"What the hell is going on? You starting a riot?"
Marlene got her complaint in first.
"Officer! She attacked me! She broke my hand!"
The guard gave me one cold look.
"093. Three days in solitary."
I held out both hands without a word and let them cuff me.
The solitary cell had no windows—just a single yellowed bulb overhead and less than thirty square feet for everything: eating, sleeping, pissing, breathing. Three full days. I didn't speak to a single person.
On the fourth day, they let me out.
That same afternoon, Detective Mercer called me in for questioning again.
His face was grim. He had a fresh stack of printed-out screenshots in his hand.
"Laurel Fox, take a look at what's happening out there!"
He slapped the printouts down on the table.
"They've torn your life wide open—name, address, everything. Your parents' restaurant got trashed. Your old company already put out a statement saying you're fired."
"The entire internet is calling for the maximum sentence!"
I looked down at the screenshots.
Red paint splashed across a shopfront. Abuse scrawled so thick the words bled together. And my parents—in a hospital emergency room, looking old and utterly helpless.
My chest clenched like a fist had closed around it, so tight I couldn't draw breath.
"Officer, public opinion doesn't replace the law." My voice was raw.
Detective Mercer shot to his feet.
"Laurel Fox! What are you hiding?"
"You want to just sit there while those people hound your parents into the ground?"
I took a long breath.
"Officer, have the results of my forensic authentication request come back?"
He paused, then pulled a document from his folder.
"They have."
"The Ministry of Public Security's forensic evidence center confirmed the photo was fabricated."
"The knife in the original image was a plastic cake knife."
His eyes locked onto mine.
"But that only proves the photo is fake. What about the video? What about Gail Lambert's diary?"
"What about the testimony from all thirty-five of them?"
I opened my eyes and met his gaze, steady and cold.
"The photo was faked. So tell me—why couldn't the video be?"
"Officer, I want to see Nelson Whitney."
Detective Mercer frowned.
"What for? Trying to get your stories straight?"
"No. A confrontation."
I looked him dead in the eye.
"I want him to admit, to your face, that he's been lying."
He hesitated, then finally nodded.