Page 17

A year and a half later. Spring.

Crennick is levelled, already becoming a memory underneath what’s growing in its place. That’s right. Growing . The charcoal of the ruins went a long way to soaking up the toxins which killed anything that tried to sprout before. Now, they're trying a thing called phytoremediation.

Something to do with using plants to leech out what toxins are left. And it’s working—we see the barren swath as large as several suburbs turn gradually greener each week from our balcony. There’s even birdsong some mornings.

As for the crime in the city, it’s dropped, proving right the voices that insisted that having such a good place to do crime led to more of it. We’re down twenty percent, and about to be knocked off the top of the highest crime rate list, with the potential to drop much further. Drug use is on a similar trajectory, with their preferred hideouts and trading spots all gone.

The bones and remains found in the clearance led to many cold cases being shut, and that’s most of what Dirk and I worked on this past year after the fake Cocooner was arrested right from our own cells. She was a quiet, mousy woman who basically confessed the minute we pressured her. Partners still, Dirk and I then closed a handful of cold cases. The perpetrators were mostly either long dead or in prison already for a different crime, but we had some arrests made, too.

That was before we quit.

Today marks the first week of Dirk’s unemployment, before starting up again as a PI, and it’s my last week before I join him. We’ve had enough madness and murder for both our lifetimes by now.

Howie lasted six months before he begged his way back from retirement, becoming a professional consultant two days a week at the precinct, spending most of those days working with Dean on whatever case he’s on. Or he spends his time lingering in the lab with Rosie. Sometimes I wonder if they’d have a more successful retirement if they tried it together.

Chloe worked her way up as fast as we all expected and is now employed at the precinct, bouncing between the lab, semi-partner to Dean, and still acting as an admin girl. She’s certainly a woman of many hats.

As for Conrad, I stood up for him in court. He was broken, hurting and desperate when he did what he did. In the end, he only served a year for inciting public unrest. I’m glad to see him running for mayor again. People are saying someone who’s served time will never be elected, but he’s looking popular so far.

As for Needler, as far as the city is concerned, he’s gone. For now, or forever, none of us can say. But he sure left a legacy Tregam won’t soon forget. Especially since the popular vote pushed hard enough to have a statue of a man in a silver mask, a needle clutched in one fist, erected in the new centre of Crennick.

There were rumours of having a dismembered Cocooner built at his feet, but that was where the council drew the line.

Oh, and Dirk and I married. It was fast, a small affair where his mother cried happy tears for the whole thing, and Howie walked me down the aisle. Meanwhile, my mother flew in to at least learn Dirk’s name.

We’re still in that penthouse apartment, overlooking the slow change that’s taking over Crennick.

"Dirk!" I squeal, half a laugh as I dodge around the end of the bed.

He was supposed to still be asleep when I left for work. He wasn’t, and now he’s got ideas that are not conducive to me being on time. That’s how he’s ended up chasing me around the room naked.

I feint right, and Dirk takes the bait, coming around the base of the bed, but when I jump onto the mattress instead, aiming to run across it and cut for the door, Dirk reacts too fast, meeting me at the edge of the bed and taking my legs out from under me so that I fall heavily back onto the quilt.

He's on top of me in an instant, hands imprisoning mine, and my heavy breathing is from far more than the exertion. "That was fun. Maybe I should chase around the apartment next time?"

I feel him between my legs, already hard, the wet tip of him on my labia as my bathrobe falls up and open. " Maybe you should save your energy. I need to get to work."

"Come on," Dirk barters, leaning down and nipping my ear in a way he knows makes me weak in the knees. "What’s the point of the chase if I don't get to enjoy the catch?"

"I'm not a deer. And Tawill is mad enough at me."

"So? You’re quitting, remember? We’re gonna go take rich people’s money for spying on their wives or whatever instead."

“That should be our slogan,” I say wryly.

"Come on, just a quickie?"

It’s kind of nice, this being wanted so much. But then, having a good reference is nice too. "You're lying."

"Mm," Dirk hums, far from denying it. Then he tilts his hips, his tip parting me. I gasp, quickly losing resistance as he presses, sliding deeper.

I make a noise that is definitely not one of protest, and then he's flush over me. "This isn't… good… self-control," I gasp as he thrusts.

Rasping against my ear, Dirk observes, "My therapist says a healthy sex life is important for taking control back."

Away from me, in other words.

If only I minded.

***

In the end, he makes me so late that I give in and call in sick. We go for a walk in Crennick instead, which is not something you only do if you have a fetish for getting the shit beaten out of you anymore.

The plants are stunted, yellow. That’s part of phytoremediation, apparently. They die, then are taken away, and new ones are planted until eventually, something lives. Like the trees that have reached almost my height further around the path, which was built of bricks salvaged from the ruins. Many of them are blackened by the fire, lending an interesting pattern as they curve over the landscape.

Tregam has become an expert on these things this past year. There's no more smell, even on the windiest days, and the brick paths wind between new growth and occasional plaques. Ahead is the centre, a circular area containing the Needler statue and a handful of other people notable to Tregam’s earlier history, and a memorial.

There’s the occasional bridge arcing over holes in the ground too, to remind us of what Crennick once was, and that’s the only reminder we need.

It’s going to be a new suburb one day, with parks, homes and businesses. Lives. No more death.

We walk under the bough of the tallest tree yet, some hardy variety, which is determined to make it no matter how much toxin it takes in.

I can feel Dirk’s wedding ring between my fingers. A simple gold band.

We stop by a plaque claiming to be the approximate spot where the fire that ended it all started. There’s none for Cocooner, though her spot must be around here somewhere. It’s hard to tell, with the landmarks gone. She doesn’t get to be remembered. Only her victims, on the memorial in the square, among the names of all who were murdered in Crennick.

Those, we don’t forget.

"Do you think he really was a psycho? Like his sister, but different?” Dirk asks, and I don’t need to ask who he’s talking about. He’s also asking if we did the right thing by letting him go. I’ve often wondered that myself.

“I don’t know. Maybe not before. But killing his own sister… that could make someone insane. Couldn’t it?”

“I don’t ever want to know,” Dirk concludes. “What do you think he's up to now?"

I tilt my head. "I don't know. I hope he started fresh."

"Somewhere else," Dirk inputs.

I smile back at him. "Don’t tell me you're jealous now ?" I tug on a lock of his hair. He's let it stay long, the way I like it.

Hand cinching my waist, Dirk pulls me against his side. "Pfft. What would I have to be jealous of?” Smiling, he notes, "I've got you married to me now. You're all mine." He nuzzles my neck suddenly, eliciting a shocked squeal.

"There are families here, Dirk!" I remind him.

"There are, aren’t there?" he muses, pulling back. "Hey, do you reckon we should make one of those?"

I raise an eyebrow. "Is that really how you're gonna ask for a baby?"

"Well, there’s a way I'd like to ask."

"Dirk…"

"Come on, my mother is nagging me about grandkids." Grinning, he adds, "We probably won't even need to take care of it, you know. She'll be so keen to babysit."

"True parenting ambition, right there," I say dryly, then meet his eye. "You really want to be a father?”

Face turning serious, he tugs me a little closer. “I do.”

“You'll have to curb your swearing," I point out.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be good.” Dirk holds my hands, getting me to meet his eyes. “Come on, you ready?"

My lips tug into a smile. “I think I am.”

***

The End