The Man Behind The Badge
1762 Words
Elara didn’t sleep that night.
The painting of Noah—wrapped and hidden beneath her bed—seemed to breathe in the dark like it had a pulse of its own. Every creak of the inn’s old bones, every gust of wind through the trees outside reminded her of Damien’s words.
> “If you see a painting of yourself… don’t ignore it.”
She lay awake, staring at the ceiling, her mind twisting around everything she had seen. Damien Crowe was either profoundly disturbed—or he was telling the truth. And if he was…
She sat up, rubbing her temples. She needed answers. And there was only one man in Gravemoor who might have them—and who had a history of keeping them hidden.
The police station stood cold and square on the edge of the square, looking more like a mausoleum than a place of justice. Its bricks were dark with age, the windows narrow and covered in condensation. Inside, the air was thick with stale coffee and silence.
Julian Drake was in his office when Elara arrived, leaning back in his chair, reading over a folder with a stormy expression. He didn’t look up as she entered.
“I was wondering when you’d show up again,” he said.
“You still working on Marjorie Gray?” she asked, dropping into the chair across from him.
He closed the folder. “I’m working on stopping a panic before it starts. You snooping around Damien Crowe’s house isn’t helping.”
Elara met his eyes. “Damien isn’t the problem.”
Julian’s jaw tightened. “You think he’s harmless? That man’s been painting death scenes for years. Murders, drownings, disappearances. Every time someone dies strangely, he has a canvas that mirrors it.”
“Maybe he paints what he sees before it happens. You ever consider that?”
Julian’s expression hardened. “I don’t believe in psychics. Or curses. I believe in facts, Elara. Evidence. And Damien Crowe’s whole life is a red flag.”
“He painted my brother,” she said.
Silence.
His gaze flicked toward the door, then back to her. “That’s impossible.”
“I’ve seen it. He painted Noah drowning before it happened. Before the police even pulled him from the lake.”
Julian stood slowly, pushing his chair back with a low scrape. He walked to the window, where the fog blurred the view of the square beyond.
“You want to believe that because the alternative is harder. Noah was troubled. You weren’t here. You didn’t see what I saw.”
“You didn’t see anything,” Elara snapped. “You closed the case in two days.”
His voice dropped. “Because there was nothing to find.”
“Or because you didn’t want to look.”
Julian turned around, eyes narrowing. “You want the truth? Damien Crowe isn’t some tragic prophet. He’s a man obsessed with death. He draws it, dreams it, bathes in it. Maybe he’s not killing anyone, but he’s certainly not innocent. People like him don’t change. They rot.”
Elara rose to her feet. “Then why are you so afraid of what he paints?”
Julian stepped closer, lowering his voice to a whisper. “Because sometimes monsters don’t have claws or knives. Sometimes they just… invite you in.”
There was something in his voice—more than professional disdain. It was personal. Deep. And dangerous.
Elara stepped back.
“I’m going to figure this out,” she said. “With or without you.”
Julian gave her a cold smile. “Just make sure you don’t end up in one of his paintings.”
---
Outside, the air was colder. The fog curled around her like a living thing. Elara walked through the square, boots tapping against the wet cobblestones. The statue of the town’s founder loomed overhead, the face worn away by decades of wind and rain. Someone had left a single black rose at its base.
She stopped.
The petals were fresh. Dew still clung to them. Tied around the stem was a thin red ribbon.
Her breath hitched.
This wasn’t coincidence. It was a message. A warning.
Her phone buzzed.
Unknown Number:
> You’re getting close. That’s not always a good thing.
Don’t trust anyone who wears a badge.
Her fingers trembled as she read it again. She turned in place, scanning the fog. But there was no one.
Just Gravemoor watching her, breathing, waiting.
She slipped the phone into her coat pocket and walked faster, clutching her bag tight. She needed to get out of sight, needed to think.
Damien wasn’t the only one haunted in this town.
And the killer?
They were watching her already.
Elara didn’t go straight back to the inn.
Something inside her twisted too tight, a warning that echoed louder with every step. The black rose beneath the statue, the ribbon, the message on her phone — someone had seen her. Had followed her. And they wanted her to know.
She ducked into an alley off the main square, one she remembered from childhood — narrow and dark, framed by buildings that leaned too close together, the bricks slick with moisture. Her breath steamed in the cold air as she leaned against the wall, trying to calm her racing heart.
Her phone buzzed again.
Unknown Number:
> If you dig too deep, you’ll find bones that don't belong to your brother.
Her pulse spiked. This wasn’t just a warning — it was a threat. A challenge.
She swallowed hard and typed quickly.
Elara:
> Who are you?
No reply. Just silence.
She shoved the phone back into her coat and emerged from the alley minutes later, scanning the fog-thick streets. No shadows moved. No footsteps echoed behind her. But the unease never left.
When she reached the inn, she went around the back and slipped through the kitchen door. Mrs. Harrow was nowhere in sight — probably asleep, or pretending not to notice the strange things that happened in Gravemoor after dark.
Elara climbed the stairs two at a time, locking the door to her room behind her.
She pulled the painting of Noah out from under the bed and laid it across the table. She turned on the desk lamp and stared at her brother’s face.
It was uncanny. The way the light had been captured in his wide, terrified eyes. The reach of his hand. The ripple of water around him. As if Damien had stood on the edge of the lake and watched him drown. Or… seen it in his mind before it happened.
The message on her phone haunted her more now than it had in the square.
> Bones that don't belong to your brother…
What did that mean?
She pulled out the murder file and laid it beside the painting. The autopsy photos of Marjorie Gray were hard to look at. Her pose was theatrical, delicate — death made into art. And the painting Damien had shown her matched it stroke for stroke.
But one photo stood out. A close-up of Marjorie’s left hand.
Under the edge of the ribbon on her wrist, barely visible, was something strange — a scar, small and jagged, like the edge of an old burn. Elara’s eyes narrowed.
She opened the folder labeled Victim 2 — a man named Jordan Keller, who died two weeks before she returned. Same pose. Same rose. Same ribbon.
She zoomed in on his left wrist.
Another scar.
Not exactly the same — but close enough to make her skin crawl.
She turned to her notebook and scribbled a question:
> Did the killer choose victims with this mark? Or did he give it to them before they died?
Something about it felt ritualistic. Like the ribbon and rose weren’t just symbols — but parts of a process. A signature. Or worse, a preparation.
She stared at the pattern she hadn’t noticed until now. Three victims. All with scars. All posed. All painted in advance by Damien Crowe.
She stood suddenly, grabbing her coat again. She needed to go back to the Crowe estate. She needed to see every painting he hadn’t shown her. She needed to know if one of them — just one — was of her.
—
The road to Damien’s house was darker tonight, and colder.
Fog pressed close to her windshield like fingers. The headlights barely pierced it. Trees loomed overhead like sentinels of bone. The forest lining the road seemed to close in tighter, as if it didn’t want her to reach him.
When she turned onto the gravel path leading to the mansion, something darted across her headlights — fast and pale.
She slammed the brakes, heart lurching into her throat.
It was gone.
Just fog.
She shook her head and pressed forward.
At the top of the hill, the manor waited like a secret. Lights glowed faintly in two upper windows, and the front door was ajar — swaying slightly in the wind.
She parked, left the engine running, and stepped out.
The crunch of gravel beneath her boots echoed too loud in the silence.
“Elara?”
Damien’s voice came from the doorway.
She exhaled sharply. “Sorry. I need to see more. Of your paintings.”
He stepped back, letting her in without question. His face was pale, darker shadows beneath his eyes than before. “I thought you might come back.”
“Why?”
He looked down. “Because I painted you last night.”
Her breath caught.
“What?”
He walked toward the back room, and she followed with stiff limbs.
“I didn’t know it was you at first. But when I finished it… I just knew.”
He stopped at a covered canvas.
“You’re sure you want to see it?”
Elara hesitated.
Then nodded.
Damien pulled back the cloth.
There she was — lying on a wooden floor, eyes open, lips parted. A black rose rested just above her heart. A red ribbon trailed from her wrist. The background was faint, but it looked like the same wood as his studio floor.
Elara stared, breath frozen, hands trembling.
“I painted this before you came back to Gravemoor,” Damien said quietly. “I thought it was a dream.”
“It wasn’t.”
Her voice cracked. Fear crept into her bones like cold water.
“What does it mean?”
“I don’t know,” he whispered.
But Elara did.
It meant she was next.
- Writer
