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When did I lose it?
When did I lose the edge that makes me good at my job? The cases close, eventually, but mostly due to sheer stubborn will. My city, my cases, my responsibility. When did I start to forget every hour of my training until I bumble along like a newborn deer on weak legs. Knocking into everything and hurting the people around me.
I’m uncomfortable in my chair, at my desk. The wheels squeak, the fabric is worn in all the wrong places, and the desk somehow shrank three inches. Now, the wood top knocks against my knees when they bob.
Has it ever happened before?
The details of all three cases are spread out in front of me, the pictures at the rear of the stack of information and the typed black text blurring together.
“Why did you really bring her in, Devan?” Naomi asks. “It doesn’t make sense to me. You didn’t read her her rights.”
She throws her hands up in the air, and not a hair of her tightly gelled black ponytail moves. It’s still pulled tightly enough to make her eyes narrow, eyes she’s trained on me without blinking.
She’s dogged me since I let Aria walk out of the building thirty minutes ago. Walk,hell. The woman didn’t walk anywhere. She strutted. She flowed like water, and every tick-tocking movement of her hips drew me in a little deeper into a pool I had no business looking at, let alone treading inside.
“I thought we’d get somewhere in the investigation,” I repeat. What other excuses do I have?
I’m so desperate to topple Broderick Stevens that I’m forgetting protocol. Or perhaps I’m so desperate to feel something besides shame, guilt, and loneliness.
“You mean you think she’s got a stronger connection to our stiff from yesterday?” Naomi questions.
I groan. “Of course, that’s what I mean.” I don’t want to bring her in on my side project yet. She’ll laugh in my face, tell me I’m nothing but a fool for trying to bring down the Syndicate. Or worse—
She’ll tell me I’m doing it for revenge, for what happened to my partner.
And she won’t be wrong.
“I remember seeing her face in the crowd. She kind of stands out; it’s all her hair. She’s the one you followed, isn’t she?”
Does Naomi ever stop to think before she talks? Not in my experience. We’ve worked together for six months now, and she’s lasted longer than any of the others the department tried to stick with me.
The mouth on her, though. She’s a free-flowing fountain of cheer and goodwill, and most days, I approach her with hesitance and a little rueful curiosity. Today, I want to staple her lips shut.
“Please, Ellison, let it go,” I say.
Which brings to mind memories of another mouth, another hand, and my agitation is back with a vengeance. The whole situation this afternoon went from shit to worse, and it was my fault. My fault entirely. Which didn’t help my bad mood.
Since when did I go from being a good cop to having a chip on my shoulder?
“Tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it,” she replies. “But for the love of life, you need to keep your head on the case. There are other people involved in this, the victim’s family and friends. We’re the ones who can bring some kind of justice for them.”
“I know.” I blow out a sharp breath. “Trust me, I know. You’re following through on the connections linking our vics?” I ask, struggling to focus on the things I can control rather than the ones I can’t, things like Aria.
“Of course I am.” Naomi nods and starts spouting off the strings linking our three dead computer hackers. “I’ve been working on it nonstop. Jasleen was right about the murder weapon, but the angle and force are the same for all three killing wounds.”
“I believe all three of them worked for the same independent online contractor. You said they worked from home, something online,” I say, trying hard to be part of this conversation and do my fucking job.
I hate myself for letting things get out of control, especially considering Aria’s ties. She’s potentially connected to the man I’m desperate to bring down. The man I want to make pay for everything he’s done.
The type of revenge guaranteed to land me behind bars on the opposite side than I’m used to.
Naomi pushes her chair away from the desk and somehow manages to make the wheels screech against the floor. “Oops!” That’s all she says, and that with a smile. She runs a hand through her hair, and it doesn’t move. “Yes, it seems they all worked online for an independent contractor. We haven't been able to trace it yet. I’ve got someone working on it, though. How about I run down the street and grab us some good coffee, and we can steal one of the empty offices. A little talk-it-out session, you know what I’m saying? I think it will be good to freeform brainstorm and see where we land.”
This far away from the windows, and with the grime caking the class, it’s impossible to tell time. I used to get so swept away in my cases, all those damn extra cases Layla and I took on trying to find her father’s killer, that time never made a difference for me.
Now?
The years of pushing have caught up to me. I’m older than my age, ancient instead of almost thirty.
