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The Game Master trembled with fury, his costume unable to conceal the malice brewing underneath. Roseline braced herself. She had to keep pushing his buttons, make him slip up.
“What now, oh, valiant masked avenger?” she taunted. “Unleash your rage like a petulant child? Prove me right by demonstrating the depravity you try pathetically to disguise?” She stepped closer, glaring up at him defiantly. “Either kill me and reveal your true colors, or stand down and prove there’s still some semblance of a human left in you.”
The Game Master’s chest heaved, hands clenching and unclenching. Roseline’s pulse roared in her ears as his next move hung in the balance.
She paused, letting disgust fill her voice. “No, you’re nothing but shit beneath my feet. An impotent coward who hides behind a mask because deep down, you’re hollow inside. You know nothing about the justice we at the NOPD stand for.”
The Game Master visibly trembled with rage, the cement walls almost reverberating with his fury. Roseline realized she may have pushed too far. Behind his bulky frame, she noticed Callan yanking at his bindings, desperate to get to her if things turned violent. She tried to signal him to stay calm with her eyes again.
The man ripped off his mask in a fit of anger, no longer composed. As soon as his face was revealed, Roseline inhaled sharply in shock. She recognized him instantly, despite the scars and timeworn features.
It was Marcus Lavelle, the detective she had replaced over two years ago in the department’s Computer Forensics unit, the man who had trained her at her new job. Lavelle had been gravely injured during a botched arrest operation and was discharged on a medical pension. According to department gossip, the life-altering damage left him addicted to opiates with no viable career prospects.
But clearly, Lavelle had not faded quietly out of the picture as expected. Everything about the Game Master’s sophisticated technological prowess and inside knowledge of systems aligned with Lavelle’s expertise. He had created the Digital Forensics division himself years before.
Lavelle’s cold smile sent a chill down Roseline’s spine. “Surprised to see me, Roseline? When you took over my job, you thought you had seen the last of poor, useless Marcus Lavelle, didn’t you?”
She didn’t answer. She couldn’t.
He shook his head, a dangerous glint in his eyes. “How quickly you forgot the one who created the Forensics division, mentored your novice skills. After the accident, you and the rest of the department cast me out like trash. But I’ve been busy in the shadows, as you can see.” He spread his arms wide, gesturing around the high-tech lair.
Roseline warily shifted her stance, keenly aware of the gun holstered at Lavelle’s hip. “Why? Why take such extremes?” she asked, trying to keep him talking. “Why turn against the very institution you served for years?”
Lavelle’s face contorted in bitterness. “You know nothing of what I’ve endured! The constant agony left by my devastating injuries. No career prospects. My pension barely covered prescriptions. I was collapsing internally, yet the department did not care!”
Roseline shook her head. “That’s not true, Marcus. We tried to help, offered counseling services?—”
“Lies!” he exploded, spittle flying from his mouth. “You all celebrated being rid of the cripple! I was replaced without a second thought. But I’ve rebuilt stronger than ever.”
Lavelle paced like a caged tiger. “The Game Master rose from Marcus Lavelle’s ashes. I vowed to teach this corrupt system a lesson, the same as I once taught you many lessons, Roseline. Lessons you all forgot and sorely need reminding of, letting the worst of the worst go free.”
Roseline tensed, ready to grab her hidden Taser. Lavelle was unstable. His motivations went beyond justice or vengeance. This was a personal vendetta without sense and reason.
She had to keep him talking, diffuse his rage. “Hurting more innocents, even criminals, won’t right past wrongs, Marcus. But it’s not too late to stop this madness. Let Callan and the others go, turn yourself in. I promise to advocate for leniency. I will plead your cause.”
Lavelle growled, “You always were naive, from the very moment you set foot in that police station. I’ll never bow to their unjust rules again!” He raised his gun, eyes feverish. “Now it’s time for your final lesson.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Roseline took a deep, shaky breath as she stood facing Marcus, his gun aimed between her eyes. Her heartbeat throbbed in her ears, overpowering her thundering heartbeats as her mind raced to calculate her next move. One wrong step here in this shadowy basement that had become an execution chamber, and it could mean the end for her, for Callan, for the mobster—all of them.
She willed her eyes to meet Marcus’s gaze, searching for any glimmer of humanity left in the man. But she found only cold detachment lurking there, the look of someone who had long ago severed any remnant of empathy or morality within himself.
Roseline forced her breathing to remain steady despite her pounding heart. She would not give him the satisfaction of seeing her utterly unnerved.
After a tense moment, Marcus lowered the gun and glanced over at Callan and the mobster bound to their chairs, his hulking frame radiating anticipation. Roseline sensed the deadly performance was about to begin in earnest. She inched her hand discreetly toward her pocket, praying her desperate plan would work.
“Since you’ve interfered with my enterprises and cost me considerably, I’ll be collecting my debts in blood,” Marcus rasped. He pulled the hood over the mobster’s head, revealing Antonio Ricci, and pointed the gun lazily back and forth between Callan and Ricci. “The question is, from whom?”
Roseline tensed, alarm spiking through her. “Don’t you dare?—”
“Choose!” Marcus barked, his distorted voice echoing off the concrete walls. “Who pays the ultimate price for your meddling? The righteous detective whose only flaw was loving you or the parasite polluting society’s fabric?”
She shifted her gaze from Callan to Ricci and back again. Callan’s ocean-blue eyes met hers, regret and longing flowing between them.
Seeing no way out, Roseline decided on a desperate gamble, hoping to buy time and distract Marcus from violence, even briefly.
“Before… before you end two more lives, you owe it to me to explain your motivations,” she said shakily, gesturing to the blank monitors and equipment. “You went to such trouble setting the stage—seems only right to illuminate your… grand mission. Why did you choose those victims?”
