── .✦ blurp: Ophelia receives her promotion: from ground officer to detective, and she feels like she's on the moon, her dreams finally coming to reality. But with her dreams came her nightmares, thoughts that had been persecuting her since she was a teen, racing thoughts she wanted to stop. Now assigned to the disturbing case of a suspicious nightclub, she uncovers a network of predatory men tied to her own past and must confront the corruption, silence, and guilt that was the fuel to those racing thoughts before they ran over another victim.
── .✦ genre/tropes: neo-noir, investigative, exes to lovers to enemies, smut, psychological thriller, mystery, crime fiction, friends with benefits to lovers
𝟎𝟏. Fuel to fire ᯓ☆
𝟎𝟐. Heat waves ᯓ☆
𝟎𝟑. Oxygen ᯓ☆
𝟎𝟒. Smokeᯓ☆
𝟎𝟓. Flareᯓ☆
𝟎𝟔. Candles ᯓ☆
𝟎𝟕. Warmth ᯓ☆
𝟎𝟖. A padlock with no key ᯓ☆
𝑨ct 𝟐 - “EARTH”
𝟎𝟗. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟎. Grain & gloom ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟏. Lily & Lollo ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟐. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟑. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟒. Waterfall ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟓. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟔. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟕. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟖. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟏𝟗. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟎. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟏. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟐. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟑. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟒. Title here ᯓ☆
𝑨ct 𝟑 - “AIR”
𝟐𝟓. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟔. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟕. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟖. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟐𝟗. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟎. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟏. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟐. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟑. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟒. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟓. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟔. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟕. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑𝟖. Title here ᯓ☆
𝑨ct 𝟒 - “WATER”
𝟒𝟎. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟏. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟐. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟑. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟒. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟓. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟔. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟕. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟖. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒𝟗. Title here ᯓ☆
𝑨ct 𝟓 - “AETHER”
𝟏. Fuel to fire ᯓ☆
𝟐. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟑. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟒. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟓. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟔. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟕. Title here ᯓ☆
𝟖. Title here ᯓ☆
── .✦ DRABBLES
once the book is fully published, but before then, you can leave requests here c:
── .✦ COMMENTARY CHANNEL
coming soon... it's a work in progress for now
── .✦ EXTRAS
ᯓ☆ who's on Ophelia's wall? (coming soon)
ᯓ☆ playlist (based on the songs in the chapters) -> here!
ᯓ☆ playlist (collaborative) -> here!
WANT SOME MORE? ALL IN MY NOTION PAGE. CHECK IT OUT!
(Notion page guide for better experience -> here!)
ᯓ☆ MEET THE FULL CAST, GENERAL MOODBOARD, WORLDBUILDING -> here!
ᯓ☆ WRITING PROGRESS -> here!
MORE OF MY WORKS? YOU CAN EXPLORE MY INVENTORY ON NOTION c:
── .✦ PUBLISHED
(I publish my works on Wattpad, here and ao3 specifically)
Where do you get the idea of Arthemis like whole plot character aesthetic and everything?
My main sources of inspiration are movies and books. I watch and read, and sometimes it plants a seed in my head that sprouts and grows according to how much I feed it.
But I'm also a true crime listener, so the crime aspect, law, and anything police-related was also taken from true crime episodes I listened to - not the crime itself (please!), just procedures and all + listening to true crime kind of gives me a general idea of how bad the human mind can get when plotting murder or anything as cold-blooded.
For Arthemis, I was inspired by an Italian movie (I don't remember the title (of fucking course)) about the mafia. Now, Arthemis isn't about the mafia absolutely, but the movie (or book, I'm not sure) talks about a small town where a girl suspiciously died and everyone kind of has an idea of what exactly happened to her, but no one has the balls to step forward and say anything.
And this is like the main thing surrounding Sabine's death and fueling Ophelia's investigative spirit.
The world is taken from a small countryside town I used to live in, while the city is completely fictitious, born from my imagination with a little inspo taken from famous cities, such as New York, Seattle, and Manhattan.
The story, though, is set in the USA (as mentioned in chapter 5 when talking about Eugenio Parisi - also these people having Italian origins doesn't mean they're part of the mafia; they're just Italian, and that's it).
Now, on Pinterest, the looks of Hadley and Bellport are very much American, and I tried my best to keep it within the time setting (early to mid 2000s - between 2000 and 2010).
I chose this time setting because another important thing for the book is the mistreatment sex workers used to get (and I think they still do) from law enforcement when they are the victims.
I kind of wrote a mini essay about it in chapter 4 when Tara constantly asks Ophelia about her arrest and why she's still free.
Obviously according to the law in the country (and the time), being a sex worker is illegal, but I tried to focus on who the damage falls upon the most, and again as a true crime listener, especially in the early 2000s (80s and 90s too), sex workers were the favoured demographic by freaks, serial killers and just disgusting and awful people, and this is because law enforcement never seemed to care about sex workers because oh, their line of work kind of implies danger every day.
They're humans at the beginning and the end of the day, and many serial killers have flown under the radar for a long span of time just because they victimised sex workers and the police put very little effort in locating this women and men too.
Now, the plot was coined in my head, and I made lots of research to make sure the investigation is realistic as possible (won't be 100% because I don't work in that field) and fits within the early 2000s investigative world, which is like a whole other dimension compared to today.
The thematic net and everything else is taken from what I know. Whenever I come up with a book, I have two main sources: Greek mythology and the Bible.
With Arthemis, the main one is Greek mythology paired with Shakespearian works (the ones I studied back in high school). The other story I'm working on, for example (still in the drafts), has the Bible as landmark.
So yeah, that is all. Hope the answer was satisfying enough.
AMOR TAM PULCHER WEEK!! Teaser will be up in a matter of hours. and the full chapter will be up on Friday.
I haven't begun writing the following chapter because I still haven't found the right music to write it to. I'm intending to struggle harder today.
I'm sorry regarding ARTHEMIS because I didn't touch it for like the past two weeks, and I'm awful for it. I'm sorry.
I will look in its direction this week (I hope).
(LOVE) is still there, it's going to be there still. I don't know for how long (not long I assume, because I've been working on another JJK ff, a oneshot for (d)emouvoir, so... hihihi.
Let me jus talk about this oneshot. I titled it 'ONE LAST MISTAKE' and it features jjk and the reader, whose name I won't be mentioning much if not at all because I have a literal visceral reaction to actually adding y/n to my stories.
Just so you guys know, it's about ex lovers going at it one last time I don't if I can post it on Wattpad because it's essentially smut with a little plot. Wattpad does allow you to gather various works under a specific collection, and I'd love to gather all the works for (d)emouvoir, but we'll see about that.
All the other works are stalling for now. Yesterday, I revisited an old draft of mine, LUPUS IN FABULA (book one: Selene), and I asked myself why the fuck I stopped writing it because I'd already planned like 20+ chapters of it. Let's see how that goes now.
That's all for this week. Sorry for the late weekly WIP update. I went to bed late last night, writing One last mistake.
── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 5.93k
── .✦ date: 21/05/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
✮⋆˙zy's corner.
As already mentioned multiple times, the first act of this book revolves around the fire element, hence the title 'flare'.
While the previous chapter concentrates on smoke and how it darkens the way when you step, here I decided to move the focus to a single source of illumination, the only thing that would be visible in a room so dark.
But if it was simply that - source- then I wouldn't have named the chapter 'flare' but something mellower, more controllable and predictable. Ophelia is well aware of this, but she's choosing to take the risk, to walk into the suffocatingly dark room and approach that light without knowing if it's close to fuel and ready to blow everything up, her included.
But what's even more important is the fact that, despite being a source of light and visible through the fumes, it still has a layer of uncertainty that makes approaching it even scarier, simply because you don't know if your eyes are playing tricks on you. You're not even sure you're actually approaching the source because you could be as well just approaching a reflective surface, like finding an oasis in the desert.
This is exactly what Ophelia runs against multiple times. It's clear that there's light somewhere in the room, but she can't find the source, only the replicas, the consequences.
This is then where her frustration stems from because she can feel it, feel the heat for the source, but she can't reach the source itself. Reflecting it onto the investigation, she can already piece everything together and see things on a greater scale, but she can tell that the wide-angle lens is only making her miss key details, and she must proceed with a magnifying lens. Yet, despite this knowledge, she can only see blurred through the glass.
This returns to the title because it also refers to the lack of definition around this source of light. You can tell that there's light there, but you can't see the difference, just looking at the city speeding by on a rainy night while you're on the bus, the windows are fogged up, and the lights in the distance just turn into shapeless bulbs.
The final part is the final consummation of this exhaustion and frustration, as if Ophelia had temporarily run out of the dark room to take in some fresh air, but is still looking back into it through the door like it's a ringing sound that follows her around, but also a stubborn fly she's determined to take out.
I hope this description explains this chapter well enough, and I hope you're going in with a wider view that will allow you to take in the content better. I'll leave you with that. See you on the next one.
xoxo, zy.
𓍝
My Life Is Going On - Cecilia Krull.
The records room was more desolate in the mornings.
The station was yet to bustle with lifeless and restless rhythms, printers weren’t running, there weren’t enough clicking heels, and the scent of coffee lingered as quickly as the perfume of a passerby.
The streets outside were rather peaceful, as peaceful as they can be in Bellport. There wasn’t much motion behind the yellow glass window, not many pedestrians or cars speeding by.
Ophelia tried to control her pace and measure how much weight she placed on each foot to reduce the echoing sound of her heels.
The deeper she went, the flatter it sounded.
The familiar stuffy smell of dust hit her senses the more she approached the frosted labelled glass door. Almost matching her heels, the keys in her hand jingled, sound softly muffled as she unlocked the door and pushed it open.
The smell of ozone and paper stung her face like a gust of wind as she walked in, hearing the lock click shut behind her.
Mrs Gable lifted her gaze from her magazine, inspecting her from above her glasses with her signature unfazed yet perpetually annoyed expression.
She didn’t speak, no greeting, no questions, and returned to the paper, reading as if Ophelia had been just a blow of wind that shook the windows a bit.
She didn’t mind it, preferred it actually, proceeding inside to find the shelves just as they’d left them the previous day.
With the list of case numbers in her blocknotes, a camera, a notebook and a pen in the cloth bag hanging from her shoulders, she headed to the rows of metallic cabinets, lightly wincing at the screeching sound of the scrape.
She’d chosen to continue from where Taehyung left off, reading the case number right under the last one he'd erased.
She collected four folders, with only two yet to be read at all, filled up a few pink slips and pushed the drawer inside again to find her way to the poorly lit table by the bulky computer.
Every movement she made seemed to echo through the room. The scrape of the chair, the click of her heels at each minor step she took, the flat sound of the folders when she placed them on the table, and the soft rustling of the bag when she positioned it in her lap.
She chose to sit facing the door and the clerk’s desk. Believed it was the best position to monitor her surroundings and check if the walls tried to peek into her notes or the folders.
She opened the first pile, took out her notebook and got into a comfortable position to read.
At the top of the first page was the station’s name written in bold, ink dark and letters thick.
Ophelia’s right hand instantly began moving on her notebook, writing down the date—November 27th, 2002—and the reporter’s name—Bonnie Morley.
In the next line, she wrote down more names, arresting officers and the investigative officers—Emanuel Morris and James Carrington.
They had arrested Bonnie, and something clenched in Ophelia’s chest as she read through the file.
Arrested for being a sex worker after she’d come forward for the sake of her missing friend. Ava Sanchez worked in the same field and had gone missing for more than three months at the time—it would make it years now, with yet another anniversary approaching.
She’d come to the station to look for her friend, only for them to lock her up and bury her words in the sand because the speaker wasn’t worthy enough to be heard and listened to.
Ophelia turned the page, writing boldly in the first line Ava’s full name and a quick profile.
Ava Sanchez. Stage name, Lily. Age at the time, 22. Would’ve been venturing into her late twenties with her friend by now, but no one had heard from her in years.
Bonnie believed that something bad had happened to her, claiming that Ava had nowhere else to go, and therefore, it couldn’t be a runaway case.
Whoever filled the report did a very bad job at masking their emotions because Ophelia could still feel and hear them through the curved shapes of the letters and the ink of the pen.
They didn’t take Bonnie seriously, clearly so since they’d arrested her despite her claims.
Ophelia knew that they’d chosen such a route just to weaken her voice in court. She knew it because it was one of the reasons for her refusal to arrest Tara.
Detectives Morris and Carrington clearly didn’t care for her words or what they could uncover. They certainly had the same approach as the desk officer from that night, as Lieutenant Thomas and as Montefalco.
No care in the world because prostitution is illegal, the girls had chosen to put themselves in harm’s way by working in such a field, and cases like this are bound to happen in a world like that.
These thoughts drew chills down Ophelia’s back as if someone had dragged an ice cube on her skin just to annoy her.
Yes, prostitution was a crime in the eyes of the law, but what all these men refused to address was the can of worms such a job carried around.
A sex worker was as much of a criminal as a drug dealer for the system, but there was a difference: only one of them hurt themselves in the process.
But they had something else in common, too: wherever they went, bad news followed. A dealer could expose a drug trafficking ring. A sex worker could uncover so much more, so much worse.
The detectives clearly knew this, but didn't care.
Given the number and nature of the police records tied to the nightclub, had they been truly interested in arresting sex workers, they wouldn't have stopped at Bonnie. They would've investigated further, tried understanding why women in such a field of work were somehow always tied to that place.
Prostitution might be illegal, but so was sex trafficking.
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
A Model Of The Universe - Johann Johannsson.
The following day and the day after, Ophelia was there in the records room, reading and re-reading case files, taking notes and pictures, marking names on the paper and faces around the station.
Rosé tagged along as often as she could, too busy uploading the pictures on her computer and dissecting each composite sketch.
Taehyung was always present. He didn’t arrive as early as Ophelia, clocking in at the exact hour written on his contract, but he stayed through it all, reading and re-reading lines upon lines, subconsciously convinced that there was something he could be missing.
“I can’t believe this,” Ophelia had muttered on the following Monday, their umpteenth day in the records room, sitting in the dust and the lingering smell of old paper.
Taehyung lifted his gaze, brows still softly scrunched from focus.
Ophelia looked up, glancing at the clerk’s desk before leaning in. “Morris and Carrington were the ones leading Bonnie’s case. They filed the report with her.”
He hummed, the piece of information nothing new to him by now.
“And Morris is rumoured to become the next lieutenant after Thomas.” The truth tasted just as bitter as it sounded.
“The way they deal with these kinds of cases shows that they have something in common. It’s got to be a requirement—”
“I think there is a case of nepotism there, actually,” he mumbled, eyes back on the paper. “Before Thomas was Vaughan, his freaking brother-in-law.”
“They don’t have family members in the station anymore.”
“Lia, you don’t need to be working at the station for that to happen, trust me. If Morris isn’t becoming the next, they’ll bring in someone else from their payroll.”
“Why Morris, though?” she paused, scratching her chin. “I mean, they…”
“He’s been licking Thomas’s ass this whole time,” he whispered. “There’s got to be a reason, no?”
To Ophelia, seeing his name in the report of an alleged crime that was brushed off without a proper investigation meant that he didn’t act alone. Calls certainly came from outside and above.
“What about Carrington?” Taehyung continued.
She shook her head, finishing writing a sentence in her notebook.
“They treat him like one of the hounds from the K9 unit, clearly not fit to become the next Lieutenant.”
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
People Help The People - Birdy.
Time stretched from the night they’d visited the nightclub to the day they’d eventually received the requested CCTV footage.
In a span of roughly a week, Ophelia had burned through a third of her notebook, making a mental note to get a new one because this one wouldn’t last long.
Leaving it in her locker, she was empty-handed by the time she returned to the station from lunch.
Taehyung was right behind her as usual, pushing back his hair to feel the freshness of the station against his damp skin.
The bullpen was mildly crowded, since officers and detectives were just returning from their lunch breaks.
Most of them trailed behind her and Taehyung through the revolving door; others were at their desks, munching on homemade food, while another bunch was organised in a line by the vending machines.
Being in a team together for almost two weeks, Taehyung and Ophelia had learned that at this time of the day, Rosé would always be waiting in line to get her usual protein bar.
“Hello,” Ophelia approached her first, slipping her hands in the back pockets of her jeans. “How are you doing?”
Rosé smiled, shrugging. “Fine. Just running low on mental energy.”
“Same here,” Taehyung sighed, resting his elbow on Ophelia’s shoulder. “If I close my eyes, all I see is letters and paper. I think I’ll have a nightmare about my school years tonight.”
The women softly laughed, shaking their heads simultaneously.
“You know?” Rosé tilted her head, “It surprises me how unserious you can get, Taehyung.”
He shrugged, smug. “I just don’t let the bad of this world taint me too much.”
“Wow, such a fighter,” Ophelia mumbled, rolling her eyes. He didn’t reply with words, just reached to poke her rib, which gained him a death glare.
“Yeah, terribly unserious,” she concluded, “I completely agree.”
“Talking about seriousness,” Taehyung and Ophelia stood up straight at the new tone to Rosé’s voice, “we finally have something.”
“You’ve got a lead?”
“Yeah, no, I wish.” She shook her head, stepping forward in the line. “The nightclub has finally sent the footage.”
Both detectives silently gasped, moving like they shared the same brain.
“Well, isn’t that good news?”
Rosé shrugged, shaking a leg on the spot as if it would speed up the person in front of her. “Depends on what we get from it.”
Ophelia tried holding down her excitement, watching Rosé with eager eyes and quietly urging her to quicken her pace so they’d go to her lab.
The pick-up goods cover slammed closed after Rosé collected her protein bar, and leaving her spot for the next person in line, the trio made a beeline for her lab.
Despite how many times she’d been in there and how many more times she was bound to be, Ophelia would never get used to the lifeless ambience and the sense of void of the laboratory.
Rosé placed her protein bar on the desk, hand shaking the mouse to wake the computer up before she hastily typed in the pin.
Taehyung was on her right, standing next to Ophelia in his signature stance—legs wide and arms crossed. Rosé had pulled the chair to sit, and Ophelia was on her left, arms crossed as well.
Accessing the portal, Rosé retrieved the footage, opening a new window with the video ready to be played.
She wasted no time, clicking the button and watching the footage change before their eyes, but as it played, their faces morphed into deep frowns.
Like a freshly blown-out candle, Ophelia's hope dissipated into a slim line of smoke, hovering in the station with the many other question marks the police refused to acknowledge.
Taehyung spoke first. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me—”
“The quality’s plain shit—” Rosé squinted at the screen.
“How is this allowed, actually?” Ophelia turned to Taehyung, but the question was addressed to Rosé as well. “Like security-wise… if something really bad were to happen, how would this help?”
It was a stupid question because she knew it wasn't allowed, knew it was done on purpose, but she was getting frustrated.
“It doesn’t,” Rosé answered, eyes glued to the screen to make something of the clips, “and it’s on purpose because we know the nightclub isn’t a regular one.”
Taehyung leaned closer, hands on the desk, and squinted. “You can’t make out anyone’s face.”
Ophelia imitated him, looking deeply and forcing her eyes to gather the few pixels into something.
“This footage takes us nowhere with the composite sketches," he continued. "We’re back to square one.”
"Do you think there's a possibility that they edited it?" Ophelia turned to Rosé, and the girl deeply sighed, shrugging.
"Could be, could be not. I’ll try enhancing it, see where it takes us, but… I can’t make promises—”
“Oh, no. You already have the composite sketches to work on. Let me try the enhancement. I know it’s not going to be awesome, but your workload is already heavy as it is.”
Rosé turned around with the chair, looking at Taehyung with slight disbelief and a sly smirk.
“You can handle it?”
“I’ve always been the nerdy one in the duo—”
“Exactly…” she gestured at the detectives, “the duo, but now we’re a trio, and I’m the nerdy one.”
Ophelia chuckled, and Taehyung simply rolled his eyes. “Look at me, getting stoned alive for offering help—”
“I never refused it, hey,” Rosé softly laughed, turning back around, her smile dissipating the moment her eyes found the screen again. “Go ahead, Prince Charming. I’ll be waiting for your call for help.”
“Really kind, ain’t you?”
“The sweetest of all, actually.” She gave him a wide smile, already switching windows on the computer to resume her dissecting activity.
Ophelia giggled, but it was a little restrained, like she couldn't find it in herself to really be joyful. She wished her a good time and pulled Taehyung to leave the lab.
The flame of the candle had been put out by a gust of wind that blew through an open window hard enough for that single flare but not enough to clear the smoke in the room.
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
Skin - Rihanna.
The number of folders on the coffee table was finite, yet the more Ophelia looked at them, the more they multiplied. It worsened when she'd eventually reach for one and open it, only for her eyes to cross and the letters to shuffle.
It wasn't a habit anymore but more of a tradition: whenever she and Taehyung spent time together outside work hours, they'd play music, especially at his place, because he had a vinyl player.
The melody hovered around like the underlying smell of cigarettes in his home.
It didn't bother her at all. She was a smoker herself, but the one in Taehyung’s apartment was distinct, mixed with his signature scent.
She'd gotten used to his space and the familiarity of stepping into a world that felt like returning home after a long workday.
His coffee table was wider than hers, and now that they were detectives with more to work on, she mentally noted it as an extra reason to visit his place more often.
But she'd be lying to herself, to him and everyone if she claimed that work was the reason she came over at all.
Only a few weeks ago, they were just ground officers who would patrol or run after shoplifters. There wasn't an impending necessity to meet outside of work.
The pile of folders was pushed to a corner of the coffee table, looking like a guard stationed outside a palace. Each contained freshly printed papers of the numerous photos she'd taken down in the records room.
Despite the amount of work, Ophelia found herself running in a circle, returning to the starting point without exactly knowing what was at the centre of the vortex.
As if she were truly in a flaming room filled with smoke, the fickle new pieces of information she collected felt like seeing a small source of light somewhere in the dark, shape undefined, brightness strong yet blurry, like looking through frosted glass.
The remaining space on the table was occupied by pens, pencils, Post-Its, ripped-out notebook pages, and her laptop. They were sprawled around to look like a crime scene, proof of her progressive mental spiral and frustration, frustration because the storyline was simple yet so complicated to piece together.
Lux Obscura wasn't an ordinary club; this was settled. It once went by the name 'Pink Slip' and then changed it for unknown reasons to untrained eyes, but she knew it was to create a brand new slate to work on, to continue with.
Given the victims and reporters tied to the venue, it had to be a hotspot for sex workers, making it, in and of itself, a den of crime in the eyes of the law.
But it clearly was more than the simple corner store for pimps and perverts. Women were sexually harassed and assaulted. They disappeared without a trace, and the station didn't seem to care, brushing it under the rug like it was dust.
The story, again, seemed simple, but like quicksand, the surface was an illusion waiting for its next victim.
Taehyung had left his mug of coffee in the other corner of the table, and after taking and placing it down multiple times, the surface was now decorated with numerous uneven rings of coffee.
Sitting on her left, he kept his legs crossed to welcome his, certainly by now, overheating laptop.
Ophelia dragged her fingers through her hair, combing them back before shaking her head to ward off the tiredness.
The little window they'd left open wasn't helping with the heat; in fact, she believed it only allowed more to spill inside. The overhead fan was certainly boiling itself, and now the breeze wasn't as fresh as it'd been when they first turned it on.
She couldn't place her elbow on the table, given the height, so she slouched against the backrest, head naturally falling to the side in his direction.
Hadn't she known what case he was working on, she'd have a hard time guessing what he was doing on the computer because he looked peaceful, as if he were indulging in a hobby and not answering duty calls.
His glasses were metallic grey, slim and rectangular lenses casting shadows on his cheeks. His hair fell over his forehead like a curtain, the curls soft to the eyes and certainly to the touch.
After work, he'd changed into a white linen button-up and a simple pair of grey shorts. She, on the other hand, was dressed in one of his dress shirts, something to feel comfortable in, while her own clothes sat neatly folded in his bedroom.
Crossing her right leg over the left one, she leaned closer to him, scooting into his personal space with her cheek on his shoulder and her left hand reaching up to comb through the hair pooling at his neck.
"So… how is it going?" She asked, right hand finding support on his thigh.
Forming such a question wasn't just an attempt at filling the huge gap of silence and striking up a conversation. Genuinely, after taking a look at his screen, she couldn't understand if he was making progress or had rammed into yet another brick wall.
"Like shit?" His tone implied that the fickle hope he'd held onto at the lab had completely evaporated. "I fucking knew it."
"Come on, what's wrong?" She tried comforting him, caressing his thigh and shifting closer until their legs were touching, body heat adding to the season's temperatures.
"I can't enhance the footage enough to retrieve anything besides coloured shapes and flaring neon lights." He whined, moving the laptop to show her the screen. "I've been working on it for the past three hours, yet I'm still at square one."
She looked at the screen better now, silently agreeing with him, but refusing to actually say anything because he already was stressed. Mentally, she hoped that, at least, Rosé was making some progress.
"Rosé was right. I can't do this shit. She's literally on another level."
"Tae, gosh." Her fingers started drawing lines on the back of his neck. "That's her field. Certainly, when it comes down to wielding a gun, you'll outdo her. Don't beat yourself over it. Besides, I think it's been edited."
He groaned, throwing his head back against the sofa. "She's, like, really good, but is already sorting out the composite sketches—"
"We can do this instead." She pointed at the pile of files on his coffee table before the same hand landed on his shoulder for a quick squeeze. He didn't realise that his eyes had followed her movement even then.
"We certainly have enough to do here. We can't go back to the records room for obvious reasons now, so we must make the most out of this—"
"Your hands would beg to differ." He chuckled, looking at her through progressively heavy lids.
She was surprised for a split second before scoffing and sitting up without yet scooting away from him. Again, his eyes followed every move, lingering on her exposed legs as she crossed them again.
"Why did you stop?" He stretched over to the coffee table, placing his laptop in one of the few empty spots left.
"'Cause I can?" she teased back, shifting to the opposite end and placing her feet on the couch. "Something wrong?"
His tongue ran across his bottom lip, the movement so subtle that anyone could've missed, not her, though. Couldn't even miss the slow drag of his eyes on her body when she brought her knees against her chest, giving him a sneak peek into what she had underneath his shirt.
"Back to work—"
"I think I need a break—"
"A break? Since when do—" But he was already scooting closer, getting up only to place his knee between her legs and sink into the couch again, now completely in her space.
"You've always told me how important it is to have breaks from time to time. I've been working nonstop for three hours since we came back. Don't you think I deserve a break?"
He pushed her legs open, making space for himself between them, his hands finding their way to her hips to draw her into his lap.
She propped herself on her elbows and looked at him through the stubborn strands of hair that had fallen over her face again. Humming with a subtle smirk, she asked, "Have any cravings?"
He cocked his brow, tilting his head at the obvious question. With his eyes fixed on hers, his hands slipped higher underneath his shirt, caressing her skin, going across the band of her underwear before rising up to her chest and behind.
"No cravings?" she continued, letting him bring her body closer to his, having her straddle him with her arms falling on his shoulders and her hips grinding against his to sit up better.
"What do you think I'm craving?" His voice had dropped a few tones, raspier and deeper than the usual. She bit her lips again before cupping his face and closing the gap.
They wasted no time, needed no extended foreplay. His tongue brushed against hers, hot and wet, totally euphoric to the touch. Her arms circled his neck, closing the distance, flushing her breasts against his chest and grinding down on him.
His hands dragged along her back, roaming around with no destination. They'd ride up to the back of her neck, gripping softly to guide her into a deeper kiss, before sliding down to her ass and digging their fingers in the flesh with just as much hunger.
The smooching sounds were loud and shameless, breaking through the chain of moans and pants almost rhythmically. She tilted her head, knees digging into the couch as she'd prop herself high enough to impossibly deepen the kiss before sinking a little and continuing to draw circles on his crotch.
She ran her tongue against his, shamelessly sucking on it, nothing soft or neat about it. Her fingers were pulling on the hair at the bottom of his neck, running through the loose curls.
His hands found their way to her ass again, moving from the back of her thighs to squeeze and fondle the flesh, trying to grip as much as he could with his hands.
They moaned against each other's mouths, saliva coating their lips and the corners of their mouths. His hands couldn't catch a break, riding up along her back to unhook her bra before sliding back down to her ass and beneath her underwear to hold her even more, push her hips down harder on his throbbing bulge, with his fingers leaving temporary marks.
Regretfully, she broke the kiss to pull the shirt over her head, and before they could resume, he dragged her bra down her arms and threw it on the coffee table.
Her breath turned shaky when his lips closed around her nipple, one hand working the other while the other arm circled her frame and drew her closer. She threw her head back, hips restless against his crotch, and pulled on his hair a little more.
Her moan was light, soft, a stark difference to the tone and volume it'd acquire in a matter of moments because, after torturing both nipples, enjoying how they slipped through his fingers from the wetness, he pushed her down on the couch to rip her underwear off her. This one, too, was thrown somewhere behind him on the floor.
He pulled on his linen shirt, letting it fall behind the couch and loosened the strings of his shorts. She just lay on the sofa, legs spread out for him, with one hand rubbing on her clit while she bit on the nail of the other.
He gave himself a couple of strokes, knee digging into the couch close to where her body dipped into the cushion. As soon as he began running his tip through her folds, both her hands stopped at her breasts, pinching her nipples.
"Come on, Tae," she rasped, hair scattered across her face and hips grinding against him, "we don't have all—" A moan cut her off, unrestrained, loud and acute. It vibrated against his drums most sweetly, and he blinked his eyes closed, letting his fists sear holes into the couch and his pelvis to flush against her, bottoming out.
She bit her lip, moans now coming out as whiny hums, while he grinded his hips, giving her time to get adjusted and sinking his teeth into his bottom lip to keep himself under control.
His breathing was rough and shallow, his eyes still closed because he knew that if he dared open them, all his efforts and restraints would fly out the window. He knew that if he lay them on her body, the way she was sprawled on his couch, legs spread for him, circling his waist, hips bucking up in search of friction, and breasts resting on her chest so soft, so touchable, he'd cum right then and there.
The soft tap on his thigh was his go-ahead signal. Without wasting another second, he pulled out almost fully and slammed into her, teeth digging harder into his lip while her moan came out loud, almost pitchy.
He pulled out again and went in full force, a grunt escaping him and a shiver running down his spine the same way the sound of her moan triggered a shockwave through his body.
"Fuck, Lia." He groaned, head hanging low to see how high she'd propped her hips into him, incredibly needy.
She tapped his thigh again, impatience flowing through her body like the blood in her veins.
"Tae, please," she began begging, aware that he was trying not to cum immediately, but desperately wanting him to ram into her with no break.
She tapped his thigh again, nails digging into the flesh now, and somehow, the pain only increased his pleasure. His chest rose and deflated at a quick pace as he pulled out and slammed back into her again.
This time, the shiver that ran through her body was visible as she uncontrollably shook for two seconds.
"Fuck, you're going to be the death of me, baby." And with that, he thrust into her again, almost fully pulling out before slamming back into her with shorter pauses between them until his pace was gradually pushing her body higher into the couch.
She'd arched her back off the sofa, both hands now on her boobs, and jaw slack to give way for each shamelessly loud moan she emitted, without caring about neighbours.
His lips were sealed, making his grunts and groans come out as dragged laments, whiny sounds that only registered south in her throbbing area.
"Fuck, don't stop," she begged, hands now flat on his thighs. His hold on her hips was rough and strong, certainly bruising the skin, but neither pondered on it.
She squealed when he picked her up again, her back leaving the couch and arms falling over his shoulders. Hoisting her up and her legs over his elbows, he held her in his arms while she reached behind to guide him back into her.
As soon as he penetrated her again, the movement slow and soft, he returned to his relentless pace, keeping her at the height he found best just to rot into her like it was his calling.
Her moans quickly turned into whiny and pitchy cries, her eyes getting blurry, and her arms closing harder around his neck.
"Fuck, Taehyung!" Her voice cut through the loud skin slaps and the wet sounds of each thrust. He didn't reply, didn't say anything, bottom lip caught between his teeth and brows furrowed deeply in concentration.
He tried blocking out the sounds of her moans, too incredibly pleasing to his ears, not to tilt over the edge so soon, but she'd nuzzle her face in the crook of his neck, suck on the skin to leave hickeys, and keep singing his name like it was her favourite song.
"Fuck, Lia." He grunted again, voice sounding like a lament, like he was fighting for dear life and losing. "Fuck."
He paused, feeling a soft gush of breeze blow between their sweaty bodies, and hoisted her up to the right height once again, before moving his hands to grip her ass and ram into her harder and faster.
Her moans picked up again, breath becoming messier, choked out, shallow, and constantly interrupted by the animalistic pace he chose.
For a moment, she'd stop breathing, eyes rolling to the back of her head, the summer heat pouring down on her like a shroud, and her hips naturally bucking away from him in overstimulation. But he never gave her a chance, and as she backed away, hands flat on his shoulder to hoist herself up, he'd lower his elbows, bring her down, change the angle, and continue ramming into another sweet spot.
"Oh, fuck!" She squealed, eyes shut so tight they were hurting. "Oh, fuck!"
Her voice thinned out, deep inhales between moans, as she tried fighting against the maddening pleasure. She'd seal her lips one moment, and then he'd thrust into her so good a high-pitched whimper would break through.
Her arms were wrapped around his neck, worried that the sweat coating their bodies would make her slip out of his hold.
The overhead fan was still on, but the heat she was feeling, the one coming from his body, the season and the hot room, made her believe they'd turned it off somewhere in between the chaos.
"Oh, my fucking god, Taehyung." She whined, dragging out every vowel in each word and hearing her voice bounce with the pace.
He threw his head back, grunting and groaning loudly before returning to the couch, placing her on the cushions again, legs now pushed over his shoulders.
With the new position, Ophelia's moans turned into choked-out cries, long whines and pitchy screams she wouldn't believe were from her in a normal state.
He closed the gap between them, body pressing against hers with the rhythm of his thrust, the relentless pace that was torturing her sweet spots in the best of ways.
"Yes, Taehyung!" She arched her back off the cushions, meeting his chest. His hands were on her ass, enclosing her in a strong embrace while he rammed into her, sanity slipping out of him with every thrust of his hips.
"Fuck, baby." His moans turned incredibly whiny, and she instantly knew he was close. "Jesus fucking Christ."
She gasped deeply, the sound tiny, while her hands rushed down his hips, begging for more and for mercy in the same breath.
"Fuck, you're gonna make me cum," she cried out, tapping on his body before digging her nails into his flesh.
He'd nuzzled his face into the crook of her neck, sucking on the skin one moment, licking off the sweat, and moaning as his eyes rolled to the back of his head.
"Fuck, Lia." He began, hips stuttering and rhythm getting sloppy and squelching sounds breaking through the pace whenever they both stopped moaning for even a second.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and legs around his waist, dragging him closer, almost wanting their bodies to merge into one.
"Fuck, Lia." He repeated, and the volume increased as he got closer, another wave of heat making its way through his body. "Lia!"
"Oh, I'm cumming, baby." She threw her head back, a deep frown of pleasure on her face, before her eyes turned white again and her body began convulsing.
He felt it, felt the relentless clenching around him, felt the continuous shivering of her body beneath him, and it only pulled him over the edge so violently.
"Lia, Lia, fuck, fuck." He repeated with every single thrust, until the final one with a loud grunt. "Oh, fuck."
"Oh, my god," he groaned, both completely out of breath. Her hands were still on his thighs, and his brain was still living the aftershocks of his orgasm.
Finally, as he got up and threw himself on the couch beside her, the fan began working again, blowing much-needed breeze their way.
Huffing and puffing, they remained silent, bodies flaring like glowing coals after fire. She was still sprawled on the couch, and he was manspreading with his head against the backrest.
Just as they'd left it, their work was still there, waiting for them on the coffee table, looking at them as the fan restabilised their body temperature and as the honking cars and rustling chaos of the city slipped through a window crack left open.
He finally turned to her, finding her with her head tilted to the side, eyes closed, and chest rising and deflating at a progressively slower pace.
"The things you do to me, Lia." He breathed out, letting his head fall to the side to see her better.
She blinked her eyes open, glancing at him with a smirk and chuckled.
𓍝
(chapter 4) ⬅ | ★ | next chapter ᯓ☆
main masterlist // index // pinterest board // wattpad // notion page // community // taglist // ko-fi // instagram // ao3 // inkitt
Like Wordsworth's daffodils: join the community and become a dainty little ro(zy) -> JOIN NOW!
But if you're shy, you can join my taglist so we always stay connected. I'm an introvert too, don't worry.
── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 363/30k
── .✦ date: 20/05/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
The pile of folders was pushed to a corner of the coffee table, looking like a guard stationed outside a palace. Each contained freshly printed papers of the numerous photos she'd taken down in the records room.
Despite the amount of work, Ophelia found herself running in a circle, returning to the starting point without exactly knowing what was at the centre of the vortex.
As if she were truly in a flaming room filled with smoke, the fickle new pieces of information she collected felt like seeing a small source of light somewhere in the dark, shape undefined, brightness strong yet blurry, like looking through frosted glass.
The remaining space on the table was occupied by pens, pencils, Post-Its, ripped-out notebook pages, and her laptop. They were sprawled around to look like a crime scene, proof of her progressive mental spiral and frustration, frustration because the storyline was simple yet so complicated to piece together.
Lux Obscura wasn't an ordinary club; this was settled. It once went by the name 'Pink Slip' and then changed it for unknown reasons to untrained eyes, but she knew it was to create a brand new slate to work on, to continue with.
Given the victims and reporters tied to the venue, it had to be a hotspot for sex workers, making it, in and of itself, a den of crime in the eyes of the law.
But it clearly was more than the simple corner store for pimps and perverts. Women were sexually harassed and assaulted. They disappeared without a trace, and the station didn't seem to care, brushing it under the rug like it was dust.
The story, again, seemed simple, but like quicksand, the surface was an illusion waiting for its next victim.
The pile of folders was pushed to a corner of the coffee table, looking like a guard stationed outside a palace. Each contained freshly printed papers of the numerous photos she'd taken down in the records room.
Despite the amount of work, Ophelia found herself running in a circle, returning to the starting point without exactly knowing what was at the centre of the vortex.
As if she were truly in a flaming room filled with smoke, the fickle new pieces of information she collected felt like seeing a small source of light somewhere in the dark, shape undefined, brightness strong yet blurry, like looking through frosted glass.
The remaining space on the table was occupied by pens, pencils, Post-Its, ripped-out notebook pages, and her laptop. They were sprawled around to look like a crime scene, proof of her progressive mental spiral and frustration, frustration because the storyline was simple yet so complicated to piece together.
Lux Obscura wasn't an ordinary club; this was settled. It once went by the name 'Pink Slip' and then changed it for unknown reasons to untrained eyes, but she knew it was to create a brand new slate to work on, to continue with.
Given the victims and reporters tied to the venue, it had to be a hotspot for sex workers, making it, in and of itself, a den of crime in the eyes of the law.
But it clearly was more than the simple corner store for pimps and perverts. Women were sexually harassed and assaulted. They disappeared without a trace, and the station didn't seem to care, brushing it under the rug like it was dust.
The story, again, seemed simple, but like quicksand, the surface was an illusion waiting for its next victim.
Taehyung had left his mug of coffee in the other corner of the table, and after taking and placing it down multiple times, the surface was now decorated with numerous uneven rings of coffee.
"So… how is it going?" She asked, right hand finding support on his thigh.
"Like shit?" His tone implied that the fickle hope he'd held onto at the lab had completely evaporated. "I fucking knew it."
coming soon | chapter 5 will be up on Thursday
main masterlist // index // pinterest board // wattpad // notion page // community // taglist // ko-fi // instagram // ao3 // inkitt
Like Wordsworth's daffodils: join the community and become a dainty little ro(zy) -> JOIN NOW!
But if you're shy, you can join my taglist so we always stay connected. I'm an introvert too, don't worry.
── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 6.85k
── .✦ date: 07/05/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
zy's corner. So... This chapter... Took me an eternity, but here we are.
The main reason for the delay was research: yes, I had to do a little research to really capture the atmosphere in an early-2000s criminal investigation, plus the field itself is not exactly common sense - seems like but it's not.
I named his chapter 'Smoke', and its title is doing real heavy lifting when it comes to themes and content.
You can say it refers to a smoking gun, that one drop that made the vase overflow and the precipitates to come up. You can also say it refers to smoke after a fire, and in this case, we'd be referring to the damage that the system has caused and was, for the longest time, invisible through the flames.
But you can also say it refers to the foggy and dusty environment of the records room, how the place feels and smells suffocating. And under that lens, we can talk about the smoke during a fire, which is dark, hinders the sight and the breathing, as if it's telling you to get out or die.
Ophelia and her team are essentially stepping into burning and raging flames, into a system that has been blazingly active in the wrong way and didn't care to leave traces because what can you see through the dark fumes of a burning building, right?
This chapter also serves to set the roles in the team, who's who and what they can do best.
Rosé's clearly the brains - she's a computer nerd (Ophelia even notices that her own computer is basically from the future compared to the ones that other detectives use), she knows her way around technical devices of whichever time, but most importantly, she's very hard-working and is fussy, let's admit it. If she's doing something, she makes sure she's doing it right and to the fullest, hence her deep research on Valerio Casale and the nightclub.
Talking about that, the nightclub's name is not random: Lux Obscura comes from the Latin and essentially means 'dark light', and its ties to chapter 2, when Taehyung and Ophelia went to the club for inspection; Ophelia notes that the glass with which the building is made is still dark, like they chose to appear transparent but still want to control that transparency.
In that sense, we can also say that 'dark light' shows that they are acting right under everyone's noses (light), yet no one actually sees them (dark).
Proceeding with the team, we've got Taehyung, who used to be the nerd in the duo (him and Ophelia) and is now dethroned by Rosé, but his role is still fundamental, because he's the grounding force to Ophelia's spirals, and we're going to have a few of those in the long run.
Finally, Ophelia, the drive behind every single move of the team. She's essentially the determination, the backbone.
Using the fire metaphor, she's the flames, Taehyung the fuel, and Rosé, oxygen, nboth both elements that feed her and made her light up brighter.
What's also very important in this chapter is the semi-essay on how sex work is and used to be treated, specifically at this time in history.
I don't know if you guys are into true crime, but I know sex workers being the main demographic that falls victim to the crazy fantasies of freaks and serial killers is not new because society has set them as the pariah, and therefore, it ignores them, whichever fate they meet.
Yes, at the time (in some countries it's still in the present), sex work was considered a crime punishable by the law. What I'm trying to send across is not that a crime can be excused. I'm questioning the entire nature of this so-called crime since the true victims in the majority of the cases (so statistically speaking, and not just two cases out of 100) have always been the workers and not the clients.
At the end of the day, specifically in this scene, it comes down to human rights.
I'm going to end this note here because it's getting very long, and I could talk forever.
xoxo, zy.
COMMENT TO BE ADDED TO THE TAGLIST
𓍝
Just - Ghost Orchestra.
Summer in Bellport was different, and Ophelia would tell this to herself every day as she stepped out of her home; she had been for the past five years, every day of the three-month-long season.
Summer was chaotic, noisy, loud in daylight and messy at night.
No one seemed to be on holiday; everyone was now a victim of capitalism.
Cars roared by, ringing at the smallest obstruction and screeching right before catastrophes.
The nights were the same yet different. They seemed so peaceful at first, something Ophelia discovered was just an appearance, because the city was more alive at night, it seemed—many things happened.
Mosquitoes roamed around like merciless and restless palace guards, cars sped by even faster, fuelled by the rather empty streets, the drunken drivers and the fresher temperatures of the evenings.
There was never a moment of rest, peace, and even if there was, it was again a meagre appearance.
The traffic light turned green, and she crossed the road, Taehyung by her side.
The police station was just down the road, a few feet away, just as the café they were leaving behind them.
With their tummies full and their sugar levels replenished, they returned to work, walking through the chamber of the revolving door to exit in an artificially fresher environment.
The station overflowed with noise just as outside, its sleep-wake cycle matched that of the city—apparent rest, peace.
Having had their cups of coffee at the café, they were headed for their desks when someone called them from the vending machines.
“Detective Cooper, detective—”
“Taehyung is just fine, don’t worry,” he grinned at Rosé, Ophelia right back at him with a smile.
“Yeah, and you can call me Ophelia.”
Rosé was standing in line, wallet in both hands, lab coat temporarily discarded somewhere.
She softly chuckled, the sound almost awkward. Nodding mostly to herself, she sprang back to focus when the person in front of her moved away.
Checking the machine and the numbers, she typed in the code for her snack and inserted the coins. The detectives patiently waited.
“I hope,” her voice strained as she bent down, “I won’t be an interruption if I ask you to come to the lab for even just a minute.”
She turned around to look at their response. Taehyung nodded, and Ophelia’s pupils widened in curiosity.
“You found something,” she said.
“Someone,” Rosé bent over to collect the snack, “or two, really.”
Without needing a call, Ophelia and Taehyung tailed behind her to the lab, with him being the last in line and the one to eventually close the door.
As if the station couldn’t get any more lifeless, the room they’d stepped into somehow had the most fluorescent lights Ophelia had ever seen.
The ceiling was covered in matte, white acoustic panels arranged in a grid system. Some tiles were embedded with sprinkler heads and others with fire detectors.
The flickering fluorescent tubes buzzed to life as Rosé switched them on, and their colour dimmed the warm shades the summer sun cast across their faces.
Now they walked in the navy blue room, looking slightly sickly, skin catching a pale, greenish tone. Besides the metallic grey furnishing, the appliances were white.
The lab looked maybe too much like a lab, void of organic life and vibrancy, artificial and carrying the edge that comes with a classic forensic lab.
It looked like the smell of bleach and the blue of synthetic gloves.
Rosé walked to the desk in the corner, dragging out the high-back office chair to sit down. Ophelia and Taehyung stopped right by her; she remained on her feet, impressed by the high-end monitor, while he perched on the edge of the desk, arms and legs crossed.
Between them, Rosé had turned the computer on and reached for a folder just in the corner.
“As you’ve told me,” she began, paper rustling when she turned the page, “I looked up Lux Obscura and its affiliates.”
The first page she stopped at was a printed profile of the edifice—when it was built, bought, turned into a nightclub and by whom.
“It’s a relatively new building, belonging to an Italian man named Eugenio Parisi.” She clicked on the mouse, and a page slowly loaded on the computer screen.
“Thirty-six of age, Eugenio was born in Lucca, Italy, married to thirty-one-year-old Elisa Parisi, and they both reside in Florence.”
“He’s not even in the country?” Taehyung asked for Ophelia as well.
“Nope,” Rosé shook her head, “He’s currently in Tuscany, in Italy, and the nightclub is just a business he has here, and I assume it’s because of his wife, who is a citizen.”
A few more clicks, and she opened another page. “She was born in Santa Maria, California, to Alessia and Donatello Romano, both successful business owners.”
“Does she have any title to the club?”
Rosé shook her head again. “Just the husband.”
“And when he’s out of the country…”
“…Valerio Casale…” Rosé changed the page, “…takes over.”
Both detectives changed their stances to look at the screen better.
“Valerio Casale is Italian as well, immigrated around twenty years ago, and he’s been in the picture since 2001, when Parisi bought the building.”
“Do we know what he’s been doing before Lux Obscura?” Ophelia reached for the folder.
“Bartender at different pubs.”
Taehyung approached her, tilting his head to read too. “Anything sketchy about this nightclub?”
“At first glance,” Rosé changed page again, “no, but you’ve mentioned that Valerio claims the club has been in the market for reports of sexual harassment and assault, so I dug deeper.”
She switched windows, and the new page gradually loaded a list, line by line.
“I pulled the call logs from the server,” she turned to look at the detectives.
“Oh, my God,” Taehyung and Ophelia leaned closer, “what’s all this?”
“These are all the reports and complaints we’ve received up to date from Lux Obscura alone. It is so fucking sketchy.”
Shaking her mouse on the pad, she opened yet another window.
“It’s been on for barely ten years, but it wasn’t born as ‘Lux Obscura’, but another nightclub that went by the name ‘Pink Slip’. It became Lux Obscura only recently. They filed for two different liquor licenses under the same owner.”
Ophelia tried reading each line, looking for something that would stand out, but most of the complaints were nothing similar to Tara’s case yet.
“Whoa,” Taehyung’s voice sliced through her stream of consciousness, “how the hell had it been on for all these years with such a reputation?”
“Taehyung, the Parisi are loaded from both sides, and they changed the name of the venue to have a clear slate to restart with.”
“Didn’t really work out, now did it?” Ophelia commented, clicking on the bar to scroll down the page. “They’ve got to be bribing their way through.”
“Absolutely. This is crazy,” Taehyung rubbed his neck, “we went to the club that night, and it was almost overflowing. There were people waiting in line to get inside still—”
“I pulled the call logs from the server,” Rosé cut him off, “but the actual case files are still downstairs in the 'Jackets.' To know why these didn't go to trial, we're going to need the hard copies.”
“Yeah, we need to tell Joseph to give us access to these police reports.” Ophelia turned to Taehyung, and he nodded.
She closed the folder, but before she could take a step away from the desk, Rosé stopped her.
“But, wait. What about the girl, Tara? You said you’d reach out. Have you?”
“Not yet. I was waiting for your feedback.”
“Then you do that, and Rosé and I will reach out to Joseph.”
Ophelia nodded and quickly stepped out.
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
In the end - Linkin Park.
To Ophelia’s surprise, not even thirty minutes passed from when she heard Tara’s voice on the phone to when she eventually saw her at the station.
She found her in the waiting room, her attire and composure completely different from the last time.
With chunky platform sandals on her feet, Tara was sitting in a jean miniskirt and a red halter top, hair gathered in a messy updo.
Just like that night, she had a full face of makeup, but nothing was smudged or faded, and unless she had really high-quality makeup, it was freshly done.
To Ophelia, it could mean that she didn’t work during the day or solely at the weekends, a routine she’d found common amongst women in that line of work.
“Good morning— Oh, sorry, good afternoon.” She sprang up from her seat, a smile bright in a way that didn’t sit right with Ophelia.
The detective grinned back without bringing her hand for a shake. She didn’t want to return to formality, and clearly, things had worked out, because Tara chose to hug her instead.
It caught her off-guard—surely great progress compared to their first meeting—but she didn’t mind it, seeing that her efforts had paid off.
“Good afternoon, come have a seat,” she guided her to her desk, where the computer was ready to take notes. Furthermore, she’d talked with a sketch artist just minutes before Tara came in, so that was also on standby.
“So,” Tara relaxed her shoulders and sighed, “why did you call for me?”
Ophelia first paused, then she blinked once, twice, slowly. Why did I call for you?
Had she forgotten? Would explain the glee on her face and the pep in her step.
“We met two days ago, Tara. Have you forgotten my face so soon?”
She tried to match her mood, keeping her tone light and playful because maybe it was all a coping mechanism—smile through the pain, or something just as corny.
But she didn’t believe it was the case.
Tara thinned her lips, still forcing a smile, and fixed her top. It didn’t need fixing.
“How was your day?” Ophelia filled the blank moment of awkward silence.
“Fine.”
Cutthroat, neat, too neat.
Ophelia’s eyes were fixed on the girl, who didn’t look up. She wasn’t looking down either, just anywhere but Ophelia’s eyes.
The very short and definitive answer made her feel like a therapist faceplanting into a wall she believed to have destroyed already.
“What have you been up to?”
“Nothing special.” A shrug, then she leaned closer with a smirk and her voice down to a whisper. “Work’s only at night.”
Nothing surprising. Ophelia had already reached that conclusion just by looking at her makeup. What was surprising was the rather immature behaviour she was faced with.
“Where’s your colleague, the tall and handsome guy from the other night—”
“So you do remember.” As if caught in a lie, Tara’s smile faded. Ophelia frowned. “Is everything alright?”
“Discovered anything?” Her once bubbly voice seemed to have fallen a couple of octaves, like a kid’s shoulders at the mention of returning home from the playground.
“You work at Lux Obscura—”
“Used to.” Ophelia looked up from Rosé’s file when she caught the interruption and the edge to her tone.
She slowly nodded. “Used to, and now—”
“I’m a prostitute—”
“I know—” she froze at the term, didn’t like the sound of it, but she didn’t correct her. “I know, Tara.”
A frown drew a ridge between her brows, and she struggled to maintain the same tone and volume.
“Do you know who Eugenio Parisi is?”
Tara shook her head.
“Valerio Casale?”
“Valerio? He’s not my manager.” From the look of things, Tara most likely had a pimp, not the traditional manager, but again, Ophelia didn’t mention it.
“Who is?”
Tara shrugged. “Don’t know his real name, but we call him Jey.”
“We?”
She nodded. “I’m not alone, duh.”
“How many are you?”
“Many.” She shrugged again. “I only count my money, though.”
A brothel, then, Ophelia thought.
“Can you give me any names—”
“We have stage names. They don’t know I’m Tara. They only know Liv.”
So Jey is a stage name, she typed on her computer, the almost metallic sounds filling the silence.
“You think you could help us create a sketch of… Jey?”
“That’s why you called me here?”
Her voice fell off another pair of octaves. Ophelia ripped her eyes off the screen, fingers hovering over the keyboard, and the sentence left incomplete.
She blinked again as she spoke. “Tara, we—”
“If Valerio is who you met, then…” she murmured mostly to herself, “then they have already cleaned everything up—”
“The man who assaulted you that night,” Ophelia brought her back to reality, “does he have a name?”
“Master.” Tara looked up, that light and glee lost from her eyes. “He wanted me to call him ‘master’.”
Ophelia internally cringed and grimaced, forcing herself back to seriousness. “Still remember his face?”
How could anyone forget something like that anyway?
“He had a mask on, though.” Tara nodded, the movement tiny, pushed through hesitation.
“We’ll still need his sketch drawing. Can you help us with that—”
“Why haven’t you arrested me yet?”
Ophelia was about to complete the sentence on the computer and get up, but the question caught her off guard, something completely out of all the scenarios she’d foreseen for the day.
But she knew why Tara asked. She thought she would’ve heard it the night they found her, not now.
“I’m a prostitute. That’s illegal,” she continued, her demeanour cold, lacking all that glee and brightness. “You should’ve brought me here in handcuffs—”
“You jumped in front of our car, Tara. You were running for your life. What would it make of me if I cuffed your hands right as you hopped into the car?”
“You’re a cop. I’m a prostitute, and I was also half-naked that night. Public indecency, isn’t that how you guys call it?”
“I’m a person before a cop. You needed—”
“But I’m a criminal in the eyes of the law—”
“You’re a human in danger, Tara,” she sternly said. “You want me to trash everything you’re saying because you’re a sex worker—”
“The system will, though,” she bit back, frustration drawing thick lines on Ophelia’s nerves. “You saw that officer that night—”
“And your attitude right now is one of the reasons why people still act like that in front of these kinds of situations.”
Ophelia held back a little. Tara was clearly a fighter: she’d fought back against her aggressor and run for her life. But women in her line of work were extremely vulnerable, names and faces that society had pushed to the back rows just because of their jobs.
They were harming no one but themselves, and they still got punished for that by society and people with evil intentions.
Tara was expecting to be treated exactly as the system had been doing for centuries. She was ready to face the kind of neglect that bred pain and fed into the sick fantasies of mentally ill people, who exploited this exact flaw to run under the radar.
Ophelia had been in the field enough to know and wonder every day just how many serial killers and people with sick and deadly sexual fantasies around the world went scot free because no one remembered the names and faces of their victims, no one cared, and no one wanted to find them.
But one thing is being a common citizen, who could only feel bad from the comfort of their home and hope the same wouldn’t happen to their loved ones, and another thing was working in the police force and having way more authority in the matter and greater power to change the course of history.
“So you won’t arrest me?” Tara egged on,
“Here’s what I’ll do with you,” Ophelia sighed, hand flat on the desk as she got up, “we believe this case is bigger than it seems, and you’ll help us dig deeper. It’s for your safety and that of any other sex worker out there. Got it?”
Tara’s eyes didn’t linger on Ophelia’s; she even hesitated to look up. But Ophelia’s stern voice was the only thing that put an end to her chain of questions.
She believed that Ophelia didn’t know that she wasn’t the first sex worker to have been disappointed by the law simply because of their line of work.
Truly, Ophelia could taste the distrust in her voice, dripping like sweat from a heated body, and smell it like intoxicating smoke in a blazing room.
And for that reason, she needed to reach out and save as much as she could before her lungs would turn black, give out, and the smoke would swallow her to leave no traces.
“Now, please, would you follow me?”
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
The Unforgiven - Metallica.
“I would’ve preferred being surprised, you know?”
“About what?” Taehyung scoffed, hopping down the stairs next to Montefalco.
The man patted his shoulder, hand lingering, “I knew you guys would never have the guts to arrest the girl.”
Rosé was walking behind them, head turning around to inspect the surroundings. Wide, dark brown, smooth bricks lined the walls leading downstairs to the station's basement.
The deeper they went, the dimmer it became, and the yellow-tinted glass window at the top of the stairs became insufficient.
With each step she took, Rosé felt as if she were entering a pool of dust, where minuscule particles hovered in the air and were visible only around light bulbs and under the cracks of doors.
The cold shade of the overhead light clashed with the warm shadow cast from behind through the yellow window, forming a hazy cloud of apparent smoke.
Just like in a pool, just like in a blazing house, Rosé felt like she shouldn’t breathe, shouldn’t welcome the dust particles, the fog, and that almost humid smell of walls that comes with basements.
Montefalco and Taehyung proceeded in front of her. They turned left, and she followed suit, noticing a door at the end of the short hallway. Again, over her head was a bright light, the kind that paled the skin and revealed veins.
The floor beneath her shoes was smooth, and the lights poorly reflected off the tiles. It was covered in wide square plates, greyish black in colour and similar to the dark shade of the walls.
She heard the men talking in front of her, heard Taehyung chuckle as he stated that it would’ve been rather inhumane to cuff Tara as soon as they got to the station when she was clearly running from danger.
She even heard Montefalco, despite his attempt to keep his voice down, tell him to be careful because other officers may label them as ‘compromised’, weak because they remembered to be humans before cops.
But he also said that he wasn’t surprised by their move. It was expected, given their reputation, and he believed they knew what they were doing because they had never disappointed him, ever.
She was turning her head around when Taehyung replied.
“As I’ve told you, we believe something even worse is happening with the nightclub. Rosé, here,” he turned to her, and she snapped back at him at the mention of her name, “discovered that crazy amount of reports—”
“Yeah, yeah, you told me.”
They finally stopped by a brown door with frosted glass. In its centre was a label that read ‘police records’.
“Okay, let me run you guys through the system a bit. You’ll refer it to Ophelia later in case you need to return.”
Montefalco reached for a key to open the door, and the lock snapped. There was a squeaky sound, uncharacteristic of the modern-looking door, and they walked into the room.
As if stepping into an abandoned library, the air grew even thicker and colder, landing heavily in the lungs like stones settling in water.
“This,” Montefalco stopped at a desk by the door, “is Mrs Gable, the clerk.”
Rosé pushed the door closed behind herself, hearing the lock click after the series of short, squeaky sounds. Every single one echoed through the room.
The woman Montefalco was introducing was probably in her late fifties. Her hair was straight and very short, curved at the end like a helmet and white as snow.
Despite the weather, she had a few too many layers on, but what struck Rosé the most was the wool cardigan on top.
Her hands were a bit wrinkly, as were her cheeks, and atop her nose bridge sat a pair of rectangular grey glasses, held behind her neck by a slim chain of metallic beads.
“How may I help you?” Her voice was almost as squeaky as the door, the kind born from age and years of bad smoking habits.
She bent her chin, looking at them over the top rim of her glasses, inspecting them with annoyance, slowly drawing thicker lines on her face.
“Let me present to you, detective—”
“Halston, and Ms Golding. Where’s Cooper?”
Her raspy and nasal voice cut Montefalco short, and he forced himself to maintain the smile.
“Cooper is interviewing—”
“So why are you here?” she cut Taehyung off, too, eyes bouncing from one face to the other.
Rosé stepped forward to answer, almost retreating the moment the old lady’s lifeless brown eyes found her, neck seemingly squeaking as she turned her head.
“We’re here to look through some reports about a nightclub, Mrs…” she swallowed down, “Gable.”
The woman hissed, shifting her weight to the other foot. She muttered something underneath her breath, and Rosé caught only a few words.
“Mrs…” her voice spiked up and instantly faded when the lady looked up at her again.
“Mrs Gable,” she repeated more softly, “I know you fear we’ll ruin the indexing and—”
“You will—”
“I know how to move around here,” she cut her off back, swallowing the lump in her throat to push down the instant regret.
Mrs Gable reached up to take off her glasses, leaving them hanging around her neck, and leaned more heavily on her arms, squinting at Rosé.
“Mr Stone was your mentor, wasn’t he?”
“And I’m Cooper and Halston’s mentor.” But Montefalco’s interjection was more than displeasing to the old lady.
She slowly craned her head at him, eyes running up and down his rather small height, before returning to the young woman with a soft and irritated sigh.
Rosé hesitated, but she nodded, and as soon as she did, something eased in Mrs Gable’s body. It was faint, barely traceable, but she noticed.
“That box there,” the woman pointed to her left, “is where you’ll leave all the reports once you’re done. I’ll replace them myself and make sure to always, and I repeat, always, leave a pink slip where you take files from, else—”
She turned to Montefalco and let him finish her sentence for her—and himself. He awkwardly smiled, suddenly feeling like a rookie, and nodding, he ushered the others to proceed into the room.
“Joseph, you ain’t coming with us?” Taehyung asked, catching him lingering by the door.
“Oh, no no.” The man shook his hand, awkwardly chuckling. “I’ve given you complete control of the case, remember? So you guys should do just that, okay? Call me if you need anything.”
With that, he scurried out, while Mrs Gable’s eyes weighed heavily on their shoulders as they stepped deeper into the room.
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
Reminiscience - Olafur Arnalds, Alice Sara Ott.
With each step she took, the space developed a thicker smell of paper and ozone while simultaneously locking out any sound besides the click of her shoes and the muffled rumbles of cars outside.
The lighting was poor, and the room became progressively smaller, space occupied by tall lines and shelves of metal cabinets held in place by the tracks on the floor.
“So,” Taehyung cleared his throat, keeping his voice down as if he actually was in a public library, “you said you know your way around here? I hope you weren’t—”
“I wasn’t lying,” she deadpanned, head turning left and right in search of something.
Taehyung nodded, muttering an apology under his breath and scanning the room to notice how some shelves were pushed together while others were separated by a very slim space, one certainly not big enough for the average human.
“So, erm, what’s it about, Mr Stone? Why did she—”
“He taught me how to move around here. I didn’t come here often; it feels new every time, but he made sure I knew what to do just in case. He knows how cranky Mrs Gable can be.”
She turned her head left again, finding a big photocopy machine at the extreme end right where the rows of shelves ended.
“Oh, we’re here,” she gasped, now turning right to find a bulky CRT computer, screen black with a single green text glowing.
Leading the way, she approached it at a quick pace, handing her folder to Taehyung to free her hands.
“Okay, so what are we doing now?” he asked, trying to fill the silence because he couldn’t stand the constant buzzing of the overhead lights.
“Mr Stone said it’s always better to bypass the search screens and use the command-line interface.”
Taehyung slowly nodded, squinting his eyes and taking in the words but not their meaning.
“I’ll run a Geocode search,” she continued, typing in the nightclub’s address. Taehyung was basically lost, and he flinched when the system chugged, the sound grinding and almost worse than the buzzing lights.
“What’s that?” he scooted closer.
“Reporting Grid Number.” Which meant everything and nothing to him, the kind of nothing he couldn’t even pretend to understand.
He nodded without knowing why and continued watching as the screen displayed something similar to a map, something, again, solely Rosé could manoeuvre.
Before her, he was the brains in the duo, knew his way around most computers more than Ophelia did, but his knowledge clearly had limits, which to Rosé were small bumps in the road and not tall walls.
“You see?” Yes, he did, but certainly not what she was seeing. “They tried burying the Geocode, but the tax ID stays the same.”
“Oh, they pay taxes?” he chuckled, “I wouldn’t have put tax evasion past them.”
But Rosé didn’t reply. She didn’t scoff or laugh. She did turn around, looking at something behind Taehyung. But when he glanced in that direction, he found only the photocopy machine.
His focus returned to the old computer, and Rosé was already moving down on the page, mouse clicking on the scroll button to navigate.
Right when he leaned in to read, she quickly reached for her folder, pulling out an empty paper and a pen. With the cap in her mouth, she began scribbling down a list of numbers.
“The case numbers, right?” he asked, and she hummed in agreement. That mere reply restored some confidence in him.
He read the numbers, seeing the timeline span from 2002 down to the present with at least twenty reports by year, and he watched as Rosé continued writing down the progressively longer list of numbers.
“We’ll start from the year, and then we navigate the folders and find the corresponding case number,” she instructed, eyes bouncing between screen and paper. She paused for a moment, folding the page to rip it in half.
“Here,” she gave it to him, “start looking for these ones, else we’ll be here all day.”
He hummed, collecting it and pausing the moment he realised what he actually had to surf now.
Rows upon rows of shelves stretched in front of him like a tunnel, and the photocopy machine at the opposite end seemed to be menacingly laughing at his sorry state.
The stuffy air of the room suddenly panged harder in his chest, and with each step he took, he felt his lungs breathe in the dust and form a desert of sand in him.
The rows stopped at the year ‘1994’, too far behind for him, so he folded the paper in his pocket and walked to the side of the shelf where he found a large, chrome three-spoke spinning wheel with a handle.
No one was between the shelves, so the coast was clear for him to begin moving it clockwise. There was some resistance, but it was insignificant compared to the heavy content on the shelves and the friction on the tracks. The sound was low, metallic and crackling.
The room shuffled as he moved a couple more shelves until he got to 2002. By that time, Rosé was done writing out all the case numbers and joined him.
“You got it?” she asked, appearing behind him.
Mrs Gable was still at the desk, glasses on and a magazine in hand. She looked rather relaxed, given how irritable she was just moments ago.
He nodded, eyes returning to the space between the two shelves.
“It’s here,” she guided his gaze to the right lines. “Basically eye-level and well-lit. We’re lucky.”
The rows contained metallic boxes with clean labels, given how recent the cases were, and as Rosé pulled one open, the manila cardstock folders were still relatively intact and hadn’t yellowed out yet.
“Found one,” she announced, and it snapped Taehyung back to reality.
He pulled out his paper and began his own scavenger hunt, signing a pink slip to hand over to her.
Within minutes, he had built a pile of folders on the floor, and she had a good handful between her arms.
“You know,” Rosé broke the ice after an everlasting span of silence. She glanced at Mrs Gable and found her still reading her magazine. “It’s rather odd that such recent reports have already been moved to the master rows.”
“Yeah? What do you mean?” His words were muffled by the pen cap in his mouth as he filled another pink slip.
When he closed it, his reply came out more clearly. “Where else would they be?”
“Closer to the desk,” she deadpanned. “It goes to show you how far they’d go to delete their tracks.”
She stretched her hand out for the slip, putting it in place of the folder in her hold before pulling it out. “I wonder who’s actually doing the dirty work for them. I doubt they have direct access to the records room.”
He instantly caught what she implied, hands pausing on the folders he was navigating. Something hit him, another reality check, one he’d add to the many others he’d learned throughout his years of work, one that told him that police corruption wasn’t just a headline anymore, something to be heard of only in movies or poorer countries.
It’d come home to the station he worked at, the place he stupidly thought would stay clean, the place he saw as a shelter he could reside in as he tried making the world a better place.
He sighed to himself, sharp and deep, and resumed his work, scolding himself for even showing any surprise.
If an undying heat always hovered around Bellport, he should’ve known there would be a source, a bonfire somewhere, raising the temperatures enough to be felt but not enough to burn because the actual fire was exactly where one would think to find only water.
“Fucking hell,” he rasped, another pink slip in his hand.
“Surely bigger than it seems,” she muttered, getting up with the pile of reports in her arms. “I think these are enough for today.”
She returned to the computer and placed the folders on the table right next to it, lit by a flickering fluorescent bulb that she knew would pull on her last nerves just minutes into reviewing the first report.
“Taehyung,” she called, her voice resounding awkwardly flat through the room.
She wondered if Mrs Gable heard her and even imagined the annoyance that would lace every single facial muscle as she adjusted her posture on her chair and flipped the page of her magazine.
Taehyung poked his head out of the rows, eyes asking the question instead of his mouth.
“I think we should go through these ones for now, so we can focus on the details without streamlining too much.”
“Hmm, yeah, you’ve got a point. I’ll be right there.”
She didn’t wait for him, pulling on the chair and grimacing at the sound as it scraped the floor. The laminate table was pushed against the wall, cold underneath her forearms just as the surface underneath her butt.
She set the piles to her left, made space in front of her to read and on her right to discard them when done, and just as she reached for the first one, Taehyung arrived with his pile of reports, setting them on the table just as she did.
“Okay,” he sighed, sinking into the uncomfortable chair, “how should we share the work?”
“Easy,” she replied, reaching for her glasses, “I look at forensic evidence, and you read the reports.”
“Yeah, you’re right. Here will be the ones I’ve read, okay?” He placed his palm on his right.
She looked up and nodded, noticing him take out a pen and a small notebook.
As if it were its duty, the fluorescent light above their heads constantly flickered at a precise rhythm, and they both blinked twice from time to time as if the instability dried their eyes.
On the desk, Rosé had placed not just her folder of empty pages and a pen. She’d also taken a camera, finding it a rather quick and silent way to take information out of the room, and given the position of the desk, Mrs Gable would have a hard time noticing her.
“They’ve got composite sketches,” she gasped, finding one stapled to the back of a witness statement.
Taehyung looked up with mild surprise on his face as he silently celebrated the minuscule victory. Before he could look back down at the papers, he saw Rosé reach for the camera, arms stretching above the desk to capture the page in a picture.
His eyes lingered on her, on the soft frown between her brows as she focused, the hazy shadow her rectangular glasses cast on her cheeks, and her posture.
Something about her reminded him of Ophelia, and he didn’t know if it was the determination on her face like a birthmark or the deep concentration lacing every muscle of her body. Either way, those were two things he envied of Ophelia and now of Rosé as well.
He finally returned to the case file under his nose, focusing his eyes on the names of the police officers, the detectives, and most especially, the victims.
His right hand reached for his notebook. He dug a shallow hole in the first page and wrote down right after it.
Solicitation.
On the opposite end, Rosé had taken yet another picture, all frames she’d later transfer to her computer and work on.
But besides the composite sketches, she noticed that there wasn’t much inserted as forensic evidence. It wasn’t a shocker, considering what they knew, but legally speaking, reading about brawls and physical assaults without any picture was still out of the ordinary.
They had no intention of checking the time, only the height of the piles as they went through them. And so they went on.
Taehyung had to change pages a couple of times, and Rosé’s camera roll progressively became heavier. The lights buzzed, the overhead bulb flickered, and they always caught the times Mrs Gable turned the page of her magazine.
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
Afraid - The neighbourhood.
Given the silence, the heels clicking down the corridor were heard even through the room, even before the lock snapped and the door creaked open.
The squeaky sound and subsequent slam echoed through the dusty room, slicing Taehyung and Rosé’s attention like a sword through flesh.
“Ms Cooper,” Mrs Gable’s nasally raspy voice made its way to their ears, and if Taehyung just paused before, his head now sprang up, neck stretching to find the clerk’s desk.
“I suppose you’re here to join your colleagues.”
The almost kind tone of the woman made Rosé deeply frown, and she completely turned her body on the chair to find Ophelia smiling by the desk.
“Yes, I am,” she replied. “You don’t mind, right?”
Mrs Gable slowly shook her head, nodding in their direction, and Ophelia gave her one last smile, which disappeared the moment she turned around and approached their desk.
Rosè’s jaw suddenly felt heavy, yearning to just drop to the floor in surprise; Taehyung’s felt the same urge but for all different reasons.
With the sleeves of her light blazer folded up to her elbows, her plain black pants fell down and almost covered her heels.
Ophelia walked up to their desk at a steady pace, with a few buttons of her top open and a messy updo, which told Taehyung that her meeting with Tara didn’t really go smoothly.
“How did it go?” he asked to have an excuse when he caught her flick her brow at his unfading gaze.
She pulled a chair close by, turned it around and sank on it with her arms on the backrest to place her chin on them.
“What do you think?” she mumbled. “I feel like I could graduate in psychology just because of it.”
Rosé chuckled. “Besides that, how the hell did you just…” she pointed at Mrs Gable’s desk.
Ophelia shrugged, muttering something about past encounters and how they marked their relationship, and Rosé slowly nodded, unsatisfied with the reply.
As she returned to the folder in front of her, Ophelia was reminded of work. She sat up straight and returned focused despite the tiredness weighing down on her eyelids.
“How has it been going for you?” she mumbled, turning the chair around to sit better.
“I’ve got many composite sketches here,” Rosé announced, pointing at the digital camera on the desk.
“Oh, that’s good,” Ophelia leaned closer, craning her neck to see what she was analysing.
“I had Tara help out with a composite sketch, a few actually.”
Turning to her left, her eyes met Taehyung’s, who flashed her a smile and looked down at the paper on the desk. She tried not to think too much about it and returned to Rosé.
“She said her manager, who I believe is a pimp, goes by the stage name ‘Jey’.”
“Jey, you said?” Taehyung instantly looked up, lowering his voice when he heard it echo through the room louder than he’d intended. “That name has come up multiple times here, along with a victim’s name.”
“Bonnie Morley is her name. Stage name’s Liora,” he continued, and Ophelia pulled her chair closer to him.
“What about her?”
“From the look of things,” he pushed the file to her, noticing her fingers going up to push back a few messy strands, “she tried taking matters to court and even seemed serious about it, more serious than the other files I’ve read where statements had been withdrawn.”
“Rosé, can I use your camera real quick?” Ophelia quickly opened and closed her hand, waiting for the object.
“Sure,” Rosé complied, and as soon as Ophelia got it, she centred the file better and began taking pictures, page by page.
“Her case is a bit different from the others,” Taehyung commented in the background. “It’s not about solicitation, drunken brawls or sexual harassment. She claimed her friend, Ava Sanchez, had gone missing in late 2002.”
This caught even Rosé’s attention as she looked up from her file. “Missing? For four years? Talk about bribery. How the fuck did they manage to hide this?”
“Yes, it’s basically a cold case, but she was a sex worker,” Ophelia sighed, mind racing back and forth between the records room and her previous conversation with Tara upstairs. “The system knows how to bury their cases really well.”
“I’m gonna try to get a photocopy—”
“No, Tae,” she stopped him, hand on his, “the station is surely corrupted for something of this scale to just be swept under the rug. No one must know about our progress, okay? So we can’t be caught photocopying files. Let’s just stick to the camera, plus we can come back some other day. Until we receive Lux Obscura CCTV footage, we have this to work on.”
Rosé nodded, fully agreeing and pushing the files she’d read in Ophelia’s way.
“They all contain composite sketches,” she explained, “and I’ve taken photos. I’ll analyse them on my computer, find recurring features and see where that leads us.”
Ophelia nodded, mind returning to Tara. “Tara said that her attacker wore a mask that night.”
“It's common for high-ranking men to do that shit,” Taehyung scoffed, bitterness lying beneath his words.
“We got a composite sketch, but it’s just a hairy man with a theatrical mask on. Basically leads us nowhere.”
“Well,” Rosé shrugged, “we’ve got all this in our hands now—composite sketches, Jey, Bonnie Morley, Ava Sanchez, the CCTV footage. Let’s focus on this, no?”
“Yeah,” Ophelia sighed, turning on the first page of the folder Rosé had given her, “Let’s focus on this.”
All of this.
𓍝
(chapter 3) ⬅ | ★ | next chapter ᯓ☆
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── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 473/24k
── .✦ date: 07/05/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
“Valerio? He’s not my manager.” From the look of things, Tara most likely had a pimp, not the traditional manager, but again, Ophelia didn’t mention it.
“Who is?”
Tara shrugged. “Don’t know his real name."
“How many are you?”
“Many.” She shrugged again. “I only count my money, though.”
A brothel, then, Ophelia thought.
“Can you give me any names—”
“We have stage names. They don’t know I’m Tara. They only know Liv.”
“You think you could help us create a sketch of—"
“That’s why you called me here?”
Her voice fell off another pair of octaves. Ophelia ripped her eyes off the screen, fingers hovering over the keyboard, and the sentence left incomplete.
She blinked again as she spoke. “Tara, we—”
“If Valerio is who you met, then…” she murmured mostly to herself.
“The man who assaulted you that night,” Ophelia brought her back to reality, “does he have a name?”
“Master.” Tara looked up, that light and glee lost from her eyes. “He wanted me to call him ‘master’.”
Ophelia internally cringed and grimaced. “Still remember his face?”
“He had a mask on, though. Why haven’t you arrested me yet?”
“I’m a prostitute. That’s illegal,” she continued, her demeanour cold, lacking all that glee and brightness. “You should’ve brought me here in handcuffs—”
“You jumped in front of our car, Tara. You were running for your life. What would it make of me if I cuffed your hands right as you hopped into the car?”
“You’re a cop. I’m a prostitute, and I was also half-naked that night. Public indecency, isn’t that how you guys call it?”
“I’m a person before a cop. You needed—”
“But I’m a criminal in the eyes of the law—”
“You’re a human in danger, Tara,” she sternly said. “You want me to trash everything you’re saying because you’re a sex worker—”
“The system will, though,” she bit back, frustration drawing thick lines on Ophelia’s nerves. “You saw that officer that night—”
“And your attitude right now is one of the reasons why people still act like that in front of these kinds of situations.”
“So you won’t arrest me?” Tara egged on,
“Here’s what I’ll do with you,” Ophelia sighed, hand flat on the desk as she got up, “we believe this case is bigger than it seems, and you’ll help us dig deeper. It’s for your safety and that of any other sex worker out there. Got it?”
Truly, Ophelia could taste the distrust in her voice, dripping like sweat from a heated body, and smell it like intoxicating smoke in a blazing room.
And for that reason, she needed to reach out and save as much as she could before her lungs would turn black, give out, and the smoke would swallow her to leave no traces.
“Now, please, would you follow me?"
coming soon | chapter 4 will be up on Thursday
main masterlist // index // pinterest board // wattpad // notion page // community // taglist // ko-fi // instagram // ao3 // inkitt // my main: @silverozy
Like Wordsworth's daffodils: join the community and become a dainty little ro(zy) -> JOIN NOW!
But if you're shy, you can join my taglist so we always stay connected. I'm an introvert too, don't worry.
the police station - #atm: the police station
the city - #atm: bellport
the countryside - #atm: hadleigh
the nightclub - #atm: lux obscura
the hotel - #atm: the plaza hotel
jungkook's art gallery - #atm: jungkook's art gallery
ophelia's family home - #atm: ophelia's family home
watford - #atm: watford
prynne district - #atm: prynne district
umbridge district - #atm: umbridge district
batemann gray district - #atm: batemann gray district
rockford district - #atm: rockford district
riplee district - #atm: riplee district
ehrenreich district - #atm: ehrenreich district
── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 3.72k
── .✦ date: 05/03/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
A/N: Yes, I know this chapter is significantly shorter than the previous, also generally speaking, we all know my chapters are always long asf. But there's a reason for this chapter's length. It serves to give the illusion of passing time without strictly writing that three, four days or a week has passed.
Also, I wanted to focus this chapter on the new character, Rosé Golding. She's my second favourite character in this book, and there's so much in store for her, just as she has so much in store for the story.
Furthermore, I'm trying to replicate a pace similar to real-life investigations, and with the way this story is planned, the kind of investigation they have ahead of them takes years in reality.
I won't be dragging it on like that. I'll try to recreate the pace, but I won't stay extremely to it, because at the end of the day, this is fiction, inspired from real life cases, things that do happen around us, but it's still fiction.
Before this note becomes to long, let me thank you all for the support you're giving not just this book but my other works as well. I'm so grateful.
Reblog if you enjoyed, and see y'all on the next one.
xoxo, zy
𓍝
Calma e sangue freddo - Luca Dirisio.
Ophelia had her phone clasped between her ear and her shoulder, and her brother’s voice resounded from the other end.
She knew the general topic of their conversation, but she’d missed the last few words he’d said, which to her was never that surprising. Hoseok was a chatterbox.
Buckling her belt and fixing her white dress shirt, Ophelia mindlessly hummed again to whatever her brother had said, turning left and right to check her outfit in the mirror.
It was rather disappointing to know that it wouldn’t be her first attire as a detective, given the events from the previous day, but it’d still be her first appearance at the station as one, and she felt this promotion was way beyond a simple salary increase.
Busying her hands still, her shoulder kept holding her phone against her ear as she waltzed around her apartment.
The living room window was partly opened, allowing the summer morning to have a presence way beyond simple slashing rays of light through the glass.
Every time Ophelia walked past it, a soft gust of breeze would brush against her skin and caress her hair while the morning sun would hit her square in the face, covering a small area but causing maximum damage.
“Lia, are you there?” Hoseok asked, and again she hummed, failing to get out of her autopilot mode.
“Lia, you’ve been humming for the past ten minutes—”
“Ten minutes? I highly doubt that. You can talk for that long?” She heard him exhale from the other end, a soft rustling noise in the background.
Stopping in her tracks, she slouched her shoulders and sighed. “Sorry, Hobi, but in case you’ve forgotten, today’s my first day as a detective. I know it might be a bit out of character for me, but I’m actually a bit nervous.”
He puffed, the sound uncomfortably loud to Ophelia’s ears. “Nervous? You? What has Bellport done to you?”
“For how long will I still be hearing that question?” she retorted, walking to grab a blazer. “You talk as if you don’t live ten minutes away by car from me.”
She already imagined the big shrug he’d give his shoulders, but couldn’t really wonder what he was doing exactly. As far as she was concerned, with the way he could easily chit-chat away, he could still be in bed.
“Does it matter? Bellport’s effects have got nothing on me.” She lazily hummed, accepting defeat before placing her phone on the kitchen counter to put on her shoes.
“Anyway, jokes aside, have I complimented you for the promotion? You’ve realised your dream—”
“No,” she hopped on a foot, voice straining a bit, “this is just a step forward, plus I think you already have. There must be a compliment amidst the thousand words you’ve said up until now.”
“And if there had been, I’m taking them back for that snarky remark.” She softly laughed, adjusting her top and reaching for the phone again.
Hoseok resumed speaking, but her brain failed to catch the initial words as she analysed her outfit and suddenly remembered to take care of her hair.
“You were saying?”
This time, he groaned loudly, and by the thumping sounds in the background, Ophelia realised that her previous guess was pretty accurate. He was in bed.
“Sorry, Hobi,” she laughed again, while he went on, promising never to call her in the morning again. Big fat lie. It was a routine for him—for her too.
“Have you had breakfast?” he asked, hearing her keys clanging through the phone.
She paused, the sound of her heeled boots slightly echoing through the apartment. She’d registered the question, but before exiting, she just had to check if the space was in order.
Catching the window left ajar, she darted forward. “Huh? What? Breakfast?”
She could hear the eye roll through his tone. “Yeah, breakfast, Lia. How exactly do you work being this forgetful?”
“I,” she closed the window, “am not forgetful. You just send my system into overdrive— Why are you behaving like I’m bullying you? Like… I am, but I’ve always done it—”
“Wow, so nice of you, Lia. Seriously. Now back to square one—”
“Oh, you really keep track of—”
“Have you had breakfast?” he cut her off, and she paused again. The kitchen counter was sparkling clean, and there was not a single pot on the stove.
“Yes, I did.”
“No, you didn’t. I ain’t a fool.”
She rolled her eyes, smiling and grabbing her purse. “Hobi, I just don’t have time—”
“How many times will I have to tell you that breakfast is the most important meal of the day—”
“Hobi,” she closed her front door, turning around to lock it, “you work behind a desk.”
“That means everything and nothing at the same time—”
“You know what it means— Stop trying to outsmart me!”
He puffed. “I don’t need to try.”
She sighed, waiting for the elevator. “Yeah, whatever.”
“Yeah, whatever, my fucking big toe. I’m picking you up for lunch break.”
“Expected,” she sighed again, giggling when he groaned.
Within a minute, she was in the lobby, stepping out onto the sidewalk.
As the big door slammed closed behind her, the sound almost muffled, Ophelia proceeded a few feet away from it to her car, hearing it ting open at her command.
“Hobi,” she began, pushing her bag onto the passenger seat and closing the door, “I have to drive now.”
“Yeah, don’t worry. I’m leaving in minutes.”
“Oh, you’re not in your bed?”
“Lia, why the fuck would I be in bed?” She softly gasped, left a bit confused, but inserted her keys in the ignition.
“Wow, Hobi, no one can hold a conversation through distress better than you, huh?”
“Define ‘distress’ for me, please?”
“Oh, you got tired of outsmarting me this soon?”
The car roared awake, slightly vibrating as she reached for her seatbelt. “Amidst the thousand words you threw at me this whole while, did you mention anything about mom’s birthday?”
The reply didn’t come instantly, and she almost frowned, checking her phone to see if he was still on the line. “Hobi?”
He sighed first, very heavily, exhausted, spent, tired, and all its affiliates. “You really thought that all this while I didn’t utter shit about that? It’s her 60th birthday. I would be a terrible son to forget that!”
“Oh, no, cut yourself some slack, Hobi,” she giggled, phone in hand, ready to end the conversation so she could drive to work. “She knows her son and knows how much of a chatterbox he is—”
“Okay, have a nice day, honey. Just don’t share your stuck-up sickness to anyone else.”
“Stuck-up what?” But she received no reply as the line went dead.
Giggling to herself, she finally slipped the phone into the tiny pocket of her purse, fully aware that in a matter of hours, the same brother who ended the call so abruptly would be hopping into the station with a bright smile and arms spread for a hug.
“Still don’t know what he said about mom’s birthday, though.”
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
Life For Rent - Dido
The door shut close behind her, and a squeaky sound followed as the car locked at her command.
With a parking spot reserved as a worker at the department, Ophelia proceeded into the building with shoulders light yet heavy.
Despite the hours, Bellport was already bustling with its signature sounds, just as a teapot whistles when the tea is ready or as a mocha burps out bubbles of coffee when the coffee is ready.
With the natural light reflecting into the building, the lifeless appearance of the interior was tamed, not overwhelmed, but rid of one of the many shrouds of human manipulation in a place so artificial.
The front door clanged closed behind her, a sound so loud that it initially startled her, but experience had made it a habit for her to just look past it, keep quiet and stay meek.
It wasn’t normal for her to make a beeline for her desk. The usual itinerary saw the coffee machine and a few colleagues as stops before the final destination, but upon seeing a familiar face at the end of the hallway, shaking two paper cups of coffee in his hands, her routine route mutated.
“Good morning.” Taehyung winked at her, and she smiled, accepting the drink.
“Good morning to you, too.” Moving past him to her desk, Ophelia placed the coffee aside to sit. “Someone seems rather excited today. Are you sure you need to drink coffee?”
She looked up at him, and her smile couldn’t help but widen.
Taehyung’s grin was the type that didn’t fit in a place like the BPD. It wasn’t just about brightness or a smile that stretched across his face, morphing anything and everything it crossed paths with.
Such a beaming look belonged to someone who was yet to see the real colours, or better, shades of the world, that side that a common citizen would most likely be in denial about.
His eyes still carried hope as if they were yet to see the worst, that one thing that would take away the sparkles that reflected in the light.
Ophelia couldn’t imitate that, not even if they’d given her a step-by-step guide, because her hope in humanity had crumbled years ago. The little one that made her give people the benefit of the doubt was one of the very few crumbs left behind—small and very vulnerable.
“Sorry, but I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this is my first official day as a detective.” He beamed like a kid at their graduation, posing as if her face had suddenly turned into a camera. “This coffee here can only do me good.”
Ophelia rolled her eyes, maintaining her smile and turning around to the PC. She gave him no reply, and not because her brother’s words resounded in her head — don’t influence others with your stuck-up illness — no.
At the moment, when they’d received the promotion on Friday, the bliss and ecstasy that had overwhelmed her heart were difficult to put into words.
Her parents, her siblings, they could only scream and clap for her, showering her in compliments and words of reassurance — we knew you’d always make it, this job was meant for you.
And all these were just consequences; in fact, they were just the surface, the tip of the iceberg, and maybe it was to be blamed on how their party night had ended unglamorously, how they were a millisecond away from running that girl over.
Maybe it was because they hadn’t been given the time to fully realise what their lives would turn into.
Or maybe what really stopped her from being over the moon was the acknowledgement that she had celebrated in the first place, that she’d taken the promotion at face value—higher rank, higher pay, fatter ego.
Meeting Tara was a harsh, brutal and abrupt reality check, one that she needed to get back on track, one that instantly reminded her why she’d become a police officer in the first place, one that was telling her that the routine was strict, breaks were barely allowed.
If one moment, she was just chasing after the single thief, screaming at them to stop, turn around and place their dirty hands behind their heads, now she’d be running after their bosses, those whose hands were only apparently clean when they got handcuffed.
“That’s it?” Taehyung made the world slip back into Ophelia’s mind, pausing the speeding train of thoughts.
He sat down. “That’s all I get? A smile? I mean, good, beautiful,” he winked, “but not enough, y’know what I mean—”
She rolled her eyes yet again, looking at him as if she were exhaustingly enamoured — like a mother to her mischievous child. “Taehyung, what do you want?”
“Lia, you were screaming over the top when we got this promotion. What’s with the moody look?”
A lot was with the moody look.
When she returned home from that night, the song she was mentally dancing to had stopped. When she’d walked past her mirror and caught a glimpse of her attire, thinking about how excited she’d been prior to the night as she got dressed made her feel bitter about herself.
That night had been yet another reminder that while she was having the time of her life, or preparing to, someone out there was fighting for their lives.
And it wouldn’t be the first time her joy was juxtaposed with someone’s pain, someone close.
She mentally tortured herself to sleep, constantly wondering what Tara could be up to, if she were sleeping, or if the horror had left her awake throughout the night.
Even worse, Ophelia’s mind suspected that events like this occurred rather often, and it pained her heart to think that Tara might have gotten used to such a reality.
She was just twenty-one years old. Ophelia didn’t know how long she’d been in that field of work, but the chances were two: she either had a strong heart and zeal, or she had enough years of experience.
Ophelia didn’t want to think about the possibility of her starting when she was still a minor.
She frowned, looking away from his eyes. “Moody? I’m not.”
She’d just spent her Sunday wondering what the girl could be up to, if she were having another flush of sensory-based memories, or if she’d returned to that club or her boss — bosses, actually, because she kept referring to them as ‘they’.
“It’s useless anyway. I’m certain they’ve noticed my absence by now and have already taken care of the old jerk. You’re never going to find him because he slipped up.”
“Slipped up?”
“They don’t really like attention. He slipped up, I ran away, so they’re certainly going to clean everything up.”
The plural pronoun just made everything sound, feel and taste worse.
Taehyung tilted his head and took a better look at her. At first, she tried ignoring him, focusing on logging into her PC, but his eyes eventually broke her resolve.
“What?” she laughed, chuckling when he pouted.
“You’re moody—”
“I’m not—”
“You are—”
“I’m—”
“Cooper.” A voice called from behind Taehyung before his surname followed — a given. “Halston.”
Like programmed robots, their heads moved in Montefalco’s direction. With an outfit already very familiar to the duo, the man approached them.
“Good morning—”
Their greetings were quickly interrupted not just by the man’s next words, but by the person who stepped out from behind him.
The girl was slender, wearing a pair of casual jeans and an open white lab coat. Her blonde curls matched the colour of her blazer, and sitting on her nose bridge was a pair of rectangular black glasses.
Ophelia silently admired the blue and yellow polish she’d covered her short nails with, not without noticing the sets of mismatched rings on almost every finger.
She waved at them rather awkwardly, bending her foot to lean her weight on the outer side of her shoe. The same hand she’d waved at them moved to push back a few stubborn strands behind her ear, exposing the black round earring hanging from its lobe.
“Meet Rosé Golding. She’s assigned as the forensic expert who’ll work with you guys on your case.”
They got up and shook hands with her, presenting themselves.
“Oh, no need to,” the girl dismissed. “Who in the BPD doesn’t know who you are, right?”
Ophelia and Taehyung chuckled at the same time, and the latter even bowed to show humility. Ophelia just rolled her eyes, smiling.
“We’re glad to have you on the team—”
“Oh, you sure do,” Montefalco cut her off. “She has just as much experience as you guys—”
“Yeah,” Rosé changed her resting foot. “But I’m not as famous—”
“Oh, you’ll certainly change that with these two, trust me.”
Rosé smiled, changing her resting foot yet again. Taehyung’s grin had never left his face, and Ophelia was torn between focusing on the rather awkward atmosphere between them and the girl or Montefalco’s restless eyes, bouncing from one person to the other.
“Well…” He clapped his hands and heaved a sigh, shoulders closing in for a split moment. “I’ll leave the briefing to you guys, and as always, I’m here. Any questions, doubts, uncertainties? Ask me.”
With that, he spun on his heels and left them, his shoes resounding through the station with every large step he took.
Rosé’s eyes tailed him, as if silently begging him to come back, but they eventually landed on her new teammates when she turned around.
“Hi—”
“We don’t bite,” Taehyung joked a bit before glancing at Ophelia and scoffing. “At least, I know that I don’t—”
She hit his shoulder, and he feigned being in pain. “You see?”
“He’s having the time of his life as you can see,” she smiled at Rosé, “and he’s yet to have his morning coffee, which is a big red flag.”
“You should, too,” he resumed, “so we get rid of the rainy cloud above your head.”
“Tae, I see you’re striving to leave a good first impression—”
“Oh, this is not my first impression of him, of both of you,” Rosé chirped in. “I always admired y’all from afar, heard about all your work, your professionalism, the perfection in— Okay, I’m sounding like a fan. I’m sorry. Let’s get serious, as you said.”
“No! First time having a fan, and they’re apologising.” Blinking multiple times to make his eyes sparkle, he begged her to continue. “Please, I love the attention—”
“I remember Joseph telling us to brief her on the case, yeah? So—”
“Oh,” he snapped his fingers and reached for a chair.
“Okay,” Rosé dragged on, walking behind Ophelia to sit on the chair next to her. “I’ll just sit here.”
Neither detective replied. Taehyung watched as Ophelia reached for the case file while Rosé mentally reminded herself to stop behaving as if it were her first day in a new school.
“Okay, guys. Let me brief you on what we have on our hands. This case kind of stumbled upon us—”
“Stumbled?” Taehyung shook his head, revisiting the scene in his mind. “To be frank, we almost ran over it.”
Rosé frowned in surprise, looking between them. They just looked back at her, lips thin and heads bobbing.
“Oh, seriously?” she asked.
“Yep,” he confirmed, arm placed on Ophelia's backrest. “We were driving back home two nights ago when a girl ran in front of our car.”
“She jumped into the backseat and screamed at us to drive, and rightfully so, we drove her to the station.” Reaching for the case file, Ophelia resumed. “From what we were able to gather—”
“And from what she was able to tell us, actually,” Taehyung chirped in, and Ophelia nodded as if their brains were connected and they both were replaying the same scenes at the same time.
“Exactly… Her name’s Tara,” she opened the file, “and she’s a 21-year-old sex worker.”
Rosé hummed, nodding. “I believe something went really wrong with one of her clients, no? Sexual assault?”
“Something like that,” Taehyung replied, “but she said she managed to defend herself and run away before anything could go any more south.”
“What struck us as odd, though,” Ophelia leaned against the chair, crossing her arms, “was how she described her supposed ‘boss’, bosses actually.”
“Yeah. She talked about his assaulter slipping up, and her bosses not liking attention.”
From the look in both detectives' eyes and the tone of their voices, the case at hand led to multiple possible causes, with one sticking out the most.
“So…” Rosé continued, as if trying to see past their skulls and into their brains, “by the time you returned to the nightclub, everything had been taken care of.”
Both detectives nodded. Taehyung turned the page, moving the focus to another paper in the file. “We met this guy, Valerio Casale. He’s the manager of the club—”
“—and pretty awful at keeping his business clean, I’ve got to add,” Ophelia snickered.
“What were you able to retrieve?” Rosé continued, moving from paper to paper, streamlining every sentence to let as much information as possible sink in.
“Basically nothing?” Ophelia’s tone was maybe sarcastic, maybe bitter, but certainly annoyed. “He managed to run past every single question we asked him.”
Rosé looked up from the file. “Well-trained then?”
“Yeah, like he’d rehearsed those answers, but not his emotions,” Taehyung scoffed. “We couldn’t even retrieve any CCTV footage because they work through third-party vendors, so we have to wait for him to get back to us.”
“Hmm, very convenient, I’ve got to say.” Rosé closed the file, crossing her legs. “I read that he didn’t let you check the private rooms.”
“Exactly.” Ophelia mentally replayed the conversation in her head, remembering his tone as he tried to make her seem aggressive. “His excuse was annoyingly perfect: the rooms are to be booked before the night, and until the night is over, they won’t be vacant.”
“And he smoothly played around our request to see the guest log, also refusing to let us see the maintenance records.”
“Well, as you said, if he’s rehearsed the answers so he was either ready for these kind of scenarios, or it’s simply not the first time and experience trained him.” Rosé nodded, getting up from her seat. “I’ll run a background check on him and the nightclub.”
“Perfect. I was thinking about reaching out to Tara again, see if she can give us a composite sketch of her supposed customer.”
As she spoke, Ophelia turned to Taehyung, searching for agreement from his side. “Last night, she was still so in shock, and I thought we’d be crossing a line if we pushed too much?”
“It was difficult to have her cooperate?” Rosé asked.
Taehyung looked up and nodded. “All the credits go to Lia here, because the girl really wanted to leave without disclosing any information about the assault.”
“Essentially,” Ophelia sighed, “she’s the type that needs time to open up. I hope asking her for a composite sketch won’t have her completely retreating into her shell, would it?”
“She’s a fighter. I don’t think she’d give up that quickly.”
𓍝
(chapter 2) ⬅ | ★ | next chapter ᯓ☆
main masterlist // index // pinterest board // wattpad // notion page // community // taglist // ko-fi // instagram // ao3 // inkitt // my main: @silverozy
Like Wordsworth's daffodils: join the community and become a dainty little ro(zy) -> JOIN NOW!
But if you're shy, you can join my taglist so we always stay connected. I'm an introvert too, don't worry.
── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 7.52k
── .✦ date: 05/02/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
A/N: I decided to drag the heat and fire metaphor into this chapter still, mostly because I'm still yet to decide whether to talk about fire as an element and then change element after some time or just go with the flow, but right now, I think I'm just better off going with the flow than sectioning my metaphors within specific limits. It'd lead me into writer's block so bad and so quick.
Y'all, I love Ophelia. I know it's just the second chapter, and if y'all could just read through my mind for a moment, you'd immediately understand why.
Our lovely Ophelia is honestly perfect, at least for now - she is human, and we love characters with nuances. But the men in this book and, in the time setting, would define her as 'too serious', or in today's words, 'too woke', when she's just correct, like... cut my girl some slack and start using your frontal lobes, but I digress.
I had to search various essays and works on how victims like Tara would most likely talk about their trauma once in a more comfortable situation.
Sadly, not every person like Tara finds themselves a duo like Ophelia and Taehyung, and officers like Montefalco, the lieutenant, and that desk officer are everywhere like roaches.
Please, give me your honest opinions on Tara's dialogue. I've already defined her character in my head, so her voice is going to stay pretty much the same, but there's space for improvement.
Also, if there are inconsistencies in the investigation throughout the book, forgive me. It's not my field, and I'm trying my best to make everything as realistic as possible, but I only know and can only learn so much about this field.
Valerio is Italian, and trust me, I'm not trying to write about the classic romanticised Italian mob boss trope. I hate that. I was just thinking of a name for him, and Valerio came up, and I said why not? Also, he's literally just a club manager like...
As already said in the introduction, this book has many characters, and I'm still contemplating their introduction, and I think I'll follow the classic novel-like way: just shove them in, give some kind of description and hope the readers don't get them mixed up or forget them if I don't talk about them for a couple of chapters.
It's getting too long here. I can write just as long as I can yap, meaning too much for my own good. Enjoy and don't forget to reblog!!!
𓍝
Policy of truth - Depeche Mode.
Ophelia had lived in Bellport long enough to know its streets like the palm of her hand, the roads cutting through the metropolis the same way ridges drew mysterious lines against her skin.
Given the career path she’d chosen, Bellport was her next destination after growing up in a rural town such as Hadleigh.
The city was a completely different place. Houses didn’t look like homes, cosy and welcoming. They looked detached, just another apartment in a tall building meant to host as many tenants as possible.
Nature, such as flowers, bushes, trees and plants, was measured, monitored and manipulated by men after they’d occupied its space, its home, to create lifeless buildings.
Hadleigh citizens were more connected than all the people living in an apartment complex in Bellport.
People walked on ahead with a map of destinations in their mind, and no one could distract them from this path.
One look at the passerby, and one could only imagine what happened in their lives.
Ophelia couldn’t possibly wonder what the cars driving by thought when seeing them. They’d probably take them for another example of clubbers returning home, which initially would’ve been correct.
But something had managed to change Ophelia and Taehyung’s plans enough for them to be distracted from their paths.
The Bellport Police Department was like any other public building in the city.
Brick walls, neutral colours, a simple marble flooring and oddly bright lights, just like in corner stores — white yet blue, dazzling yet gloomy.
Given the hour of the day, or better, the night, it was also quieter, almost peaceful, but the Bellport Police Department was never a place meant to be peaceful.
Citizens came to express the reason behind their distress, fear, discomfort, injustice, not their peace. That was to be preserved.
Most of the officers were at home, and the few that were clocked in were aimlessly driving around to patrol the streets. This left just a few at the reception and another few working at the desks.
For these reasons, Ophelia easily spotted the girl whenever she turned around. There was no crowd, no horde of people passing by and giving her the chance to disappear.
She couldn’t see her face, though. In the car, her knees were the resting place for her chin; now they were the perfect hiding spot for her face with the contribution of her long, messy brown hair.
As they walked into the police station, Taehyung had kindly lent her his shirt to help her preserve some of her dignity, but also to make her feel comfortable, to send her a message without outwardly speaking.
But it didn’t work out because there she was with her arms around her legs and her face hidden from them, even after an officer had given her a bigger towel to cover herself with, returning the shirt to Taehyung.
Ophelia tried to understand, still reluctant to accept the worst-case scenario: the girl didn’t have shoes, and maybe that was the reason why her feet wouldn’t stay on the ground; maybe she’d run for a long time before she found them, and they’d certainly feel sore at that point. But the girl’s reclusiveness went beyond the physical.
She hadn’t said anything to them, yet her eyes bellowed a thousand words at the same time, her body language was writing a book of its own, and at the time, the only thing her mouth could utter, the strength she had left was allowing her only to scream at Taehyung to drive.
Maybe she’d exerted her voice enough, running for God knows how many miles, calling for help at the top of her lungs.
But, again, one look at her dishevelled state, and Ophelia was forced to accept the worst.
It was almost ironic, really, because she’d been in this line of work for years now, and yet, every time she’d still have a sliver of hope in humanity, the thought that it didn’t really happen, didn't it? They didn’t really do that because who would, right?
“Just got off the phone with the lieutenant. I have news for you guys.” A male voice rang from beside them.
Coming down the hallway was their mentor, the one they’d been assigned ever since their rookie times. Joseph Montefalco was a man with a good reputation in the station, respected and highly regarded even by the Chief of Police.
Taehyung and Ophelia partially owed their promotion to him because he hadn’t just put a word but an encyclopedia of good words for them. Their professionalism and skills smoothed the path even further.
“I hope you guys won’t be annoyed to know this on your day off, but the lieutenant has decided to assign you to her case.”
The couple’s brows rose up simultaneously with something more along the lines of shock rather than gleeful surprise.
“That quick?” Taehyung asked. Ophelia glanced at him first, then at Montefalco, silently questioning the same thing.
The man nodded, holding up the files in his hand. “He believes it’s an easy case to start with. Probably something that includes something minor, such as sexual assault or something—”
“Something minor such as sexual assault?” Taehyung asked again, grimacing.
Ophelia was right back at him. “What’s minor in that?”
“Don’t know,” Montefalco waved the white flag. “Lieutenant’s words, not mine.”
“Well, great. We’re on the case.” Taehyung crossed his arms and took a step forward to silently invite the man to guide them through the files.
He got the note and complied. “From what we’ve gathered, her name’s Tara. She’s twenty-one years old and a sex worker. It’s probably the case of a rather stubborn client—”
“Has she made an official statement?” Ophelia interjected, already disliking the distasteful implication of Montefalco’s words.
He nodded in Tara’s direction. “That’s what she’s doing right now.”
Ophelia took it as her cue to approach the girl. Taehyung wanted to follow suit, but Montefalco’s voice stopped them.
“I was assigned as your guide for this investigation, but I know you guys are good also without me. I just need you to know that I’m here if you need anything.”
Ophelia was already transfixed on Tara to register Montefalco’s last words. Seeing Taehyung move in the corner of her eye simply gave her the go-ahead to finally approach the girl.
The officer working at the desk immediately saw them, and the expression on his face portrayed a wide range of emotions that all had frustration in common.
“She still hasn’t spoken much since you’ve arrived,” he answered to their silent question.
Taehyung moved closer to see what exactly the officer had been able to write into the report, while Ophelia stopped next to the girl, hands gathered in front of her, and head tilted to the side.
“Hi, I’m Ophelia Cooper.”
She tried not to appear too pitiful, keeping herself on the threshold between professionalism and empathy.
Her extended hand unsurprisingly wasn’t met by Tara’s, and Ophelia hissed, taking a step closer and keeping her voice under wraps.
She felt Taehyung move next to her, acquire his usual wide-legged stance, arms crossed in front of his chest. But he didn’t say a word or intervene, silently giving her the lead.
She glanced to her side, following Tara’s line of sight and found the officer, whose facial expression was certainly applying pressure on her and worsening the situation.
The officer noticed Ophelia’s attention on him and quickly looked elsewhere, brows revealing the rather harsh words he was tempted to let out.
“Do you want to talk here, or… shall we go to a quieter room?”
Tara’s eyes had finally left the officer, but they were still too hesitant to meet Ophelia’s, so they lingered around, seemingly counting the pens in the dispenser and reading the titles of the few papers scattered on the desk.
The lack of response was burning the few remaining cards Ophelia had in her hands, so she glanced at Taehyung, quietly calling for help.
He broke out of the little trance of confusion and leaned closer. The officer on the other side of the PC was busy with something else completely, his patience as resistant as paper in water.
“Is there—”
“Honestly, this was a mistake.” Finally, Tara spoke, the volume of her voice lower than it was back in Taehyung’s car. But her reply was at the expense of Taehyung’s words and their efforts in getting her to open up.
She abruptly got up from the chair, still with no shoes on, and looked for the exit. Next to them still, the officer was first surprised, but then he clicked his tongue a few times and smirked, shaking his head as if her reaction was exactly what he was expecting and what he was too tired to face so early in the morning.
Ophelia caught the sound. It registered through her ears and in her brain, drawing chills down her neck from the annoyance.
Whenever she was called out on a crime scene, she always still held a bit of hope in humanity, something that made her believe that in the end, only sick people could commit such heinous crimes against their fellow citizens.
This behaviour of hers was a default setting in her system, something she hated but also couldn’t remove from herself.
But one thing that had unwillingly become normal to her — she disliked this one as well — was how uninterested most officers seemed. It rather had to be a large-scale investigation, else their focus would struggle to last for more than a minute.
The officer’s reaction, paired with Montefalco and the lieutenant’s words, was all a reflection of this cold front the system had acquired.
Before Tara could take a step forward, Ophelia blocked the way; one arm in front of the girl was enough to make her freeze on the spot.
She sighed, sensing just how much Tara wasn’t pleased by her action. “Please, come this way with—”
“I’m fine—”
“We’re trying to help you.” She cut her short, not because her patience was running thin. She just didn’t like lies, especially the ones that sounded and looked like this one.
“Please,” she begged. “Let us.”
Tara thinned her lips, body still subtly shaking as if time had darted from August to mid-January. Finally, she looked up, her eyes meeting Ophelia, who gave her a weak smile before nodding to the spot ahead of them.
She followed after showing something along the lines of a nod. As she walked in front of them, Ophelia and Taehyung exchanged glances, silently sighing in relief.
Tara sat down on the empty bench, Ophelia got comfortable next to her, and Taehyung joined shortly after grabbing a random notebook and a pen from one of the empty desks.
“So, I’m Ophelia,” she resumed, “and he’s Taehyung.” On cue, he smiled at the girl, both desperately trying to make the interrogation seem like a casual conversation.
But they already feared the worst; in fact, they were already predicting what she’d say, and such a topic could never be talked about casually, even amongst lifelong friends or family members.
“My name’s Tara.” Ophelia nodded, proud of the minuscule progress. “I’m…” she trailed off, slowly exhaling, “a sex worker.”
This time, Taehyung was nodding, quickly jotting a few notes down and showing her he was paying full attention.
“You…” Ophelia cleared her throat. “Are you able to recall how you ended up on the road?”
Unexpectedly, Tara chuckled, the tone slightly bitter but mostly amused. “It’s funny when you say it like that, actually.”
Ophelia and Taehyung glanced at each other yet again, hesitant smiles and nervous chuckles almost escaping them as they didn’t know what to do with her reply.
“But, I mean,” she continued, letting another sigh out and shrugging, “I did end up on the road; in fact, almost got run over, so…”
Ophelia herself was a huge fan of sarcasm. It was a weapon she always carried around, on and off duty, without breaking any laws. But at the moment, she felt lost, like she’d never wielded it before, and Tara was her first time.
The girl crossed her legs, shaking the dangling foot. “I don’t even have shoes on.”
The detectives just listened to her, trying to see how things would unfold, hopeful that they were on the right path and not speeding straight into a brick wall.
Tara scooted her knees away from Ophelia, looking down at her shoes and smiling. “Your shoes are really nice. Prada?”
The detective grinned, nodding. “Wanna wear them? Can’t imagine how disgusting it feels to be barefoot here.”
“Don’t need to.” Tara puffed, moving her knees back in their previous spot. “I have a pair like that. My last client, Al, had gifted me a pair just like these.”
“Your last client before…”
“Yeah, before tonight’s.”
As if she could feel the words forming on the tip of Ophelia’s tongue, she resumed her speech. “He’s a fat, old man. Reeks of cigarettes and whiskey.”
At this point, Tara’s eyes, fixed on the tiles, had found the interest they’d previously lost, and her dangling foot was shaking more rapidly.
“He doesn’t know how to shave his beard, I think. His face’s so rough— Imagine having a rough face. I’d kill myself— Oh, and his hands are rough, too, like… really rough. And it’s funny because my mama always used to tell me that rough hands are equal to rough work, but that old man is supposed to be rich, you know? And he’s so fat. There’s no way he even lifts a finger at home.”
She just went on, and Ophelia believed that having her gaze transfixed on the floor, away from their worried eyes, probably allowed her to carry out this task easier than they’d initially thought.
Now, Tara was simply venting out, and Ophelia just sat back listening while Taehyung tried to write down the details as fast as he could.
“He’s hairy as fuck. Has a whole forest on his chest. I wonder how his chain doesn’t pull on the hairs.”
Her dangling foot slowed, and to Ophelia, Tara was most likely mentally replaying the scenes in her mind, moments that scarred her senses.
“I thought I didn’t give a fuck, but I do. He’s disgusting. He ripped my dress apart, and I really liked that dress, and I told him that, but he said he’d buy me a new one. I don’t want a new one, though. It’s not that hard to get, but… I guess I won’t be getting the new one regardless now because…”
She shrugged, the words dying in her throat as silence fell upon them like a veil.
The detectives didn’t dare to utter a word, scared they’d be stepping on the brakes right at the best moment.
“Isn’t that enough of a crime?” Tara asked, turning to look at Ophelia. The latter was confused for a bit, but hid her emotions.
“Yeah, I mean, I don’t play around with my dresses either—”
“Exactly. What a jerk— And worst of it all was that he tore it even more and turned it into a leash— Look.” She pushed her head back to show her neck to Ophelia.
“He wanted to walk me around like a dog— and honestly, I don’t have a problem with that, but then… he started hitting me with his belt.”
Ophelia’s eyes were subtly widened, and she wondered why, because she was already expecting something like that, words like those.
“I told him I didn’t like it— My boss? My boss knows that I don’t like it. I never do stuff like that, what the fuck? I can’t get hurt like that. Who’s gonna pay the bills? Not me, not with my ass in bed.”
She laughed at her own words, shaking her head like she’d cracked the best joke of the century. But then her voice dimmed, joyful high wearing down.
Her eyes were still on the floor. Ophelia tried reading through her body language in the most discreet manner possible. She tried making sense of her movements.
Her dangling foot was back to its spasms. Her hands were flat on the bench, fingers coming out of the edges and gripped them as though she’d fall to the ground otherwise.
As she inspected her better, the marks that she’d previously seen in the car as they rode to the station weren’t supposed tattoos or shadows cast on her body as they drove along the streets.
They were bruises. Some were already purple, and others were still bright red and fresh, and Ophelia couldn’t help but wonder how long this had been going on for. The darker bruises certainly weren’t from this encounter.
“So I grabbed the bottle of whiskey and broke it on his head.”
Taehyung and Ophelia’s eyes met, now genuinely surprised. The meeting was brief, though, because he returned to taking notes, and Tara resumed her speech.
“I hated the smell anyway— And the taste. You’ve ever had whiskey? I was once offered a glass of it. I think it had milk in it. Fucking hated it. Rather give me milk or pure alcohol, right? Don’t mix them up. But yeah, I broke the bottle on his head. I don’t know if he’s okay, though. I honestly didn’t care, and I still don’t. I just ran out of the room, didn’t even grab my things— thank God…”
She trailed off, sighing and chuckling.
“Thank God, the club is always so packed on Saturday nights, else everyone would’ve seen me running out. I don’t think he died, though. But he was drunk when I first met him, so that was enough to confuse him. Sometimes I surprise myself.”
Ophelia swallowed the lump in her throat. She didn’t even know where it came from or what made it form because she wasn’t nervous or scared. But she was certainly taken aback.
“That… was honestly so brave of you, Tara,” she commented, needing to fill the empty space before silence would slide into it.
Her words made Taehyung snap his head up, eyes showing something similar to confusion, bewilderment, and a slight warning.
Yes, Ophelia was a police officer, a detective now, and she shouldn’t be condoning any form of violence, but a part of her couldn’t help but be proud of Tara. That part of her knew that if she were in the girl’s shoes, she certainly would’ve done worse — probably made sure the old, greasy man was at least knocked out cold.
“Are you able to give any more descriptive details on this old man, just so we can recognise—”
“It’s useless anyway. I’m certain they’ve noticed my absence by now and have already taken care of the old jerk. You’re never going to find him because he slipped up.”
The final detail had both detectives frowning.
“Slipped up?” Taehyung interjected, finally having a verbal presence in the matter.
Tara nodded, lips pursing and eyes still on the floor as if she were thinking but also recalling events.
“They don’t really like attention. He slipped up, I ran away, so they’re certainly going to clean everything up.”
“By ‘they’ you mean your boss and his associates?” Ophelia asked, body frame completely turned toward the girl, switching from an empathy-heavy approach to a more professional one.
Tara nodded. She nodded a couple of times too many as if she were too tired to keep everything measured and to check her behaviour.
“So…” Taehyung’s voice rang through. “The club, Lux Obscura, is where everything went down. I guess it was in a private room.”
She lazily nodded again, hands now on her knees and arms extended. The only sound she emitted as a reply was an indolent giggle, bitter in its undertones.
“I’m so sorry for wasting you guys’ time—”
Taehyung frowned, the pen now just an accessory. “Oh, no. Absolutely. What makes you think that?”
Tara weakly shrugged, lips still pursed as her answer came in late. “It’s kind of my job, you know? I’ll return home now, sleep, and get back in the loop, hoping this won’t repeat—”
“Tara,” Ophelia leaned closer. Their knees were touching, and her hand was on the girl’s. “It’s horrible that the system makes you think like that. We’re here for a reason, and right now, our job is to make sure you’re safe, and harm doesn’t come your way, okay?”
Tara’s eyes finally left the floor, head lazy and slow as it rose for their gazes to meet. She inspected every inch of Ophelia’s face, desperately looking for truth in her expressions, hopeful that her words weren’t just a scripted line she’d grown to metabolise, given her years of experience.
“We’ll get to the bottom of it no matter how hard they scrub the floors and wash the sheets, you get me?”
She saw Tara gulp down on her saliva, eyes finally rid of the uncomfortable amusement they sported seconds prior.
She turned to look at Taehyung with something along the lines of disbelief, and surprise etched all over her face, metaphorically replacing the smudged makeup.
The man showed her a small smile accompanied by a proud nod before she turned back to Ophelia.
“I’m really thankful,” she finally said, now objectively more serious.
The detectives grinned at the same time. Ophelia opened her arms for a hug, and Taehyung clicked his pen.
Tara hesitantly smiled, simply leaning to the side for the embrace, and Ophelia welcomed her in, watchful of her levels of comfort.
“I guess I’ll go home now,” Tara resumed, an indirect way of requesting to be released not just from the hug, not just from the makeshift questioning, but from the entire station itself.
The lifeless lights in the building appeared to be depending on her life to shine. Having such a source seemed to explain its gloomy appearance.
Ophelia and Taehyung got the message, and they all got up at the same time. Taehyung swiftly headed to the officer at the desk, submitting the notes he’d taken and quickly rejoined them.
“I hope you don’t mind if we drive you home, right?” he smiled, leaving his invitation open for her.
Tara chuckled and shook her head. She gestured to her body and said, “It’s not like I have many options, right? Was about to get raped in there. I can’t even imagine what will happen if I’m walking on the streets just in my underwear.”
She was laughing about it, but the detectives couldn’t help feeling slightly uncomfortable. Not at the words themselves, but mostly at the nonchalant attitude that followed them.
They both knew that it wasn’t far-fetched, but it didn’t stop them from hating the fact that people, women, could get so used to it that the words could just easily fall off their lips like it was a joke.
⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆
Dark beach - Pastel Ghost
Gradually, as the tyres of the car moved on the tarmac, the neighbourhoods in front of Ophelia’s eyes changed, reflecting the kind of stigma that would follow each.
A part of her was reluctant to let Tara head back home, worried that something or someone could find her and retaliate. But she only had so much power right now.
Tara’s apartment complex was almost on the other side of Bellport, far away from the Rockford District where Ophelia lived, far from the police station and even farther from Lux Obscura.
The walls of the buildings didn’t have a single colour anymore. Those which were initially sand yellow had acquired a tone closer to urine.
On the lower floors, the walls were decorated with graffiti upon graffiti, nonsensical sprayed writings and drawings. Like a wave of heat, from the bottom rose a cloud of fog, traces of years of dog urine trailing down the walls.
One of the street lights was flickering, giving the neighbourhood an even more eerie appearance.
The metal railings on the balconies were rusting, with visibly weak supporting beams. Some of the front doors at ground level were left ajar, signalling a problem with the locks and a precarious security situation for the people living in the complex.
Tara had gone right through a door like that, waving at them just before disappearing behind the tall wood.
Now, as they drove to Lux Obscura with their new badges as detectives, the walls lining the streets were more uniform in colour, decorated with different patterns.
Here, the railings weren’t rusting, nor were the beams weak; in fact, they followed a sinuous and floral pattern, recalling Art Nouveau styles.
This was the beauty of the Prynne and Umbridge Districts, the side of Bellport that stood as an elegant throwback to the past.
Once past them, Ophelia and Taehyung were driving across the heart of the city, the proof that the metropolis was indeed a metropolis.
A few meters in, and they parked in front of a grand building, unexpectedly too grand for its nature.
Hadn’t there been streetlights scattered along the sidewalk, the big label flashed across the front would’ve been enough to light up the entire neighbourhood.
The frontage was mainly in glass, tall dark windows running from top to bottom, reflecting the neon blue light of the label. It felt like the club sought to be transparent but still needed to control the intensity, still hide something.
In the centre at ground level was another bright sign, just white this time, seemingly recalling the lifeless colours at the station. This one said ‘entrance’ right above a wide opening, where two big men in tuxedoes were standing with their hands behind their backs.
The car door slammed closed before Taehyung locked the car, and they crossed the street.
As expected of a nightclub, there was a long carpet running down a couple of meters from the entrance, and right next to it was a red velvet rope, separating casual passersby from the clubbers.
This didn’t faze the detectives, who went straight to the bodyguards and showed their badges.
Without much more than a nod, the men moved aside, letting them in after unhooking the velvet rope.
Tara’s words immediately replayed in her mind, and Ophelia grew suspicious even of such a small gesture. Were they simply respecting the law, or had they been expecting them, after cleaning up, to host the new visitors?
The inside lived up to the grandeur the exterior exuded.
Once past the rope, they weren’t immediately inside the club, but something closer to a courtyard, a very elegant and fancy one at that.
There was a bridge separating the outer entrance from the one to the actual club. This passageway went across a slim bed of water lined with blue neon strip lights.
This canal didn’t stretch for too long, though, leaving space for the courtyard to continue and for clubbers to come out for a smoke or simply for some fresh air without actually exiting the club.
With their IDs in their pockets and given the location they’d left before meeting Tara, Taehyung and Ophelia seemed like casual clubbers as another big-bodied security guard opened the wide door for them.
As he did so, the loud music spilt out like overflowing and overbearing water, the volume very quick to stress the ears, but this would reveal itself to be maybe one of the minor issues with the environment.
Right from the entrance, the place was packed, overcrowded, and Ophelia imagined just how things would unfold had a fire randomly broken out in the building.
But what she also thought about was just how Tara managed to run quickly enough through the thick maze of people in the room. The number certainly allowed her to go unnoticed once in the overwhelming hot embrace of the clubbers.
But as Ophelia thought about it, she couldn’t help but wonder how exactly Tara ran past the bodyguards outside as well. Unless she used another exit.
Instinctively, as if smothered under the weight of the music, the pounding beat, the slashing neon lights dancing through the room, her hand reached for Taehyung’s as he was leading the way.
As soon as he felt her touch, he clasped her hand, pulling her closer to just feel her body against his, to know that she was there and not lost in the utter chaos they’d dived into.
There was something almost dystopian in the clubbers’ faces. No, it was pure bliss, enjoyment, booze, a joyful high making them feel on Cloud Nine, but Ophelia had been told of the obscure things that had taken place here in the meantime, while everyone is dancing, drinking, making out, hooting and hollering.
As she thought about it, she wondered just how many times something like this occurred whenever she went out. She asked herself just how often she was blissfully unaware of someone else’s distress while they were just a couple of metres away from her under the same roof.
Because of this, she tried looking around and checking if everyone in her immediate vicinity was fine, just for the sake of checking.
But she wasn’t the tallest in the room, and even if she were, with the chaos around and the dim lights, she’d barely make anything out.
Somehow, Taehyung had found his way through the crowd and to the counter, its glowing surface serving as great help.
Now out of the suffocating embrace of the other clubbers, Ophelia moved next to her colleague between two stools and beside a random man, who’d taken his drink and was ready to leave.
She glanced at his glass, finding it open enough for it to be spiked, especially once back in the human zoo.
She immediately took a dislike to the taste and the thought that followed that piece of information.
If Tara was able to be minutes away from being raped, and hearing her say they’d clean up everything before they’d make it to the club, Ophelia could only imagine what could happen on the dance floor.
“Hello,” Taehyung bellowed, trying to get his voice across the counter as the loud music and the clanging glasses were an obstacle. “We’re from the Bellport Police Department, and we’ve received a complaint—”
The barista turned his back to him, and Taehyung halted in his words, brows furrowing. He glanced at Ophelia, who was sporting the same expression, but before she could say anything, the barista disappeared.
“Yeah, what the fuck?” Taehyung commented, leaning closer to speak to her. But, again, before she could turn to reply, someone came out from the same door the barista had just left.
“Hello. I heard you’re from the BPD. I’m the manager, Valerio Casale.” His thick Italian accent rolled with the words as he extended his hand for a shake. Ophelia couldn’t really say why, but she didn’t like his nonchalance.
“We received a complaint of sexual assault, not even—”
“Please,” Valerio gestured, interrupting Taehyung. “Follow me. Let’s talk somewhere far from this banging noise, shall we?”
The detectives exchanged glances but followed him nonetheless, Taehyung walking in front of Ophelia while she still tried to check her surroundings as best as she could.
Truly, when the door closed behind her as they walked into a slim hallway, the loud music was locked out with it, the pressure on their eardrums leaving space for a foggy whistle.
“So, back to seriousness. I’m Valerio.” Taehyung shook hands with him, presenting himself, but Ophelia refused to play along, giving him a fake grin.
They both brought out their pocket notebooks, already set on what each would be writing.
“We’re following up on a report from a young woman who was on your premises earlier tonight.” She went straight to the point, eyes fixed on the man before her to study his expressions and ears catching the scribbling on Taehyung’s notebook.
Valerio first reaction registered in his brows rising and his eyes widening. He acquired a mildly wide-legged stance and crossed his arms.
“The sexual assault?”
Ophelia didn’t answer, just wrote in her notebook. Taehyung did it in her stead. She just looked up and furrowed a brow, as if challenging Valerio to make her repeat herself.
They’d first spoken to the silent barista. Taehyung had openly stated the reason for their visit the moment Valerio stepped outside, and now he was asking for confirmation yet again. All this, paired with his nonchalance and oddly distasteful cooperation, made the hairs on Ophelia’s neck stand up uncomfortably.
“Yes, a young woman reported being a victim of sexual assault that happened within this building.”
Valerio blinked a couple of times, poking his chin out as if in shock at that piece of information. He stammered a few times, licking his lips and moving in his position.
“Well, I… I didn’t know about that. Is it serious? I wouldn’t be surprised if a drunk customer—”
“It’d be serious nonetheless,” Ophelia corrected him, pen hovering just millimetres away from the paper.
Valerio’s eyes met hers, catching the hazy smirk and the challenge across her face. He’d be the fourth man of the night to downplay sexual assault to a minor crime.
“The report mentions an incident in one of the private rooms involving a broken bottle.” Taehyung continued, his wide-legged stance immediately making an entrance.
“We’d like to see your guest log and the maintenance records for those rooms from the last three hours." Ophelia cut to the chase.
In the meantime, Valerio was still replaying the same expressions, the same blinking, the same stammering, the same surprise that Ophelia could only be suspicious of.
Given his first response, any form of sexual assault wasn’t uncommon at Lux Obscura, also given the kind of venue it was.
But seeing how he was reacting, Ophelia replayed Tara’s words in her mind and remembered how quickly they were let in by the guards.
“Well, I fear you guys are mistaken.” He finally formulated a full sentence, turning around and gesturing for them to follow.
The detectives, as per habit, glanced at each other. Ophelia rolled her eyes, and Taehyung gave her a knowing look, feeling just as suspicious.
“All the private rooms are occupied at the moment.”
He led them down the narrow hallway and into his office. Before the door closed behind her, Ophelia turned around to check the space, finding a single camera in a corner above the door that separated the hallway from the noisy club.
Deeper into the office, Valerio had reached for a list on his desk, guiding Taehyung through each line.
“You see? Any private room must be rented before the night, and as of tonight, all of them are occupied, unsurprisingly so also, because the club is always packed on Saturday nights.”
This little piece of information was the only thing that matched what Tara had reported so far. The only thing.
Despite how sensible his excuse was, Ophelia felt like his words were also a simple confirmation of Tara’s claims. He denied one thing from one side and confirmed another from another side.
“What about the maintenance records?” she asked, approaching them.
“Well… as I just explained to your colleague, the rooms are rented before the night, meaning that cleaning happens after the night.”
Ophelia wasn’t stupid. She took notice of the words, the meaning behind them, but she also noticed how he sneakily refused to show them the maintenance records, roaming around the bush instead.
“So as of right now, that list is empty, right?”
She held eye contact, and he did too, but briefly, ending it with a chuckle and something Ophelia could only describe as a nervous tick as he rubbed his chin.
“What about CCTV footage?” Taehyung’s baritone restored her mind to the present. “Can we see that?”
Ophelia crossed her arms, taking a step forward next to her colleague and watching as Valerio moved to the PC sitting on his desk. A few clicks, and a screen filled with different frames popped up.
“We have CCTV cameras, and they all work—”
“Can we get the footage?” Taehyung pestered on, now growing impatient; in fact, Ophelia could see him clenching his jaw a few times.
Valerio got up, hissing, the sound pushing her closer to rolling her eyes and throwing her head back.
“I’m afraid that’s not in my power— You see? We use a third-party vendor, so to retrieve any footage, we’d have to contact—”
“We’ll do just that then,” Taehyung cut him off, eyes still on his notebook but voice stern.
Valerio chuckled, rubbing his chin again while hoisting his weight on the flat hand on his desk. “Guys, I’ve been everything but uncooperative here. Why are you attacking me?”
“Who’s attacking you?” Ophelia flicked a brow. Her eyes felt heavy on the man, and she inspected him a bit better.
Despite sounding like a man in his early twenties, he had the looks of someone definitely in his forties, and even his lack of facial hair couldn’t hide that.
He had a smooth crown of ashy brown hair on his head, each short strand pushed to the back and held down by sweat.
With the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up to his elbows, Ophelia could see the mosaic of tattoos scattered on both forearms, stopping at his wrists to leave only silver rings as a decoration on his hands. No watches, no bracelets, no necklaces.
He still hadn’t responded to her question, struggling even to keep eye contact, so she chuckled — her turn now.
“You feeling attacked?” she taunted, and he reached up to scratch the back of his neck.
“Oh, oh—” he stammered. “No, no. Absolutely. It just doesn’t happen often for the BPD to pull up to me in these situations. It’s usually among the victim and the perpetrator, you know?”
He continued explaining, now answering questions neither of them had asked. Taehyung just stopped writing for a moment, looking at Valerio.
Ophelia glanced first at him, then at the manager, before shaking her head and jotting something down in her notebook.
Before Valerio could resume his nervous rant, Taehyung approached him. “We’d like to have the contact info of your third-party vendor if you don’t mind.”
Valerio wasted no time complying, and Ophelia, in the meantime, took a better look at the frames on the computer, slipping her notebook into her back pocket.
“These are the only frames?” she asked, calling for Valerio’s attention as he looked up.
“Oh, no, no,” he puffed, reaching for the mouse. “The building is huge, and just twelve CCTV cameras will never be enough. We’d get in trouble for that.”
Learning how to scroll across the frames, Ophelia tried to understand what space exactly was being recorded.
“The building has multiple exits.” Words sounded like a statement, but they were mostly a question.
Valerio explained that it was for security reasons. Ophelia chuckled within herself, still doubtful that a couple more doors would help much in case of a real emergency, given the crowd on the dance floors.
Regardless, it proved her suspicion to be true. Tara hadn’t exited from the main entrance.
“Is this the hallway to the private rooms?” she continued. Valerio glanced up, looked at PC, and simply hummed in agreement. A single hum, really, and Ophelia mentally took note of it.
As she stared into the frame, she noticed it was completely empty, and while on a random Tuesday, this wouldn’t bother her much, after what Tara had told her and how Valerio had been responding, the utter silence made everything feel even more eerie.
Clicking his pen, Taehyung got up. “Perfect. In the meantime, we’ll be drafting a subpoena to shorten the wait, okay?”
Ophelia slowly blinked as she came up from the PC. Experience had taught her that Taehyung’s casual tone was just a subtle manifestation of his sarcasm, because they didn’t need Valerio’s permission to issue a subpoena anyway.
“We're done in the office for now, Valerio. We're going to take a look at the floor. Don't worry, we'll try not to ruin the 'vibe', okay?”
She mimicked Taehyung’s tone. With that, all notebooks were put away, and they exited the office, reluctantly leaving Valerio alone to think about doing God-knows-what.
“What the fuck?” Ophelia whispered to Taehyung, reaching for the door. He didn’t verbally reply, scoffing and shaking his head instead.
To the discomfort of their ears and bodies, they were quickly submerged in the hot and loud chaos of the club, the sound of the door shutting behind them going completely unnoticed.
She didn’t have any intentions to get too far, but Taehyung’s hand reached for her arm regardless as he pulled her close.
“I’ll check the exits, yeah?” His voice didn’t register as loudly as it was, given the music, but Ophelia still heard him.
“I’ll canvass the dance floors then. We’ll meet at the entrance at…”
He checked his watch and answered for her. “Half past three sounds good?”
She nodded, adding that she’d text him anyway, and with that, they went their separate ways, diving into the heated crowd, into a blaze that was less welcomed than the one that burned between them earlier that night.
Animal - AGER
It didn’t take black magic to realise that Lux Obscura was a famous club in Bellport. Ophelia actually thought ‘notorious’ was a better adjective to describe it with.
The number of people moving carefreely on the ground had her wondering just what matter was their bodies made of to withstand the heat, the constant touching and the smell of sweat and alcohol.
The club she’d celebrated her promotion at was more like the bar around the corner compared to Lux Obscura.
If she were to lose the head on her shoulders and choose to party in this place, she’d certainly bring a horde of friends with her, clinging to everyone every step she took just not to get lost.
What helped her orientation, though, were the lights and the dancers, women around her age, certainly younger actually, dancing on poles or cages. The latter made Ophelia unconsciously frown.
It was almost incorrect to say that they were dressed in bikinis because they barely wore anything to fit under such a category.
The amount of clothing on their bodies was enough to cover nipples and their southern areas, leaving just a string to go between their butt cheeks.
Any other piece of clothing was just an accessory — ripped pantyhose, fishnets, garters or suspender belts.
Hadn’t it been for the weather and heat within the building, the girls would be freezing. But at the moment, even the sweat was advantageous. To whom, Ophelia really wasn’t sure, unless she had to take into account the customers who loved watching them dance.
With glitter scattered across their skin, the sweat only made them shine brighter when the neon lights flickered in their direction. Even their glow was measured and controlled.
She tried pushing these thoughts to the back of her mind, focusing harder on the situation at hand.
Instinctively, her mind took her back to the BPD, replaying Tara’s words for her, the odd concentration on sensory details — the whiskey, the hairs, the cigarettes.
But it was quick for Ophelia to realise that such notes were only significant in an isolated room, not one where alcohol and sweat overwhelmed everything else, even the normally overwhelming smell of cologne some people love to shower with before leaving their houses.
She was modestly covered compared to other clubbers, and she was immediately thankful for it because even feeling sweaty arms brush against her exposed shoulder made her skin crawl in disgust.
As much as she wanted the investigation to lead somewhere just so she’d have something to report back to Tara, the deeper she swam through the heat wave, the worse it got.
The man Tara had described was nowhere to be found; in fact, every clubber she stumbled upon was hardly fat or old.
Everyone sported that former dystopian look of joy and bliss on their faces or on the wet surfaces of their tongues as they made out in dark corners, on the dance floor, or in the booths around the poles.
Deep into the club was a small stage, glowing so brightly to further attract attention, way beyond the simple loud sound booming from the speakers it controlled.
As the DJ hyped up the crowd, everyone screamed back at him, hands in the air and feet leaving the floor to jump as hard as they could just to match the relentless beat of the music.
At this point, Ophelia felt like a kid drowning in the ocean and aimlessly swimming against the current. The harder she tried, the more the bodies bumped into her, and the weaker she’d become.
But even as she reached the shore, sitting on one of the stools by the bar counter, Ophelia hadn’t quit.
She looked at the human zoo the same way a relentless sailor looks at the horizon. The journey had only started, and her zeal never died — just like the flame within her.
𓍝
(chapter 1) ⬅ | ★ | next chapter ᯓ☆
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── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 5.38k
── .✦ date: 22/01/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
𓍝
Fuel to fire - Agnes Obel.
Hadleigh seemed void that day, which was out of the ordinary because Hadleigh was such a small village that just two families of five were enough to warm up the room.
It was so small that a single bus line was enough. It had standard hours, allowing the townspeople to plan their days better.
Hadleigh was so small that it had a single wide road running through it from the nearby town to the town square by the church. Any other road was smaller, wide enough for cars to come and go at a reasonable speed.
The main road went down from the town square up to the football court on the other side of Hadleigh.
It’d be more correct to define Hadleigh as a random spot in the mountains, an area littered with houses and shops.
Hadleigh was the type of village that made everyone neighbours, despite how distant the houses were, because the distance was never big enough.
Sabine knew this.
Whenever she looked out the window, she’d face the side of a tall mountain and could see houses scattered on it like random coloured patches on a cat’s fur.
What amazed her the most was that sometimes she could look at those houses and feel like she was right there, like they were that close, but they weren’t.
Sabine knew this.
Everything in Hadleigh was seemingly close just as it was seemingly distant.
Hadleigh was a village amidst nature, and connecting with nature went beyond fingers grazing leaves or taking in the smell of spring while running in a vast field.
It was fascinating to see this reality reflected even amongst the villagers. It took Sabine some time to realise that the connection went way beyond hugs and kisses.
That day was one of the many days Sabine had spent in Hadleigh.
It wasn’t the brightest or the gloomiest. It was standing at the threshold between a grey, windy day and a blinding sunny day.
Sabine was cooped up in her seat on the bus, heading home after an unusual day in school.
During the ride, she appreciated how her mates understood her silent message, the one she left when dropping her school bag in the seat next to her.
Sabine, that day, wanted to be alone. This wish of hers was never hard to fulfil because she didn’t have a horde of friends running behind her, even on her best day.
Her legs were against her chest, her chin on her knees as she closed herself off, feeling too exposed despite her clothing.
There was something about Hadleigh that she’d grown to dislike. She was unsure at first, but now, she was certain about it.
She didn’t like how divided it was. Hadleigh had no in between despite being a village set amidst a wide bed of clean and unharmed nature.
In Hadleigh, there was good or bad, right or left, white or black, no in between. Ever.
In Hadleigh, in was never out and out was never in. In and out never existed. You had to choose unless someone else would take on the task, and at that point, you couldn’t complain about the outcome, just take it.
Sabine disliked, no, she hated, that she’d gone back on her words, her choices. She should’ve stayed out, never in.
Out meant a carefree life, like being forever stuck in the blissful beauty of childhood.
In meant you had to care. Had to because there wasn’t a choice, especially on what to care about.
In meant secrets, a waterfall of secrets. A cruel and merciless avalanche of secrets that poured down on your head, suffocating you, burying you, caging you until you accept it, metabolise it, and agree to do exactly what it implies.
In meant secrets, and secrets meant truth, and it goes without saying that truth could mean pain sometimes, many times actually.
And Pain was a stranger to rejection or acceptance. Pain didn’t discriminate, let alone listen to people’s opinions. Pain was the puppeteer; everything else was a puppet with no autonomy.
But Pain still gave people a choice, though, because people knew where Pain was and where it wasn’t.
And Sabine mentally repeated that she’d been that one dumb example of what happens when you step into Pain’s territory.
She should’ve known better.
Pain was punishment, the consequence of a single action or a series of actions. Pain came in many shapes; the punishment was never an isolated case but a wide spectrum of events.
Sabine hoped hers had come to an end.
The bus took the usual turn onto Hadleigh’s main road, the meters shrank, and within moments, it came to a halt at the stop at the town square.
It’d be wrong to say that the driver had developed the patience to wait for everyone to unboard the vehicle. It wasn’t a matter of patience but rather routine: every weekday, by three, it’d stop at Hadleigh’s stop, and all the high and middle school students would get off, spreading like split water into every nook and crevice of the village as they headed home.
Sabine, just like on any day, was one of the many drops to compose that water.
She slung her bag on her shoulder and decided to dive in, blending in with all the students, the ones she knew and the ones she could just recognise.
The pathway between the seats was slim, so the flow of students was almost static until she got off the bus and out in the open.
She knew the town square like the back of her hand. She knew where each secondary road led to, which neighbourhood or natural reserve.
The bus was parked, engine off, as the driver eventually got off to grab a coffee at the café by the elementary school.
Sabine remembered that store really well because teachers ordered coffee from there, making the waiters walk across the square with a trail of little mugs.
The elementary school faced the church, which faced the park, a place that held many memories in Sabine’s mind.
It’d been a long time since she’d last played there because it was the go-to spot right after school when she was still in elementary school.
She crossed the road and walked on the cobblestone in front of the church. For some reason, as if sensing impending doom, Sabine paid closer attention to her surroundings that day.
She took notice of the bench her older brother always sat on, waiting for the moment she’d run up to him and tell him that she was tired and wanted to go home.
That moment always came late, and sometimes, he’d have to anticipate it by a few minutes because Sabine was restless, especially around the people she liked, her friends.
She walked past the bench, the slide and the set of swings. The latter reminded her of all the afternoons she spent playing with Ophelia: she’d sit in her lap — sometimes, they’d switch — and they’d swing together, simulating a church bell with their tiny legs.
On point, the church bell rang three times while Sabine turned right, going up the few stairs to the back of the building.
As she did so, she took notice of the presence behind her. It didn't surprise her, though, because Hadleigh was only so big, and the neighbourhoods were only so many.
She also couldn’t ignore the familiar voices ringing behind her in the distance.
She proceeded, one foot in front of the other as she turned left into an arched stone pathway.
This led to another of the many secondary roads in Hadleigh. On her left was a wide expanse of green, and just as usual, she saw the same three horses munching on the grass.
They noticed her, but she pretended not to notice them that day because she’d heard the set of familiar voices ring again behind her, and stopping to play with the animals didn’t seem like the right choice.
She’d made enough bad choices lately. It was time to change and go back to the old ways, out.
Stones and leaves cracked under her weight, a sound that was usually comforting now reflected the haste in her movement, something that only increased the distress within her.
She’d already mentally attached a face to each voice she heard, but falling victim to hope, she glanced behind when she turned the corner again.
This only proved her fear.
Being out of their sight for the moment, Sabine ran down the stairs and onto the asphalt.
On a normal day, she’d leisurely go down each step, listening to the peaceful sound of the river flowing past her.
On a normal day, she’d be admiring yet again the work done on the stairs, analysing how each log of clear wood was placed to form the railing and the edges of each step.
But that day wasn’t a normal day; she could feel it in the air, on her skin, and taste it on her tongue.
The road was one of the many leading to the litter of neighbourhoods that brought Hadleigh alive.
As per habit, she walked on the left side of the tarmac, keeping away from the slightly taller wall of stones and leaves on the right.
On a normal day, she would’ve mentally replayed the first time she’d screamed her lungs out because the dog in one of the compounds running along the way decided to run up to the gate and bark.
She’d got used to that scare after so many years, but that day wasn’t a normal day, and when the dog ran up to the gate and barked, oddly, Sabine flinched.
She knew the animal wasn’t the real culprit.
The set of voices was approaching at a steady pace. She could differentiate each tone, each giggle, each snort, each chuckle. She could mentally imagine the face they’d make as they did so. But she couldn’t imagine why they were following her.
Maybe she could, and just didn’t want to believe it.
One of the voices called for her, her name falling from their lips so smoothly. Another giggle followed, tone rich in joy but with stains of mockery here and there.
The same voice asked her to stop in her tracks, but she knew where Pain lived and had no intentions of knocking on its door. Not anymore.
She could see it in front of her, a few steps away. It was like a hole through the woods, like a cave.
It used to scare her once, but now, she looked at it like it was her last hope. Without wasting a second, she ran towards it, turning left to glide through the trees.
This was another of the many secondary pathways in Hadleigh. It wasn’t anything as official as a road made of asphalt, but years of footprints had killed the grass enough for nature to open up and let men through.
This pathway was the last section of Sabine’s shortcut to home. Once out of the thick rows of trees, she’d be walking amidst a wide field a few meters away from her front gate.
But before she could reach there, despite seeing the light, something, someone, a hand, reached for her wrist.
The rustling of her clothes, the thumping of her heart, and the crackling of the branches under her feet shielded her ears from hearing them run after her as soon as she increased her pace.
The touch was soft, but the look in their eyes wasn’t. She looked at each one of them, her mouth moving on its own accord as she begged.
But Pain was like the devil: once you made a deal with it, you couldn't go back.
Sabine had been naive enough not to realise that she’d stepped into its den and uttered the words that sealed her path and marked her destiny.
Pain was good at its job, riddled with profound professionalism. Nothing could make it waver, not the shaky sound of her voice as she pleaded for her life, not the glossy look in her eyes as she searched for mercy in the pair looking at her.
This pair of eyes, though, didn’t belong to Pain. They were a lot familiar, once in shades of warmth, love, and passion.
Now, they were cold, like they’d been gouged out, leaving only deep, black holes in the face.
The only warmth came from the liquid trail running down her neck once she hit her head. She knew it’d stain her clothes and her school bag, but she was too weak to care.
All the energy she had left in her was used to look for warmth. All in vain.
Even as she was lifted off the ground, body eerily cradled in their arms, Sabine still felt cold. As they walked with her in their hold, Sabine could feel the breeze blow on her head through her hair.
It was cold. Everything was cold, everything except the liquid running down her neck.
So she reached for it, or so she believed. Her arms dangled weakly, moving passively with each step they took.
The warmth she sought came with lots of promises, as if Pain had finally decided to have mercy on her and pay her back.
Maybe it was the throbbing in her head that caused her senses to be this weak, because Pain was never merciful. It had one job, and it never slacked.
The warmth Sabine was reaching for was an illusion, one of the many consequences that dealing with Pain brought.
She felt light and heavy at the same time, body in the embrace of a strong breeze. Still cold.
It frustrated her, and she wanted to become whiny, maybe drag herself around like a child because she was desperate for some warmth.
Maybe it was the throbbing in her head that made her forget where she was.
Despite it being at the threshold between human life and nature, Hadleigh was still all about good or bad, right or left, in or out, white or black, no in between.
Hadleigh wanted you to make a choice and live with it, or let others do the job for you and live with it regardless.
Maybe it was the throbbing in her head, because it suddenly stopped, and Sabine finally found the warmth she’d been seeking.
Her body was weak. She couldn’t move.
Her eyes were open, but she couldn’t see, which wouldn’t be the first time anyway.
She’d been blind all this while, and only recently came to terms with the truth.
Just like Eve in the Bible, Sabine had eaten from the forbidden tree despite all the warnings.
Now, she lived with the consequences, but while Eve was simply kicked out of the Garden of Eden, Sabine was thrown down to her end.
⋆｡°✩ ‧₊˚ ☾. ⋅
Souvenir - Selena Gomez.
Ophelia’s body was on fire. It began with little sparks, but those are always enough when fuel’s around.
The liquid running down her throat seemed to cling to the flesh with claws, ripping through it with no mercy, but Ophelia didn’t care enough.
For her, pain was nothing but a fleeting feeling, like a demon in need of a vessel to exist.
Her body was her own vessel, not anyone else’s. What would happen with this vessel was hers to decide, and she always made sure to have fun in the process, as if laughing in Pain’s face.
She loved stepping on toes and touching sensitive nerves anyway.
The little sparks responsible for the fire had multiple origins, and Ophelia had a hard time determining where each one came from.
The liquid she’d just swallowed burned her throat, no doubt, but the hands running down her sides caused more damage, and that night, she’d chosen to be a bit masochistic.
Her hands were up in the air, head snapping left and right, and her hair was everywhere.
The music blasting through the speakers did not spare the ears. Just like Pain, its terms and conditions were clear and lacked flexibility.
You can’t really walk into a club and complain because the music’s loud, can you?
Even if that were possible, Ophelia wasn’t the type, considering that it was the whole point of her coming.
Her arms fell on Taehyung’s shoulders, wrapping around his neck and closing the little distance that made them two distinguished people.
They swayed and jumped with the beat, and if they weren’t screaming, they couldn’t hear each other despite the proximity. Any form of communication had to be physical, hence his touching her body.
As if bothered by the loose-fitting nature of her off-shoulder top, Taehyung’s hands stopped at her hips, fingers grazing the slip of exposed skin above her knee-length capri pants.
They hooked on the hem of her bottoms, pulling her impossibly close, and she just let him, enchanted by his moves and the music.
He leaned closer, and she took in the scent of his cologne, waiting in anticipation. “Fuck. If I didn’t have to drive tonight, I know I’d be fucking wasted.”
“Oh, you aren’t?” she giggled, hands now on his chest, nose so close to his. “I couldn’t tell.”
Experience had taught her just how nice his chuckles sounded, something breathy but not too much, a sound deep and husky in a way that she didn’t simply like or love: it surged heat all through her body, melting her nerves.
She could almost hear the smirk in it, picture the expression he’d sport on his perfectly carved face, and imagine the peculiar glow his eyes would have.
The gleam would appear right on cue as if something she’d said or done triggered it, as if she were the source of light he was looking at, which wasn’t wrong either.
Because of this, despite the music, she could tell exactly how he sounded when he chuckled at her words.
“Isn’t it a good thing?” she asked, eyes focused on his with her bottom lip between her teeth.
The sound came again — her favourite — and he didn’t break eye contact, enchanted by the glint in her blue eyes.
She giggled again, proud of her deeds. She was always his trigger.
They worked like fire and fuel: she the latter, and he the fuel, the element that could widen a blaze that could never be put out.
Around them, colleagues and friends were busy choosing between drinking, dancing or doing both.
To the eyes of other clubbers, they certainly appeared as another group of citizens who’d decided to dive into the bliss of a Saturday night, the world’s favourite day.
Music and drinks went hand in hand with nine-to-five workers seeking a break from the unforgiving pace of their work hours. But being humans, a species unable to live without music, there wasn’t any need for an excuse.
Having one, though, was simply the cherry on top, and there wasn’t a better excuse than a job promotion.
Taehyung and Ophelia’s unique dynamics had paid off in the best way possible, and as the Bellport Police Department dream team, they had gone from ground officers to detectives.
The occasion called for celebrations — the reason for the fire to seek fuel even more.
Ophelia had spent a few more minutes getting ready for the night. She’d chosen a pair of capri pants, a specific one, because her ass looked great in them. Her off-shoulder top revealed she had no bra underneath, but also skin she wanted seared with kisses.
It was late August, and naturally, the club was scorching hot for everyone. But Taehyung alone particularly felt the heat because he was standing right in front of the source, hands sliding down her back without fearing he’d burn his fingers in the process.
The goal was something more, something bigger, hotter, than the small blaze atop a match.
In fact, just touching wasn’t enough. Feeling how her back curved along his palm wasn’t satisfying enough. The rough material of her pants was too much of an obstacle, something he believed was unfairly too resistant to the heat, the fire — more resistant than he ever could be.
He wasn’t drunk, and not because he had to drive them home or because he just didn’t feel like passing out and waking up with a rock band playing in his head.
In fact, overdosing on alcohol was never really a problem, but it simply wasn’t strong enough to make him withstand Ophelia’s charm.
If the effects initially made his vision blurry, as soon as his eyes landed on the woman, time slowed, the background faded, and he focused solely on her.
What else would you focus on when you find a blaze burning in a dark forest? He wasn’t to be blamed.
She was a nymph and he a mere lost soldier, who didn’t know better — even if he did, he’d willingly block it out and let her do her magic on him.
Because of that, he followed her as she pulled him through the crowd, looking at her the same way a sailor looks at the North Pole after hours of blind sailing on open sea.
Their friends and colleagues were just another random tiny star in the night sky that she could easily outshine.
His hand was clasped in hers as she grabbed their belongings and led the way out of the club.
He meekly followed, numb even to the drastic change of temperature when they’d stepped out of the building, because where their hands met radiated him with heat that would normally make him overstimulated on a random summer day, but instead simply pulled him in as if it was a cold winter night and he, in profound need for warmth.
With this as a premise, it’s a surprise to no one that he could barely register his surroundings, not until the car came to a random stop. Not until he was in the backseat, lost amidst the scent of her perfume and the intoxicating intensity of her kisses.
The moon was their only source of light, but it was hardly a problem since they knew each other’s bodies as if the ability was intrinsic to their nature.
Her fingers ran through his hair, breathless gasps escaping her the more he kissed her neck, lingering in her most sensitive spots.
Too needy for his touch, that fuel, how exactly she’d got out of her pants escaped her, but she didn’t try to think about it. There was no mental space for it anyway.
His hands traced paths on her body like she had a map written on her skin that could lead him to where she wanted him the most.
Her nipples were hard as if his touch was deadly cold against her burning hot skin, leaving only goosebumps in its wake. But the real heat was lower, at the level of their crotches, where her hips wouldn’t stop moving.
Their lips met once again while she quickly unbuttoned his dress shirt, but he barely gave her the chance, pulling on her top and leaving her just in her underwear.
She cupped his face, connecting their lips yet again, and he finished what she’d started, shirt soon discarded in the space next to them and hips already bucking up to get rid of his bottoms.
Just as he’d predicted, just as she’d wished, just like fuel to fire, they both gave into each other, diving into the ocean of their passion but still burning in the process.
Her hips moved on their own accord. An arm wrapped around her frame while his free hand groped her breast, heartbeat restless.
They moaned in each other’s mouths. Moving like a spreading wildfire, their kisses, already passionate, turned messy as if they had no time left, as if the night was steadily running to an end and the light of the day would expose truths they’d rather keep hidden.
She propped her feet on his lap, back straight, and the pace increased. His face was cradled in her hands still, lips clasped in kisses they could never grow tired of.
“Oh, God. Lia.” He just sat back, breathless and with hands now on her butt as he let her take him whole — body, soul, energy, and sense.
His moans and grunts were the only proof that his brain hadn’t completely shut off yet. His head was thrown back against the seat, eyes curious to watch her as she moved on him and study her silhouette, the way the moonlight illuminated her body from the side, but the pleasure was too strong for him to fight off.
He wasn’t weak, though. He just didn’t want to fight, never would. So he just let her take him whole like the fire she was.
“Fuck, Tae.” Her moans were close to sounding like hiccups. His name was seemingly the only word she knew as her body moved on its own accord, the sinful dance tattooed in her system.
The greater the blaze became, the harder it burned, the louder their moans became, the faster the pace got, until he was moving her body on his own, fingers digging into her hips, and her legs almost giving out under her restless pace.
He grunted, eyes rolling to the back of his head, as the pleasure drew closer to cutting his senses short. She tried moving still, but the moment he adjusted their position to thrust into her, her moans died in her throat, and she hid her face in the crook of his neck.
Now, it was her turn to let him consume her. Everything he did to her, the kisses on her neck, his lips around her nipples, his hands running along her body like they needed to feel everything, made her feel alive.
The more he did, the more the fuel poured out, the better she felt, alive.
He hissed, bottom lip caught between his teeth and hands gripping the flesh of her ass if it were the only thing reminding him that he hadn’t evaporated yet.
They kissed again, but it was brief as they approached their orgasm at a steady pace, just like fire burning flesh.
First-degree burn, just like the kisses on their skin, the hickeys on their necks and on her breasts, and her nails digging his biceps, leaving temporary marks he’d want to turn into tattoos, maybe even scars.
Second-degree burn, just like the prints his hands left on her ass cheeks when he spanked her or gripped hard, or the bite marks she left on his shoulders to stop her voice from coming out too loud.
Third-degree burn, just like the sensitive spot he was constantly hitting as though he were on a mission to scar her in the best way possible.
But nothing scars deeper than a fourth-degree burn, heat searing past the fat, past the muscle and down to the bone, the same way the pleasure made their nerves short-circuit.
He grunted, hissed, groaned, whined, hips thrusting up a few more times on their own accord, while her gasps, shallow breaths, and thinned out moans would die in her throat because her body was too busy uncontrollably shaking as the pleasure washed over her, like a shower of water on fire.
Just like a parable, after the high came the down, but Ophelia was a fire that could never be put out, and he was a leaking tank that could never run out of fuel.
It was always just a matter of time before its trail would find the blaze again.
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Nightcall - Kasinsky
Speeding along the empty late-night road, the once calm wind outside screamed against their ears and faces as the windows were left open.
The car was silent. The radio softly played in the background, filling up a space Taehyung and Ophelia were too tired to occupy with small talk.
The woman rested her arm on the car door with her elbow just a bit out of the window. His position was similar, but one hand was busy keeping the steering wheel steady.
The high hadn’t worn off yet because a wildfire always leaves smoke after it’s quenched. But it also carries silence as if nothing had happened before it burned, as if the couple hadn’t given into their deepest desires in the most carnal way possible just moments ago.
There was no need to check herself in the mirror because whenever the temperature got too high with Taehyung, she’d always end up looking like a different person.
Exactly, her wavy hair was all over the place, a few strands clinging to her forehead because of the traces of sweat.
Her capri pants and off-shoulder top suddenly felt too heavy for the weather, as though she hadn’t had dinner and danced in it across the evening into the night.
Her feet weren’t slipped under the strap of her heeled sandals. The shoes were just there, keeping her soles from coming in contact with the small rug of Taehyung’s car.
She was tired, lazy, worn out, but satisfied, and her smile was the objective testimony. She didn’t even try to hide it. The silence didn’t help her case either.
“Funny.” She turned to face him. On cue, the sound of her voice had him snap his head in her direction. It wasn’t a problem anyway. It was way past two in the morning, and the road ahead was empty.
“We get promoted to detectives and decide to celebrate it by having sex in the car.”
He laughed, again a sound she liked way more than she’d ever admit. His eyes were back on the road, head shaking in disbelief.
“Do you think they’d, I don’t know, de-promote us if someone discovered it?” Just like her, he was back to being fully dressed, but he’d left out a few buttons.
“Tae, it’s demote, not de-promote, and no, I don’t think so. They love us too much at the PBD. Can’t risk losing us over—”
“Public indecency?” he chuckled.
“It’s only public indecency if we do it in public public,” she argued, leg now across the other.
“Lia, do you hear yourself?” He laughed yet again, and she insisted with her takes, laughing along with him, but their fun was shut off the moment his foot abruptly hit the brake, the car screeching and tyres drawing lines on the tarmac.
She barely had the time to scream his name and ask what was going on when her eyes landed on the girl standing in their headlights, palms flat on their car.
Her brown hair was messy, wavy strands caught in the material of her poor attire, the gloss on her lips and the sweat on her forehead.
They barely had the time to inspect anything before the girl rushed to the backseat door and jumped inside, screaming at Taehyung to drive.
Normally, Ophelia would be very suspicious of such an act; in fact, she’d heard multiple cases of people stopping to help supposed victims along the road only to turn around and find out that their car was being stolen.
But she couldn’t help but wonder why a girl dressed strictly in her undergarments would risk jumping in front of a moving car, screaming for help.
So she checked on her, asking about her well-being, and trying to understand what could have led her to make such a risky decision.
But the girl wasn’t compliant. She was mentally and physically closed off, knees under her chin, arms around her legs, and her head constantly checking behind as Taehyung drove off.
Ophelia tried to make sense of her body language, tried to push aside the part of her brain that was giving her a single explanation for the situation. She tried not to think about the worst-case scenario.
But what else would you suspect when a young girl, left in her undergarments, rushes into a random car at an odd hour of the night?
In fact, thinking about it, Ophelia stopped fighting back, mentally accepting the situation for what it was, what it could be, what she feared it’d be, what she was certain it’d be.
𓍝
(prologue) ⬅ | ★ | next chapter ᯓ☆
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── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ wc: 247
── .✦ date: 08/01/2026
── .✦ notes: cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
── .✦ tagline: Two cases. Ten years apart. One truth that was buried to protect the wrong men.
── .✦ pairing: kth x oc x jjk
── .✦ genre: noir, investigative, fwb, exes to lovers, smut
── .✦ date: 01/01/2026
── .✦ cross-posted on Wattpad and ao3
Welcome to
Arthemis
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Artemis, the Olympian goddess and personification of autonomy, virginity, protection, hunting and freedom from the male gaze.
Themis, the Titan goddess and personification of divine justice, balance, natural law and moral order.
Neither goddess is defined through marriage, motherhood, or subservience to a male deity. They represent female power not mediated by men.
Themis, justice. Artemis, protection of the innocent.
While Themis represents divine fairness, moral law, cosmic balance, and the innate sense of justice, Artemis is the protector of women in childbirth, young girls, the oppressed and those harmed by male violence.
Themis, principle of justice. Artemis, enforcer of justice and protector of those who suffer injustice.
Themis finds as enemies anyone who violates sacred law, oaths, hospitality, or cosmic balance.
Artemis finds as enemies hunters who disrespect her, men who violate boundaries, and predatory or prideful men.
Both operate as forces against male overreach.
They both embody divine justice:
Themis is the rational, objective counterpart—the law.
Artemis is more instinctive, emotional and protective—the arrow.
Together, they form a dual model of justice: logical and visceral.
They are liminal goddesses:
Themis stands at the threshold between chaos and order.
Artemis stands at the threshold between childhood and adulthood, civilisation and wilderness.
Themis decides what ought to be, and Artemis enforces it in the mortal world.
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cast
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OPHELIA Cooper [28] ↴
SABINE Germain [17] ↴
TAEHYUNG Halston [30] ↴
ROSE’ Golding [29] ↴
JUNGKOOK Wexler [29] ↴
JIMIN Gray [29] ↴
YOONGI Weston [29] ↴
NAMJOON Barnes [29] ↴
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themes
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Reader insert without the use of Y/N (the reader will play as the original character), crime, police investigation, detectives, female emancipation, brief friends with benefits, brief exes to lovers, Greek mythology references, a little bit of astrology.
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worldbuilding
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BELLPORT ↴
LUX OBSCURA ↴
BELLPORT POLICE DEPARTMENT (BPD) ↴
THE PLAZA HOTEL ↴
HADLEIGH ↴
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time setting
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The story is set in the early to mid-2000s, and the flashbacks date back to the late 80s and 90s.
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trigger warnings
(a must-read)
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Violence against women: mentions and depictions of assault, murder of a female character, discussion of predatory male behaviour, systemic misogyny, human trafficking, and sexism.
Racism & classism.
Sexual content & potential coercion themes: erotic scenes, power imbalance implications, references to sexual exploitation.
Death & gore: discovery of a body, forensic descriptions, medical trauma.
Teen death: lingering grief, survivor’s guilt, childhood trauma resurfacing.
Domestic and familial trauma: broken families, toxic marriages, intergenerational pain.
Psychological strain & obsession: struggles with guilt, fixation and spiralling, intrusive thoughts, anxiety.
Substance use & alcohol consumption: underage and adult substance use and alcohol consumption.
Corruption & abuse of power: crimes shielded by institutions, nightclub underworld tied to exploitation, procedural injustice themes.
Emotional and psychological manipulation & gaslighting: interactions involving coercive behaviour, manipulation, grooming, and attempts to control or undermine characters emotionally.
It goes without saying: you must be over eighteen to read this book, and also, read with caution.
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author's note
(another must-read)
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This is not your classic BTS fanfiction. Here, the focus is not on the idol and the fantasy of being with them.
The focus is on the female characters.
Rumours have it that fanfiction can’t be educational. I beg to differ. Anything can be educational as long as you make it so; that’s why I decided to write this story.
It would be incorrect of me to say that it’s not based on a true story because it is, but to be more precise, this book is based on many true-life stories, which have been forgotten, buried, overlooked or are simply unknown.
Fiction is a reflection of reality, and I shall do just that with this book. I want people to read this work and understand the kind of world we’re living in. I want you to realise how deeply corrupted the system is, so much so that the daily occurrences we usually sweep under the rug reflect just how bad we have it.
So, please, if you’re here thinking that this book is solely about your bias with a fictional female character experiencing romantic drama, let me hold your hand as I say this: this book might not be for you, unless you’re ready to widen your horizon, and for that, I thank you so much.
Essentially, the focus is less on love, back-to-back passionate smutty scenes, and drama in the classic fanfiction way. This story is fanfiction, but with a different goal. If you don’t like that, you can read other works of mine.
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Side note: There’s no reason I chose specific members to play specific parts in the story. The characters are what they are, and the members are here simply to bless us with their looks.
I even changed their surnames to make the story flow better, so it further proves my point.
A specific idol playing a specific idol doesn’t reflect how I think about them at all, because some characters are straight-up evil and will remain that way even if I were to change their face claim.
Please keep that in mind.
Regarding the characters that have a tragic ending, I decided not to give them a face because, despite it just being fanfiction, I don’t know how someone would feel if they discovered that their photo had been fetched from Pinterest randomly and used to identify a character that tragically died in a random story.
I don’t know. This was my thought process, but I do describe, so don’t worry.
Another side note: the characters are actually numerous, and I didn’t present all of them here. I will likely be updating the cast (with a new chapter) as we proceed because I believe there’s no need to add them all here when I won’t be introducing them into the story until later. At that point, I’m not really sure about how well you remember them or their looks.
The same goes for the spaces. Here, I added the main ones. But if you’re not new here, you know I have a Notion page where everything is well outlined, all the characters, all the spaces, and every other micro-detail I like to never miss, such as the Spotify playlist and the Pinterest board.
Third side note: I’ll be mixing flashbacks with present-day scenes, so you should know beforehand that
→ this (𓂃˖˳·˖ ִֶָ ⋆🌷͙⋆ ִֶָ˖·˳˖𓂃 ִֶָ ) is the divider that symbolises the beginning of a flashback;
→ this (⋆｡°✩ ‧₊˚ ☾.) is the end of the flashback divider, which could also be a sort of time skip if the scene changes timeline right after the flashback;
→ this (⋆⭒˚ 𓍝｡⋆) is the usual time skip divider;
→ this (𓍝) is the chapter beginning and ending divider followed by my endnotes.
I’m also working on a commentary channel for this book, but I still don’t know if to make it written or audible. We’ll see about that.
