Ch.62: Isabella's End

"We found another one."

The voice crackles over the radio of a paramedic attending to my burns.

"Guest suite. Second floor. Female. Apparent suicide."

I freeze. The sterile gauze falls from my hand.

"Isabella," I whisper.

Thorne looks up from where he's giving a statement to the Chief of Police. He sees my expression. He nods.

"I need to see her," I say.

"Ma'am, you need to get to the hospital," the paramedic insists, trying to gently push me back onto the gurney. "You have third-degree chemical burns and massive trauma."

"I need to see her," I repeat. My voice is stronger this time. Harder.

I push the paramedic away. I stand up.

Thorne steps in. He flashes his badge at the paramedic. "Let her go. I'll take her."

We walk back toward the house. The fire crews have knocked down the main blaze, leaving only smoldering ruins and black skeletons of walls. But the guest wing, built of stone, is still standing.

We enter through a side door. The air is thick with the smell of wet ash.

Police are already there, stringing yellow tape across the doorway of the suite.

"Detective Thorne," a uniformed officer acknowledges him, lifting the tape. "It's a mess in there."

We step inside.

The room is untouched by the fire, preserved in a strange, silent stasis. The heavy velvet curtains are drawn. The lamps are still on.

Isabella is sitting in the armchair by the window.

She is wearing the torn silk gown. Her hands are folded in her lap.

She looks peaceful.

Except for the face.

She really did it. She carved it off.

The strips of necrotic grey flesh are lying on the floor at her feet, like discarded peelings. Her underlying muscle is exposed, dark and glistening in the lamplight.

But the knife is not in her hand.

It’s on the table next to her. Clean. Wiped.

And next to it is a syringe.

"Overdose," the officer says. "We found a vial of morphine in the bathroom. Empty."

I walk closer.

I look at the face on the floor. My face.

It looks like a rubber mask. Hollow. Dead.

Then I look at the note.

It’s propped up against a vase of wilted roses. A sheet of hotel stationery, covered in elegant, looping handwriting.

*To the Police:*

*My name is Isabella Thorne. I am not the victim. I am the accomplice.*

I blink. Thorne? She used his name?

I read on.

*Dr. Aris Vane promised me beauty. He gave me a stolen life. I took it willingly. I knew what he did to his wife. I watched him do it.*

*I am responsible for the torment of Elena Vane. I am responsible for the kidnapping of her daughter.*

*But I am done hiding.*

*Everything Aris did, he did for me. Or so he said. But he only loved the reflection in the mirror. He only loved his own work.*

*I leave this confession as my final act. Elena Vane is innocent. She fought to survive. I fought to steal.*

*Do not pity me. Pity the woman whose face I wore.*

*Signed,*
*Isabella.*

I lower the note.

"She cleared you," Thorne says softly, reading over my shoulder. "She took the blame for everything."

"She didn't have to," I whisper.

"She wanted to," Thorne says. "It was her way out. Her redemption."

I look at Isabella again.

The raw muscle of her face is beginning to dry. The blood has stopped flowing.

She looks gruesome. Terrifying.

But she also looks... herself.

For the first time in months, she isn't wearing a mask. She isn't wearing a lie.

She died as Isabella.

I reach out. I touch her cold, stiff hand.

"Thank you," I say.

I turn to leave. I can't look at it anymore. The waste. The tragedy.

But as I turn, I catch a glimpse of something in the mirror on the opposite wall.

A reflection.

Not of me. Of her.

The angle is perfect. The lighting is cruel.

In the mirror, the strips of skin on the floor seem to reassemble. The grey flesh catches the light.

The empty eye sockets of the mask seem to stare back at me.

It is a trick of the light. A hallucination born of trauma and exhaustion.

But for a second, I swear the mask smiles.

A cold, dead smile that belongs to me.

I shiver.

"Let's go," I say to Thorne. "I'm done with this house."

We walk out. We leave the room, the note, and the body.

But the image stays with me.

Even in death, she wore my face.