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Faith’s reprieve was short-lived. On the way back, Slade got a call from the Carmel Police Department telling him to return to the station immediately. “And just so we’re clear,” the police captain said, “the presence of Special Agent Bold in your vehicle is why you’re being called back here. Bring her with you, or we’ll have problems.”

“I’m on my way back, sir,” Faith replied over the radio, guessing at the reason for the police captain’s anger. “You can tell ASAC Gardner that I stand by my decisions and I’m ready to answer for everything I did.”

Slade pursed his lips. There was silence on the other end for several seconds before the police captain replied, “I’ll do that, Special Agent.”

The signal disconnected, and Slade released the breath he’d been holding. “Damn. I wish I was ten percent as brave as you.”

“You’re brave enough. You kept fighting for this case even when the brass tried to take it from you.”

“Yeah, but brazenly telling my superior he was wrong? That’s a whole new level of badass.”

Faith managed a smile, but she was far more anxious than she'd let on. She'd accomplished what she wanted. She'd solved the case. Now, the other shoe was dropping, and she wasn't sure anymore that she was ready to handle that.

But she didn’t have a choice. The shoe was dropping whether she wanted it to or not. She might as well face the music.

And she was right. A murderer was in custody. An innocent was alive. Hopefully, ASAC Gardner would accept that and not feel a need to punish Faith for fulfilling the FBI’s mission.

Slade took a deep breath when he pulled into the station. "There's a shot. This will be the last time we see each other, depending on how angry our bosses are. So I just want to say thank you. I wouldn't have been able to solve this case without you. Not in time to save Carpenter anyway, and probably not in time to save anyone. Whatever happens in there, I'm glad we worked together."

“Me too,” Faith replied. She squeezed his shoulder. “Good luck in there.”

“Yeah. You too.”

The three of them walked inside. Even Turk looked anxious about what was to come.

So when they walked inside to the sound of applause from the gathered members of the Carmel Police Department, it took them a moment to process what was happening. It wasn’t until the captain approached with a grin on his face and shook both of their hands that Faith realized that they weren’t in trouble after all.

Well, Slade wasn’t in trouble. ASAC Gardner was there, but she had a frosty smile underneath eyes hard enough to cut diamond. Faith had a feeling that she was going to get a very different greeting in a few minutes.

The officers took turns congratulating each of them. Faith made small talk with several of them, and Turk, of course, was the star of the show. He sat in the middle of the room with his chin lifted, smiling contentedly as everyone hugged, pet, scratched and loved on him. If he ever did retire, he would be the world’s happiest lapdog.

Faith kept a smile on her face, but she kept an eye on Tabitha out of the corner of her eye. The ASAC was clearly just counting the minutes before she could pull Faith aside and give her a tongue-lashing and possibly something worse. Part of Faith just wanted to get it over with, but another part of Faith took some pleasure in making Tabitha wait while all of her admiring fans thanked her for doing what Tabitha had expressly forbidden her to do.

Finally, the ASAC had enough. She approached Faith, her frosty smile now the grin of a crocodile approaching her prey. “Special Agent, will you join me for a cigarette?”

“I don’t smoke,” Faith replied. She was sorely tempted to leave it at that, but it was probably best not to push her luck. “I’ll step outside with you for a moment, though.”

“Thank you.”

The two women made their way to the side of the building where Tabitha had first warned Faith to stay away from the case. Tabitha did light a cigarette, some fancy high-class brand that Faith didn’t recognize. She took three deep puffs, then turned to Faith. No smile this time.

“Well done, Special Agent.”

Faith blinked. “Ma’am?”

“Well done. You solved the case. You caught the bad guy. And the press loves you.”

“The press?”

“Yes. The Indianapolis Field Office informed them that due to the Bureau’s pressing needs, you were unable to speak with them. However, they express their sincere gratitude to the Philadelphia Field Office for lending your expertise and allowing them to apprehend Ms. Sawyer as quickly as they did. You are once more America’s darling.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“Screw you, Bold.”

“Ah,” Faith replied drily. “There it is.”

“Yep,” Tabitha said curtly, taking another puff on her cigarette. “There it is. You’ll notice I’m still here and not in Philadelphia.”

"Yes, ma'am. I assume you knew that I was going to disregard your instructions."

“I knew. I was going to catch you in the act and have you suspended indefinitely without pay until I could have you dismissed. Obviously, that didn’t work out. Technically, I could still do that since you worked while suspended due to a failed psych exam, but that would be bad press, and the FBI sorely needs good press right now.”

“In other words, ma’am, you got what you wanted, and I got what I wanted. We prevented further murders, and the world isn’t demanding to burn the FBI to the ground. Funny how that works.”

“As I said, well done. And I suppose you’ve earned your little bit of sarcasm. Now here’s the risk you’ve taken.”

She took another puff and said, “Are you sure you don’t want a cigarette? I have a feeling you’ll need one when you hear what I have to say.”

“I’m all right, thank you, ma’am.”

Tabitha shrugged. “All right. Because you ignored my instructions, Franklin West might go free.”

Faith’s jaw went slack as a wave of dizziness washed over her. “What? What the hell are you talking about?”

“You investigated a case after failing a psychological evaluation. Retroactive to your discovery of Dr. Patel’s body, you officially investigated a case after failing a psychological evaluation. I realize that court isn’t your thing, but I’m sure you’re aware of how damaging such a breach of protocol can be to a prosecution.”

Faith’s mind scrambled for purchase. “But… that’s okay. It’s okay. Meredith Sawyer isn’t evil, she’s unwell. She’ll be in a mental institution regardless. And this has nothing to do with West.”

“At least until his defense attorneys catch wind of it and call into question your handling of his case and by extension the entire FBI’s.”

“I was cleared for duty at the time.”

“But you were not cleared to investigate West’s case. You weren’t, for example, cleared to track him down twice, by yourself, and attempt to arrest him without backup and without telling the FBI where he was. You weren’t cleared to break into Jared Greenwood’s house and assault him. And then there’s that little issue with your K9 attacking a foreign citizen in a subway.”

Turk growled softly, but Tabitha didn’t react. “The point of everything I’m saying, Special Agent, is that it would be very easy to paint you as violent and unstable and claim—no, prove —that your handling of the West case was severely unethical. And when that happens, the defense is going to move to have the case dismissed.”

“But they can’t do that!”

"Oh yes, they can. I seem to recall a very famous case of murder where a certain football star was acquitted of a crime everyone knew he committed because the police mishandled evidence. I can't imagine that being an FBI agent will absolve you of your own personal responsibility."

Faith’s legs felt weak. “But… you can’t do that. You can’t tell them I failed my psych. You can’t put West back on the street.”

“I won’t. I don’t want that psychopath on the street any more than you do. So here’s what happened. We threw your psych eval out. We shredded all the documents, wiped all of the emails and called Dr. Perth to let her know to purge everything on her end.”

“Did she?”

"She says she did. But she was very angry. She said"— Tabitha pulled out a piece of paper and read—"'two wrongs make a right this one time, but I am extremely disappointed in the Bureau for ignoring my recommendation. Special Agent Bold's recovery has been set back by possibly years, and the danger she poses working in her current state of mind is unconscionable. Were it any killer other than Franklin West, I would immediately report this action. But I grudgingly admit that he is even more dangerous than she. I resign as Bold's therapist immediately and strongly urge you to remove her from duty at once—and I'm doing that, by the way—' or she will present a very real danger to the innocent people around her.'"

A knife twisted in Faith’s gut. She didn’t believe that Dr. Perth was her friend, but she thought the doctor respected her more than that. To suggest that she was dangerous to others… that West was only just worse than she was… that was wrong. For Heaven’s sake, she was sad about the Boss’s death, she wasn’t a crazed psychopath.

“To be clear,” Tabitha continued. “The FBI’s position is that you should be kept on administrative leave and eventually brought back into the fold as a field agent. Like I told you before, you are a damned good detective. Possibly the best since Elliot Ness and possibly even better. But you have to learn to follow the rules. Very, very bad things happen when you don’t. I don’t know how to make this any clearer.”

She took another puff. “We think we put a lid on this before it got out of hand. We don’t think anyone knows that you failed your psych. Against all odds, it actually looks like we’re going to get away with this.” She met Faith’s eyes. “But please, for the sake of everyone, get yourself under control.”

She dropped her cigarette on the ground and crushed it with her heel, then stooped to pick it up and toss it in the trash can nearby. “They really need to bring back ashtrays in front of buildings.” She gave Faith one more look. “Walk the line, Special Agent. You’ve absolutely run out of room to do anything else.”

So saying, she left, her heels scraping rather than clacking over the icy ground. Faith stayed with Turk until her heartbeat calmed. Then she took a deep breath and rejoined the others. She managed to put a smile on her face and share in the celebration, but in the back of her mind, she could see West’s contemptuous leer and hear him promise as he had so many times before.

I will break you.