The same red moon

Detective Kofi Mensah is called to the Meridian Hotel. A man is facedown in the shallow end of the pool, one bullet, behind the left ear. The cameras were looped. The staff remember nothing. Before Kofi leaves, he finds something lodged beneath the pool drain, a silver earring, crescent-shaped. He bags it. But something makes him slip it into his jacket pocket instead of the evidence locker. Elsewhere, Adaeze Okafor walks into Lagos Central Police Station, sits down across from a tired detective, and confesses to the murder of Samuel Eze. Her account is precise, cinematic almost ,the hotel, the pool, the angle of the body. The Lagos detective is relieved. Case closed. The Lagos confession transcript lands on Kofi's desk as routine cross-border notification. He reads it once, sets it down, reads it again. She described everything correctly. Everything except the dead man's name,one syllable transposed, barely noticeable. He pulls the earring from his jacket. At Kofi's apartment, 1 a.m. He sits at his kitchen table with the transcript, the earring, and a bad feeling he can't file away. He books a flight to Lagos. Kofi walks into the Lagos interrogation room and slides the earring across the table toward Adaeze. She looks at it, and her face doesn't show fear. It shows relief. He leans forward. "Who gave you this?"