They called her the darling of the silver screen.
America’s sweetheart.
Everyone’s muse.
But to me, Isla Mercer was my wife.
And now, she’s dead.
I’m Detective Jack Mercer. Homicide, twelve years. Seen everything from bar fights to back-alley executions.
But nothing prepares you for when your own living room becomes a crime scene.
Blood on the floor.
Her favorite coffee mug shattered.
No forced entry.
No struggle.
Just silence.
She died in her sleep. Peaceful, they said.
It didn’t feel peaceful to me. It felt like a scream that never got the chance to happen.
Everyone loved Isla.
She was beautiful, yes, but more than that. She lit up red carpets, charity events, movie premieres. She smiled like she was made of light, and people fell at her feet just to be near her glow.
At first, I loved that about her.
Then the fan letters started arriving at our house.
The stalkers. The obsessed. The “just one selfie” weirdos who’d wait outside the gates.
She laughed it off. “Comes with the territory,” she’d say, flipping her perfect hair.
But I didn’t marry a territory. I married her.
And I wanted her to belong to me.
The night before she died, we fought.
I told her the fans were too much. That I missed the quiet Isla—the one who danced barefoot in the kitchen, who stole my sweaters and burnt the toast.
She told me I was being paranoid. Controlling.
She slept in the guest room.
I slept in rage.
Three days later, I buried her in a white dress she once wore to the Emmys.
No eulogy. Just dirt.
They called me strong. Brave.
Said she could rest now.
But I wasn’t resting.
I was working.
I found the book two days after the funeral.
Silent Slaughter: The Anatomy of a Perfect Crime.
It sat on her nightstand like it had been read the night she died.
It wasn’t a thriller. It was a blueprint. Step-by-step. How to commit the perfect murder.
I started reading. Then rereading.
Not because I wanted to solve it.
But because it sounded… familiar.
I discovered suspects. A crazed ex-con named Vincent “Viper” Malley. He had a record. A motive. A tendency to obsess over women he couldn’t have.
I found a glove in his trash.
Fibers matched the scene.
Security footage placed him on our street.
Case closed.
I testified in court. Cried on the stand. Told the jury about the way she hummed when she painted her nails. How she kissed my forehead before leaving for auditions.
Viper didn’t stand a chance.
Guilty. Life sentence.
Everyone clapped for the detective who brought his wife’s killer to justice.
But justice didn’t feel like this.
Because I still wasn’t sleeping.
I’d stay up watching her movies. Listening to interviews.
Trying to find clues. Hints. A face in the background. A sound in her voice. Something I missed.
But all I saw was her smile. The way she looked at the camera like it was me.
And then came the dreams.
And the voice.
And the memories.
One year later, I walked into the precinct with shaking hands and a new theory.
“I cracked it,” I told Delgado, my partner. “I was wrong. Viper didn’t do it.”
His jaw clenched. “Jack, what are you talking about?”
“I know who did it.”
He took me into the interrogation room—because where else do you take a madman?
I laid out the entire case.
How the killer knew there wouldn’t be a struggle.
How the murder weapon was never found—because it was never there.
How the scene was staged to look effortless.
Delgado’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know all that?”
I paused. “I just… I remember.”
“Jack,” he said slowly. “That wasn’t public information.”
I stared at him.
Something in my head—something old, and buried—started to twitch.
He slammed the table. “YOU KILLED HER.”
“No. No, I solved it—”
“YOU. KILLED. YOUR. WIFE.”
His voice cracked. My heart dropped.
“You’re telling me,” he hissed, “that you’ve been living a fantasy this whole year? That you gaslighted yourself into believing your own lie?”
“I loved her.”
I was crying now. Sobbing, shaking, full-body grief. “I LOVED HER. But they all loved her too. The fans, the world—she was MINE. She was my wife. MINE.”
“You wrote the book, didn’t you?” he said, voice suddenly hollow. “Silent Slaughter. That was yours.”
I didn’t answer.
I didn’t have to.
Was I smart?
Yes.
Was I mad?
Also yes.
They cuffed me that night.
Delgado didn’t say anything as he walked me to the squad car.
The others didn’t look at me.
I looked up at the rain. It was falling again, just like the night she died.
Fitting.
“I fooled everyone,” I said quietly. “Even myself.”
They’ll write about me, I’m sure.
The grieving husband who became the killer.
The detective who couldn’t handle losing the spotlight to his own wife.
But they won’t understand.
She wasn’t just famous.
She wasn’t just loved.
She was Isla.
And Isla was mine.
In the end, the man who solved the murder—
Was the murderer.And when love ends…
Everything else does too.
Sabina Sodikjonova | 14 | Orlando, FL | @sabina_sj on TikTok
