Page 16

The flames lick their way from one building to the next, and in places where it doesn't catch well enough, it’s suspected that propellant may have been thrown on. The fire department had to set up a line between Downtown and Crennick in the end, and only there was the blaze stopped. No other suburb caught so much as an ember.

But of Crennick, it has turned to ash and smoke. Few buildings are left. The old gunpowder factory had enough residue to start the blaze over again in the middle, spewing off in every direction.

For two days, Crennick burned, and little else happened in Tregam during that time. Even now, the news reports only on the fire as though it were an accident, conjecturing the squatters may have started it. Indeed, they may have, but the rest of Tregam kept it going.

It’s a tragedy, that’s what the news says, at least until the blaze is dying down, leaving the black ground and nothing else behind. Many of Cassandra's followers who ran into Crennick away from the angry mob are never seen again, and an unfortunate handful of others are lost, presumed burned.

Many walk through the ash on the third day, an empty palette where so much loomed for so long. Embers glow, ruins still smoking.

The station is quiet, nearly empty in the aftermath as most of the detectives are out on burn sites, old remains revealed among the fresh rubble suggesting answers to cold cases.

Dirk and I step together into Tawill’s office. Her forehead is smoother than last time, and while the sight of us seems to tire her, it doesn’t anger her. There’s a weight lifted from her.

A weight has been lifted off all of our shoulders, really. There was no National Guard in the end. It was fire, a natural disaster, as far as those outside Tregam were concerned. We sit down. Howie and Dean have already been through and received the necessary reprimand from the department.

Howie has gone into retirement two months early. His case is resolved anyway, and the retirement is long coming. Dean is on paid leave for a month while he thinks about his disobedient actions.

“I’ll have to suspend you both unless you can give a good clue on Needler’s whereabouts?” Tawill asks, not with much hope or even interest. For her, Needler being out of her hands is a good thing, a problem solved.

I spread my hands. “Last I saw, he was running off into Crennick.” To Dirk, I ask, “You?”

He shrugs. “Dude is probably ash by now.”

“Mm-hm.” Tawill’s eyes narrow on us, and she moves on quickly. “Well, it’ll be Christmas soon. You can both start again in the new year.”

I smile, reaching out to catch Dirk’s fingers over the arm of my chair. I don’t care if she sees. Life is too short to keep your hands off the one you love. Tawill barely bats an eye. “We’ll need time off to move, anyway.”

We found a place, on the old edge of old Crennick. A penthouse of a lower, older apartment building. We get the keys this weekend. Soon, I’ll say farewell to Olivia’s memory entirely.

“Then I’ll see you both next year.”

The cells are the only bustling part of the station. They’re filled mostly with Cocooner followers rounded up in the confusion of three nights ago. A dozen or so men crowd one, stripped of their weapons and their purpose. They sit around looking sorry for themselves. In the other cell are three women who were caught in the school compound, the only women devoted enough to Cocooner to be there. Two rile and demand their rights, while the other sits quietly, flinching at every noise.

We don’t linger long. Safe to say Cocooner’s legacy is dead behind those bars.

Stopping by the stark white cell that homed Needler, I jab the code in and step into his side. It feels empty, like a house moved out of. Though nothing else has changed, the furniture, the coffee cup, are all still in place. The only point of colour is the red folder I gave him, the one on the ruined copycat Cocooner scene. It sits on the small metal desk.

Dirk steps up to the glass, quiet, a distant look in his eye. In the end, Tristan killed his monster. Maybe Dirk would have wanted to do it himself, but this is how things worked out. And Dirk can be a free man for it.

Idly, I flip open the red binder, frowning when my eyes catch on the messy scrawl of ink. It’s one word, large, capitalised the way a child would. I wonder when Tristan learned to write, with the mess that was his childhood.

I dearly hope he’s found peace now.

The word scrawled in the ‘perpetrator’ section of the thin document is WOMAN .

I huff a short laugh. “Needler figured out this case.”

“What?” Dirk steps over and looks down at the word. He takes the binder. “Huh. He could be right?”

“How many women do you think followed Cocooner?”

He lifts his head. “Shit. At least three.”

I think of the cell we just passed. What are the odds that one of them is our murderer? “Okay, let’s pass it on.”

“Yeah,” Dirk hums and I turn away, heading for the exit as he runs his eyes over the rest of the binder.

I’ve reached the door, about to put the code in again, when Dirk’s voice comes, exasperated. “Oh, fuck him.”

I spin around. “What?”

Dirk is holding the binder to me, directing my attention with his thumb to a small scribble in the corner. I squint, focussing. “Is that…?”

“The door code,” Dirk confirms, sounding more annoyed than impressed. “He fucking knew it all along.”

I snort, then break into a laugh. Because what else can I do? At least since the raid, maybe before, Tristan could have walked out of here. He could even have walked out of here a hero with Conrad and the people.

“Fuck me,” Dirk groans, and closes the binder. “Asshole.”

Laughing, I take his hand. “Come on. Let’s drop this off on our way out.”

He squeezes my hand back, his ire falling away. “Okay. Then to the new place? We’ve got our first Christmas together to plan.”

A warm feeling infuses me. The first of many. I bite my lip.

“Let’s go home.”