Page 56 of Faultline

She pours the cold coffee down the sink and refills from the pot. "I'll call Rhys. You should call Carl and let him know we want to present the fire evidence alongside the rest. His documentation of both burn sites adds the physical escalation to the financial pattern."

"You've already planned the agenda."

"I planned the agenda before the coffee was cold." She sips the fresh coffee. "Somebody has to."

"Somebody." I lean against the counter, arms crossed, watching her over the rim of my mug. "You're going to stand in front of the whole town and lay this out."

"Yes."

"Some of them took the money, Tosh. Some of them sold to the shell companies and moved. They're going to be in that room, and they're going to hear you say their fresh start was part of a depopulation strategy."

Her jaw tightens. She sets the mug down with a deliberate care. She's thought about this, run the scenario, made her decision. "They deserve to know. What they do with it is their call, but the information isn't optional. Not anymore."

The raven calls again from the ridge. The sound drops into the kitchen through the single-pane glass and fades into the hiss of the woodstove.

She's right. She's been right about this since the first client went quiet and she started pulling threads that I didn't know existed. The only reason Cascade hasn't already won is that they planned for a man who wouldn't sell his land and didn't plan for the woman sitting in his kitchen building the case that turns their entire operation into a federal target.

I set my coffee down and cross the kitchen. She watches me come.

Her chin lifts, and the readiness in her eyes is automatic. She reads approach the way I read terrain, constantly, instinctively, measuring intent before contact.

I stop close enough that the warmth between us fills the gap. My hand finds the back of her neck, my fingers settling against her nape with a weight that isn't gentle but isn't rough. Deliberate. The kind of grip that says I've decided something about her she didn't get consulted on, and I'm not interested in discussing it.

"Call Rhys," I say. "Set the meeting. I'll get Carl and pull the evidence he collected from both sites."

"That's the plan."

"I know. You already made it." My thumb traces the tendon at the side of her throat, and her pulse jumps against the pad. "I'm telling you I'm in."

"You've been in since they flagged your grandfather's grave, Liam."

"I've been in since you told Rhys women were unreachable and nobody with a badge was going to fix it faster than you would."

My hand stays on her neck. Her eyes hold mine, and what passes between us isn't the desperate heat of the other night. It's worse. It's the certainty that this woman is inside every defense I built, and I no longer want her out. I didn't authorize that. I'm not fighting it.

"Make the calls," I say. I release her neck and step back. "I'll start mapping the presentation for the meeting. Property acquisitions, the corridor, the lithium. You handle the relocation evidence and the corporate structure. Rhys brings the law enforcement pattern."

"Three tracks," she says. "Same table."

"I'll handle the maps." I pick up my mug. "And Tosh?"

She's already reaching for the phone. "What?"

"Your case is better than my fuel break."

The look she gives me lands somewhere between the ribs, in the space I stopped letting people reach years ago. "That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me."

"Don't get used to it."

"Wouldn't dream of it." She dials Rhys. Her voice when he answers carries the crisp authority of a woman who's been building toward this call since the morning she sat in the Ridgeline and laid names on a table for a sheriff who was already suspicious.

I stand at the kitchen window with my coffee and watch the tree line while she talks. The spruce are doing what they always do. Growing. Holding ground. Rooted in soil that contains a mineral deposit worth enough to attract the kind of people who view cemeteries as geological data and vulnerable women as obstacles to be relocated.

Tosh's voice carries through the kitchen, steady and sharp, laying out the framework for Rhys. Dates. Entity names. The registration chain. She's giving him the same briefing she gave me, compressed, every word chosen to move a cautious sheriff toward a public stand.

When she hangs up, the kitchen is quiet. The woodstove ticks. The raven has gone silent on the ridge.

"Rhys is in," she says. "He'll set the meeting for this week."