Trapped

Emily

So this is it, little sweet Startown, but not so sweet anymore.
Since you know, a raping killing psychopath decided to haunt the women of this town.
No pattern, no suspects, no nothing.
Yet, I'm going to solve this case.
That's what I do. I solve cases, I get money, and dad pats me on the shoulder, as a sign of his pride, but this time I'll get more, he'll give me his blessings to find out who killed Amanda.
And who knows, maybe he'll even help me.
So, I walk in through the main door of a tall building, first thing I think of is it smells like wet dirty socks.

The police department is smaller than back home, and somehow everything is.
nobody notices me at all, as if it's a normal thing for a stranger to walk into the PD and say nothing.
so I had to talk to someone. i hated waiting.
"Hello," I say to a girl, who was using the computer, she has brown hair, and a tanned skin with very beautiful green eyes.

"Hi," she says without looking.
"I'm Emily Lance," I extend my hand, but she doesn't even notice. "I'm the new detective."
"Oh," she looks over the screen. "Hello, welcome...um, I am Chloe, " she extends her hand, and I politely shake it. "Welcome here, you should go into that office," she points at a brown door in the corner behind her. "That's your new partner's office, you'll probably be sharing it with him, since we don't have much space," she looks around her, then back at me and smiles.
I nod and walk away. She is weird.

I open the door, and I see a tall person standing in the room, looking at me with a weird face.
Black hair, dark blue eyes. He looks exactly the same but only more tired. As if he has been having sleepless nights due to the stress caused because of his cheating wife.

"Should've known they would send you," he says with a smirk.

Jerk.
Emily, it's not a big deal.

I close my eyes, and take a deep breath.
"You're not imaging," he rolls his eyes. "I'm real."

It's Zack.
Zack Shepard.
The man who made my life a living hell.
The man who ruined my life.
The man I hate the most.
I'm in his town.
He and I are in the same town.

Oh my god. Im his partner.
How? Why? I can't. Can I? No. Yes.
Oh god, why.

"I can't be this unlucky," I sigh.
"Come on," he says. "You get to work with this," he points at his face. "You can't be this lucky."

It's true, he was good looking, which made it harder for me to hate him when we were teenagers. But, it's a habit now.
What was the saying about habits? Old habits don't die or are hard to let go of or whatever.

Emily, you are a professional.
You can do this.
Breath and ask about the case.

"Okay, do we have any suspects?"
"Well, there is this guy, "he says. "I don't think he should be a suspect though."
"Why?"
"He is only seventeen."
"Martin knight was only 15, when he killed his friend's mother and buried his friend alive, because his father cheated on his mother with his friend's mother and had a child with her who turned out to be his friend, whom he buried alive," I say. "So he killed his brother, and his brother's mother." I let out a breath.
"Same old Ems."
"Don't call me that." Ems, as if nothing happened.
"why is he a suspect?" I add.
"He isn't, but someone tipped us, said he is."
"Did you have a talk with him?"
"It's my job?" He says "of course, I did."
"Did he know who would blame him?"
"Nope."
"Did you ask?"
"No, Emily it's my first day as a detective."
"Can I talk with him?" I roll my eyes.
"Don't you trust me?"
"No."
"God, this is going to be hard."
"Making me trust you?"
"No, why would I want your trust?," he rolls his eyes. "I meant, working with you."
"Only if you make it hard," I say. "Look, he is the only lead we have for now, I want to talk with him."
"Don't think that's possible."
"What?"
"Well, I talked to him without consulting his mother, and she'll sue us all if we go near him again without a warrant," he says. "And we can't get one," he adds.
"I'll do it my way then," I smile.
"The Ems pretend way?" His eyes widen.
"Uh huh."
"That's why I love you."
"Yeah sure," I say "see ya when I'm back."

Zack Shepard, confident and thinks that saying I love you after everything that happened is no big deal at all.
Jerk.

The Ems pretend way is what I do when I need a lead in the case, but can't get it as detective Emily. I don't usually do it unless it's the only way.
Now, I need to do it so I can leave as soon as possible.
I would pretend to be someone else, I've been a teacher, a student, a doctor, but with this suspect those wouldn't work.
I can't be a teacher nor a student, because he would find out I wasn't in his school, and this town only has one high school.
Being a doctor would do me no good, so I'll be a journalist, who is interested in the psychopath, and a source told me he was somehow involved.
And I'd hope he'd think I'm interesting enough for him to let me in.
I would see his body language and reactions.
I'm very good at my job.

I wear a a knee length brown skirt with a light blue shirt, and glasses.
I put some dark eyeshadow, dark red lipstick and tie my hair in a pony tail.
I take a look at myself in the mirror of my hotel room, I look so journalist-y.
Here we go. But, first I call Shepard to check where the suspect lives.
"Shepard, it's Emily."
"What is it?"
"What's his name?"
"Michael Henderson."
"Where does he live?"
"He can't know the police are involved."
"Fine, where does he live?"
"I'll text you the address."
I hang up.

Zack Shepard cannot stop me when I'm in the pretend mode, he had tried before, and he had failed miserably.
He is letting me do it, because he knows I get what I want.
I take a fake brown notebook to fake write notes in it, and I decided my phone will be my recording machine. Oh, and I work for Redfoxinn.