Suddenly, she was no longer welcome at the parties she’d not wanted to go to in the first place. No agency would touch her. She was a pariah. Even one of her acting classes suggested she’d be better suited elsewhere. Nobody told her directly why, but they didn’t have to. She’d been blacklisted. Her scholarship to UCLA withdrawn too. She didn’t get an explanation for that either.
One night, Clara had come over, ostensibly to sympathise, but her advice had been to get out of town. Tatiana couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She was LA born and bred, and she was being told by the woman she considered to be her best friend to run from it. Clara’s words would stick with Tatiana for the rest of her life: “Abigail is never going to stop. Not after what you’ve done.”
They’d fought and Tatiana had not seen Clara since. Well, that wasn’t quite true. She’d seen her billed as the wacky neighbour in a teenage romcom. Tatiana didn’t need to check the credits to know who the producers were.
The years that followed were a blur of self-recrimination, bad decisions, booze and drugs. Tatiana no longer wanted to be in control. Look where that had got her. She was a “tainted woman”. She couldn’t even get arrested in this town. What’s more, she couldn’t get a rapist questioned, never mind arrested.
Six years after her bright future had burst into flames before her eyes, her brain had latched on to a plan. She got her hands on a couple of thrift-shop wigs and started to follow Steven Reed. It had taken some time to track him down, but by that point time was all she had. She was cat-sitting for a friend, one of the few she had left, and having somewhere to stay rent free meant she could cut back on her waitressing shifts. Following Reed became her “project”. She called it that as it sounded so much better than “obsession”. She swapped outfits and appearances, to make sure that Reed could look right at her and not recognise her. Truth be told, when she looked in the mirror, she didn’t recognise herself.
She built up a detailed picture of his movements. She also saw enough to confirm that his modus operandi hadn’t changed much. Seen from this remove, something she’d always wondered about became clear. Abigail knew all about it. Maybe not the exact details, but enough. Outside of work hours they spent little time together. Theirs was a strictly professional relationship. They knew their brand and played it well. It also provided Steven with the perfect cover.
She’d got the gun from a guy in a bar. She’d never fired one before, but she knew enough – they’d covered firearms in one of her acting classes. There she was, one Friday night, sitting in her beat-up Datsun outside one of those ridiculous houses on stilts on the side of a hill, waiting for Steven to roll in with his next victim. She ducked as the headlights passed and watched numbly as they got out of the car.
For reasons that were not clear, the girl was wearing a mask – one of those opera-style ones. She watched the pair go inside, then looked down at the gun in her lap. She repeated over and over again what had become her mantra: This is the only way. This is the only way.
She managed not to scream at the knock on the window.
A blonde woman climbed calmly into the passenger seat. “Hi. Don’t shoot me.”
Tatiana looked at her, open-mouthed, too confused to speak.
“We’ve been watching you. You’re pretty good at the following thing.” The woman pointed at the gun. “This bit – not so smart. There are much better ways to nail this asshole once and for all. Come on. I’ll show you.”
The woman got back out of the car but Tatiana stayed where she was, still gripping the gun. Her eyes returned to the house. She could see the lights on in the living room now.
The woman bent down to look in the open door.
“I mean, you could do it your way, but really – who wins? How about we try our way and if you don’t like it, well, you can always shoot the son of a bitch afterwards. I’m Dionne, by the way.”
And that was how Tatiana had first met the Sisters of the Saint.
She had followed Dionne to a van around the corner, where she had sat in the back and watched a live video feed of Steven Reed oh so effortlessly charming his guest. It looked like the camera was hidden on the shelf beside some of their awards. Then, when the mystery woman excused herself to use the bathroom, Tatiana had looked on as Reed, with a practised motion, slipped something into her drink, swirling the liquid around with his finger to make sure the substance dissolved completely.
Dionne sat beside Tatiana and looked in her eyes. “You are not the only one. And you never were.”
“So what?” said Tatiana. “You’re going to blackmail this asshole? Get some money out of him? Nobody will believe you. Believe me, I know.”
Dionne spoke in a calm, reassuring voice. “Yes, they will. Have a little faith.”
On the monitor, Reed handed his guest her drink. “Why don’t you take that crazy mask off, sweetheart?”
“I will in a second – promise.” The woman’s cellphone chirped in her purse. “Excuse me.” She took it out, read a text message and sighed deeply. “Oh, Steven, Steven, Steven.”
You could tell he didn’t think the gun was real when she pulled it out of the bag. He almost smirked. It fell from his face when she placed the barrel to his forehead.
“OK, asshole. Why don’t you explain what you just put in my drink?”
“I
