Chapter 2 - Seraphine
The next morning, my apartment looked like the crime board of a detective movie—papers everywhere, photographs pinned to the corkboard I’d dragged out of my closet, red strings connecting patterns only I could see. My coffee had gone cold hours ago, but the caffeine still buzzed in my veins. Sleep wasn’t an option. Not yet.
The case file sat open on the table, its contents spilling like a wound I couldn’t stop poking at.
Twelve women. Twelve disappearances in two months. Each one different—different backgrounds, jobs, incomes—but one glaring similarity tied them together like thread:
They all vanished after walking into Club Obsidian Veil.
I rubbed my temples and leaned closer to the photos spread across the desk. Each picture was haunting in its own way. Smiling women caught in their last moments of normalcy—laughing, posing, their eyes bright with the thrill of the night ahead. None of them had any idea they were walking into a black hole.
And then there were the clothes.
Not the kind of outfits you wore to a regular nightclub.
The first woman wore a fitted latex bodysuit that shimmered like oil under the streetlights, her hair in a sleek bun, a jeweled choker tight around her neck. The second had on a red corset with gold lacing and a sheer skirt that caught the light like fire. A third wore black mesh that left her skin exposed in delicate, deliberate patterns—her confidence radiating from the photo even through the grainy pixels.
They were dressed for something intimate. Controlled.
Something dangerous.
“Jesus,” I muttered, dragging a hand through my hair. “What the hell kind of club is this?”
The more I studied, the stranger it got.
Each photo showed the women just before entering the club’s doors—some taken from traffic cameras, others from nearby pedestrians or building security footage. The time stamps lined up too perfectly. Friday nights. Between nine and eleven. Not a single one had been seen leaving.
But as I flipped through the photos again, something tugged at the corner of my mind. Something I hadn’t noticed before.
I spread them out, side by side.
Every single one of the missing women wasn’t alone.
In each picture, there was another woman walking beside them. A different face every time—or so it seemed at first.
I leaned closer, squinting at the glossy prints. The lighting wasn’t great, but her silhouette—the tilt of her head, the way she carried herself—was eerily consistent.
“Wait a second…”
I grabbed the first photo and zoomed in on my laptop version. Then the second. Then the third.
Different hair colors. Different styles. But the same bone structure. The same delicate jawline. And there—barely visible—the same small beauty mark near the corner of her mouth.
I felt my pulse quicken.
It wasn’t a coincidence.
It wasn’t different women at all.
It was her.
The same woman, dressed differently each time—different wigs, makeup, clothes—but always there. Always leading one of the victims through the door.
A recruiter.
Or a hunter.
I enlarged one photo until the pixels bled together, trying to sharpen the shape of her face. In this shot, she was wearing a white-blonde wig and a black cocktail dress with a plunging neckline. Her lips were painted deep red, the kind of red that belonged in old Hollywood crime scenes. Another photo showed her with cropped brunette hair, smoky eye makeup, and a gold silk dress that looked custom-made.
In each image, she had one hand on the victim’s back, guiding them forward like a shepherd leading lambs to slaughter.
My stomach churned.
Who the hell was she?
I flipped back through the police reports, scanning for any mention of another woman. Every file said the same thing: Last seen entering Obsidian Veil with unidentified female companion.
Unidentified. Convenient.
Either the police didn’t care—or someone didn’t want her identified.
I jotted a note down in my pad:
Same woman in all images. Recruiter? Connection to club? Need to find her.
But that led to the real question: How?
If Obsidian Veil was invitation-only, there was no chance I’d get through the door as “Seraphine Vale, investigative journalist.” I’d need an entirely new identity—and one that fit their world.
I opened my laptop and searched Obsidian Veil again. The club’s website was slick and empty—black background, silver serif font, one cryptic tagline:
“Obsidian Veil: By Invitation Only.”
Below it was a single line of text:
The heart of the city beats at midnight.
No address. No phone number. Just an encrypted contact form that redirected to a dead email address.
I wasn’t surprised. This was a place that wanted to stay hidden—and people with money and power would make damn sure it did.
Scrolling deeper, I found whispers buried in the corners of the internet. Forum posts. Rumors. A few photos of luxury cars parked outside an unmarked building downtown.
And one anonymous comment that made my skin crawl:
You don’t get invited to Obsidian Veil. You get chosen.
I leaned back, tapping my pen against the desk. “Chosen,” I whispered.
Maybe that was what this mystery woman did. She chose them.
And if I wanted to get inside, I’d need her to choose me.
That realization sank in like a stone in my chest. I glanced around my apartment—stacked papers, empty coffee cups, worn jeans and sneakers—and almost laughed at how far removed I was from the women in those photos. They looked like they belonged to another universe.
I looked down at my outfit: oversized T-shirt, leggings, and yesterday’s eyeliner smudged under my eyes. The idea of walking into a luxury fetish club dressed like this was almost laughable.
Almost.
Because suddenly, I wasn’t laughing.
If I wanted to find out what happened to those women—if I wanted to track down the mystery recruiter, or whoever was behind this—then I had to become one of them.
A thrill of fear shot through me, sharp and electric.
I turned back to the photos, studying the women’s fashion again. Each outfit was unique but followed the same rule: bold, provocative, expensive. The kind of confidence you could only buy.
I wasn’t rich. But I knew how to fake it.
I grabbed my phone, opening a search tab and typing: high-end boutique—leather, corset, luxury wear, downtown.
If I was going to fit in at Obsidian Veil, I needed to look like I belonged there.
A new wardrobe. A new persona. A woman who could walk through those black doors without flinching.
But first, I needed to find her—the mystery woman who kept showing up beside every missing girl. She was the key to Obsidian Veil, the gatekeeper to whatever waited behind that door.
If I wanted answers, I’d have to buy myself a ticket into hell—stitched in silk and leather.