The Silent Girl

the table but remained slouched in her chair, arms crossed, as she answered Jane’s questions in a monotone. The deceptively easy queries came first: Name? Bella Li. Date of birth? May 18. Occupation? Martial arts instructor. Bella sighed loudly, the picture of disinterest. But the next question made the muscles in her forearm twitch.
    “Where were you last night, between the hours of six PM and nine PM ?” Jane asked.
    Bella shrugged. “I was home.”
    “Alone?”
    “Why do you want to know?”
    “We want to verify your whereabouts.”
    “I consider my love life private. I don’t see why I should have to share names with anyone.”
    “So someone was with you that night?” asked Frost. “Could you tell us his name?”
    “Why do you assume I’m interested in men? Do you really think a woman can’t do better?” She shot a provocative smile at Jane.
    “Okay,” Jane said with a sigh. “What was
her
name, then?”
    Bella looked down at her own hands, studying her close-clipped fingernails. “There was no one. I was home alone.”
    “You could’ve said that earlier.”
    “You could have told me why you asked me here.”
    “So you were home by yourself. Did you leave your residence at any time?”
    “I don’t remember.”
    “Maybe if we showed you a photo, you
would
remember.”
    “What photo?”
    Frost said, “From a security camera on Jeffries Point. You’re very good at eluding surveillance cameras, Ms. Li. But you didn’t spot all of them.”
    For the first time, Bella didn’t have a ready response, though her expression did not change and her eyes remained as unperturbed as forest ponds.
    “We know it’s you in the video,” Jane lied. Leaning in closer, she saw the girl’s pupils twitch, a reaction that was both involuntary and telling. Bella might appear calm, but her internal fight-or-flight instincts were on full alert. “We know you were there at the warehouse. The question is, why?”
    The girl laughed, an impressive rally of nerves in someone so clearly at a disadvantage. “You tell me. Since you seem to know everything.”
    “You went there to scare Kevin Donohue.”
    “Why would I?”
    “First you placed a threatening note on his windshield. Then you broke into his warehouse. Disabled his security system and his phone line.”
    “I did that all by myself?”
    “You have extensive martial arts training. You were taught at one of the best academies in the world, in Taiwan.” Jane slapped a folder on the table. “The file on your travel records for the past five years.”
    Bella cocked her head. “I have a file?”
    “You do now.”
    Bella opened the folder and flipped through the pages with feigned disinterest. “So I’ve been in and out of the country. Aren’t we Americans free to travel where we want?”
    “Not many Americans spend five years in a Taiwan monastery, studying an ancient art like wushu.”
    “Different strokes for different folks.”
    “And here’s the interesting part. You were sponsored by Mrs. Fang. She’s not wealthy, yet she paid for those years of training. Paid for your plane flights, your tuition. Why?”
    “She saw that I had talent.”
    “When did she recognize that?”
    “I was seventeen and living on the streets when she found me. She dusted me off and took me on, maybe because I reminded her of her daughter.”
    “Is that what you’re doing in Boston? Playing her surrogate daughter?”
    “I teach at her studio. We practice the same style of martial arts. And we share the same philosophy.”
    “What philosophy would that be?”
    Bella looked her in the eye. “That justice is a responsibility shared by all.”
    “Justice? Or vengeance?”
    “Some would say that
vengeance
is simply another word for justice.”
    Jane stared at Bella, trying to read her. Trying to decide if this was the same creature who’d saved her life in the alley, who’d perched on the warehouse roof. Bella was flesh and blood, like any other twenty-four-year-old, but she was definitely not ordinary. Looking into those eyes, Jane glimpsed a strangeness, a wildness. An animal spirit that made her suddenly draw back, a chill raising the hairs on her arms. As if she’d glimpsed something in those eyes that was not quite human.
    Frost broke the silence. “Ms. Li, it’s time to tell us the truth.”
    Bella gave him a dismissive look. “Which part isn’t the truth?”
    “The part about why Iris Fang chose you in particular.”
    “She could have chosen