my voice dripping with venom. “Do you honestly think a person built entirely on a mountain of stolen lives deserves to rest in peace?” I stood up, my handcuffs rattling loudly, and grabbed the hem of my gray prison shirt. Callahan sprang from his seat, lunging across the table to grab my arms. “Beatrice! What do you think you’re doing? Sit down!” My wrists were pinned, but I twisted my body hard in the opposite direction, forcing the fabric to tear with a sharp, loud rip. The detective froze. The look of alarm on his face instantly melted into horror. There was no modesty to protect. What lay beneath the torn cloth was a landscape of ruined, waxy flesh. My body looked like a candle that had melted and cooled into grotesque, unnatural folds. “Thomas!” I yelled at the mirror, my voice echoing off the concrete walls. “Look at me! Does an arsonist end up with ninety percent of her body burned while the victim walks away with a few light scratches?!” My reflection in the glass looked monstrous, but I couldn’t stop smiling. The fire six years ago had consumed me from my ankles to my throat. I had spent months in a sterile burn ward, hovering between life and death, screaming until my vocal cords tore. And now, they wanted to tell the world that I was the one who lit the match. Realizing I knew Thomas was watching, Callahan quickly signaled the guards and had me moved to a different room. As we crossed the hallway, Thomas burst out of the observation room, his face twisted in a mixture of panic and denial. “You did that to yourself, Beatrice! You burned yourself to frame her! You were always sick, always jealous of what Cassie had!” Callahan moved fast. He shoved me into a secure interrogation room and slammed the heavy metal door shut, locking Thomas’s shouting voice on the other side. The hallway fell quiet again. Callahan sat down heavily, rubbing his temples in exhaustion. “I apologize. I didn’t realize they had allowed Judge Barrett into the observation room.” He took a deep breath, looking at me with a sudden, quiet intensity. “Tell me about the fire. Tell me what actually happened.” I looked at him, studying his face to see if there was any real curiosity left in his eyes. “Not just the fire,” I said softly. “If you want to understand, we have to start from the very beginning. My version.” It was true that Cassie took care of me when we were young. But she didn’t do it out of sisterly love. She did it out of obligation. We came from two entirely different worlds. We would have never met if my private elementary school hadn’t organized a charity drive for impoverished schools in the countryside. I had donated a box of gently used books and stationery. Inside one of the storybooks, I had scribbled my home address. A week later, I received a letter. It was a thank-you note from Cassie, written in neat, careful print. I was thrilled. We became pen pals. She wrote to me about the green fields and the farm animals; I wrote to her about the museums, the skyscrapers, and the books I read. She invited me to visit her village during the summer. My parents drove me out there. But when we arrived at the entrance of the village, we didn’t find a welcoming committee. We found Cassie’s mother screaming, her hand tangled in Cassie’s hair as she swung a heavy wooden broom down onto her back. “Inviting guests?!” her mother shrieked, her voice carrying over the dirt road. “We barely have enough to feed you, you worthless parasite, and you have the nerve to invite city folk to look down on us?!” The broom snapped. Cassie collapsed into the dirt, blood trickling from her lip. I sobbed the entire drive home, begging my parents to save her. In the end, my parents paid her family thirty thousand dollars—a fortune to them—to formally take over her care and bring her to the city. My parents didn’t formally adopt her because they wanted to protect her dignity. They wanted her to feel like an equal, a dear friend who was staying with us. I was too young to understand the dark complexity of human pride. When my parents brought her into our home, Cassie knelt on the hardwood floor, her eyes wide and desperate. “Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Campbell. I will be Bea’s servant for the rest of my life to pay you back.” My parents immediately pulled her to her feet. “No, sweetheart. We don’t want a servant. We just want you to be happy here, with Bea.” I felt like a savior. I shared my clothes, my room, my toys, and my life with her. To protect her from gossip, we never told anyone at our new private school where she came from. But teenagers are perceptive. When classmates asked why Cassie was always fussing over me, ironing my clothes, and fetching my lunch, I would simply smile and say, “Because she loves me.” I didn’t realize that to the rest of the world, I looked like a spoiled, tyrannical princess, and Cassie looked like my long-suffering maid. And I certainly didn’t realize that my future husband, Thomas, saw us the exact same way. Shortly after Thomas and I married, his behavior shifted. He started smiling at his phone, setting it face-down on the table whenever I walked into the room. He worked late, and when he came home, there was often a faint, delicate scent of women’s perfume lingering on his coat. When I confronted him, he sighed with irritation. “I was laughing at a legal group chat, Bea. Putting my phone face-down is just a habit from work. And the perfume? I work with female clients. Am I supposed to tell them to step away because my wife is paranoid?” Still uneasy, I confided in Cassie. She hugged me tightly, whispering in my ear: “Next time you suspect something, don’t ask him. Just investigate. Find the proof first so he can’t lie his way out of it.” The proof arrived sooner than I expected. Thomas went on a short weekend business trip. He sent me a photo of the city skyline from his hotel room window, but in the reflection of the glass, I saw the distinct silhouette of a woman standing by the bed. I called Cassie immediately, but her phone went straight to voicemail. Panicked and desperate, I called two of our mutual friends and drove straight to his hotel. We used a spare keycard from the front desk to open the door. Inside, Thomas was half-kneeling on the carpet, gently cradling a woman’s bare leg in his hands. It was Cassie. When Thomas saw our friends standing in the doorway holding up their phones, his face turned livid. “Beatrice, have you lost your mind?!” My entire body was shaking. “What… what is she doing here?” Thomas stood up, shielding Cassie behind him, and slapped the phone out of my friend’s hand. “Cassie is in the pre-law program. I brought her along so she could audit a real case. She tripped on the stairs and sprained her ankle, and I was checking her injury. What is wrong with you?!” But the scent in the room was unmistakable. It was the exact same perfume I had smelled on his coat. I pushed past him, grabbed his phone off the nightstand, and unlocked it. Cassie’s contact was pinned to the top. The chat history from that single day was longer than all the messages Thomas had sent me over the last six months. My blood ran cold. “Is this your ‘legal group chat,’ Thomas? If you two had nothing to hide, why didn’t you just tell me she was coming with you?” “Enough!” Thomas roared. He reached into his pocket and threw two plastic keycards onto the bed. “I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d lose your mind and accuse her of something terrible! Everyone knows how much Cassie has sacrificed for you over the years, and this is how you repay her? By trying to brand her as a mistress?” Seeing the two separate room keys, the friends I had brought with me began to whisper among themselves, looking at me with disapproval. “Bea… maybe you really did misunderstand,” one of them murmured. Cassie slowly slipped off the bed and fell to her knees in front of me, tears streaming down her face. “I’m so sorry, Bea. This is my fault. Please don’t fight with Thomas because of me.” But as she bowed her head, I saw it—a tiny, triumphant smirk curling the corner of her lips. Before I even realized what I was doing, my hand flew out and struck her across the face. “Cassie, I treated you like a sister! How could you do this to me?!” In the next second, a blinding pain exploded in my cheek. Thomas had slapped me so hard I stumbled back, falling hard against the desk. “You treated her like a sister?” Thomas sneered, his voice cold and disgusted. “You treated her like a servant. You made her wash your clothes, fetch your meals, and forced her to go to a second-rate state school just so she could keep nursing you. How do you sleep at night, Beatrice?” The metallic taste of blood filled my mouth. I looked up at them, my vision blurring. “A servant? Without my family, her own mother would have sold her off to clear a debt! My parents paid thirty thousand dollars to get her out of that hell. And when my family went bankrupt and college tuition skyrocketed, I gave up my study-abroad fund and split it with her so she could afford school. That is why we went to the state college together! Is that the story she told you?” The room fell dead silent. Cassie’s soft, theatrical sobbing was the only sound. Thomas’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t back down. He pulled Cassie to her feet, shielding her from my sight. “If you actually did those things out of charity, you wouldn’t throw them in her face to humiliate her.” Without another word, he guided her out of the room. Our friends followed them, leaving me alone on the cold hotel floor. The sheer weight of the betrayal crushed me, and the world went dark as I fainted. When I opened my eyes, I was lying in a hospital bed. Thomas was sitting beside me, holding my hand tightly. When he saw me move, he immediately looked up, his eyes bloodshot and weary. “Bea… thank God you’re awake.” He kissed the back of my hand, his voice thick with emotion. “I am so, so sorry about what happened at the hotel. I lost my temper.” He reached out, gently smoothing the hair from my forehead. “The doctor told me you’re pregnant, Bea. You have to stay calm, for the baby. There is nothing going on between Cassie and me, I swear. We both crossed some lines, but it was just a misunderstanding.” He pulled a small, worn photograph from his pocket. It was the picture of Cassie and me from middle school. “Your friendship is too precious to throw away over jealousy,” Thomas whispered. “She wants to apologize to you. She’s coming to our house tomorrow. I’ll leave the two of you alone so you can talk it out. Will you do that for me? For our family?” I stared at Cassie’s innocent teenage smile in the photograph. I thought of what my mother used to tell me when we were young: “Never expect perfect grace from those who have known nothing but survival.” I slowly closed my eyes and nodded. The next afternoon, Cassie arrived at our suburban home, carrying a container of my favorite homemade soup. She watched quietly as I ate a few spoonfuls, and only then did Thomas feel comfortable enough to leave. “I’ll leave you two to catch up,” he said, offering me a reassuring smile before driving away. The moment his car cleared the driveway, Cassie’s face changed. The submissive, guilty expression vanished, replaced by a cold, mocking sneer. “Beatrice,” she said, leaning over the kitchen island. “Do you have any idea how nauseating you are? Sitting there pretending to be the benevolent queen, when I know you absolutely despise me.” I set my spoon down, my hand starting to tremble. “What are you talking about?” I tried to keep my voice steady. “I won’t let you play your mind games with me again, Cassie.” She laughed, a sharp, ugly sound, and pulled out her phone. She pressed play on an audio recording. Thomas’s voice filled the quiet kitchen: “…My entire career is built on family law, Cassie. A messy divorce would ruin my reputation. We have to be smart. But as a promise to you… when Bea went under for the IVF procedure, I had the clinic swap her donor eggs with yours. The child she’s carrying is yours and mine.” My heart stopped. To protect Thomas’s pride, we had told no one about our struggles with fertility or the IVF treatments. I tried to stand up, to scream, but my legs felt like lead. My arms wouldn’t obey my brain. The soup. It was drugged. Seeing the raw terror in my eyes, Cassie’s grin widened. She reached into her pocket, pulled out a box of matches, and struck one. The small flame danced between us. “Beatrice,” she whispered, her eyes gleaming with a sick light. “If this house catches fire right now… who do you think Thomas will choose to save?” I tried to force the words out of my throat, my voice barely a whisper. “If you want him… take him. I won’t stand in your way.” “Slap.” She struck me across the face, sending me sliding off the chair onto the floor. “Take him?” she spat, glaring down at me. “Even now, you speak to me like you’re handing down scraps from your table. ‘I’ll let you have him.’ Who do you think you are, Beatrice? You were just lucky enough to be born to rich parents. What makes you better than me? Why did you get to have everything while I had to beg for your discarded toys?” The tiny flame of the match caught the edge of the kitchen curtains. “It’s a dog-eat-dog world, Bea. And weak, naive girls like you get left behind.” She pulled out her phone, dialing Thomas’s number on speaker. “Thomas! Help me!” she screamed into the receiver, her voice instantly shifting into a pitch of pure, frantic terror. “Bea has lost her mind! She set the house on fire! She’s trying to burn us both alive!” That was the last thing I heard before the smoke filled my lungs. Through the haze of the spreading flames, I saw the front door crash open. Thomas ran straight past where I lay paralyzed on the kitchen floor, throwing his arms around Cassie and carrying her out into the fresh air. Then, the burning ceiling collapsed, burying me in ash and fire. I looked across the metal table at Detective Callahan, whose face had gone completely pale. “So,” I said, my voice steady and quiet. “What I did to Cassie Knowles wasn’t murder. I simply returned the favor.” Callahan stood up so fast his chair screeched against the floor. “Secure the old Barrett residence immediately! Get a forensics team out there—Cassie’s remains are likely buried on the property!” They moved fast. Within hours, the forensic team unearthed a small, sealed urn containing human ashes from the backyard of my former home. In the visitor’s room, Thomas slammed his fists against the glass partition, tears streaming down his face. “Yes, Cassie did terrible things! But you had the evidence! You could have used the law to destroy us, Beatrice! Why did you have to kill her like this?!” I stared at him through the glass, my expression entirely tranquil. “If I had died in that kitchen fire like she planned, Thomas… how would I have used the law?” I leaned closer to the glass. “And tell me—are you crying because you’re afraid of what the law will do to me, or are you crying because your precious Cassie is gone?” Thomas froze, his mouth hanging slightly open, unable to find an answer. Suddenly, the door behind him burst open. Detective Callahan entered, his face tight with anger and confusion. “The lab results just came back. Those ashes in the urn… they don’t belong to Cassie Knowles. Beatrice, you lied to us!” I smiled, resting my chin on my hands. “I never said those ashes belonged to Cassie.” “They belong to my mother.” I looked at Thomas, watching the confusion turn into cold dread on his face. “If my history with Cassie was just about that house fire, Thomas… why on earth would I have gone out of my way to kill five other completely innocent people?”
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