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Chapter Text

There are three things every detective knows about international calls at 7:17 AM: they are usually scams, they don’t bring good news, and they always come when you have no mental capability to deal with the bullshit. Which is why Rebecca didn’t pick up after first ring. She just finished her shift. Twelve hours of gang violence, domestic disputes, one overdose she couldn’t shake out of her mind—the kid was so young. And now this? Her thumb hovered over the screen, right over the decline button, but ultimately swiped right. That surprised even her.

“McKenzie,” she said automatically, keeping her eyes on the cracked sidewalk. Big cup of iced coffee sweated in her hand.

Silence.

“If this is about my car’s extended warranty, I’m hanging up and filing a complaint with the FCC,” she warned. God, she already regretted picking up before even getting the first sip. When would she learn?

Someone at the other end of the line breathed hard. Lord, not that kind of a call—

“…Rebecca?”

No way. No. Fucking. Way. This is impossible. How?

Her brother was dead. Ghosts don’t call. Ghosts don’t have phone numbers. Especially not international ones.

She never expected to hear his voice again. The last time she’d heard from him was a goodbye voicemail she got one summer day three years ago. She listened to his message over and over, crying and screaming in turns, until she accepted the worst: he was gone forever. Not just from their house, their life, or their country. Forever. So she buried his memory in her mind, shoved her phone to the bottom of her drawer, and tried to keep on living.

Her cup hit the sidewalk, and she didn’t even feel dropping it. The coffee spread over the surface, pooling under her boots. It made her irrationally angry. Yet another mess she’d have to clean up.

She backed into the nearest wall she could find and let it hold her up. Her knees couldn’t be trusted anymore to do the job.

It must be a prank. My brother is dead. He can’t call. Can he…?

“…Jake?” she said, her mouth suddenly dry. “Is this really you?”

She hated the way it came out. It sounded like she was begging.

“Yeah.”

Holy fuck. There could be no mistake. It was her brother. He only said two words, but she didn’t need more. Just the first—just the way he said her name like he used to, when they were kids and he’d done something stupid, already knew he screwed up, and she was his last shot at getting out of it. She’d know that voice anywhere. It was Jake, even if he sounded… different. Older. Haunted, maybe. Appropriate for a ghost, she thought, and choked on something halfway between a laugh and a sob.

“You aren’t dead,” she said, and didn’t even try to soften it.

“I’m not.”

Rebecca didn’t know what to say next. Because what do you say to someone you already buried in your mind? What happened? Are you okay? Where have you been? What the fuck, Jacob? One hand landed on her chest, as if she was trying to stop her heart from bursting out.

“I got your message,” she said finally. “Three years ago. Remember that?”

He hesitated. “Yeah.”

“You said you were ashamed of yourself.” Her throat tightened. “But you were proud of me. And I thought... fuck.” She closed her eyes and leaned her head against the cold concrete. It hurt, but she just pressed harder. “It sounded like—Jesus, Jake, it sounded like you were dying.”

“I thought I was.” His voice was so quiet it barely made it through the static. “I thought we all were.”

Her pulse jumped. We all were? Not just I. We. “Jake, who’s we?”

He didn’t answer.

“Were you in danger?” she asked. “What kind of mess did you get into this time?”

“I can’t explain it.”

“You can’t or you won’t?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I could.”

She barked a bitter laugh. “Try me. I’ve seen a lot of unbelievable shit in this job.”

“Not this,” he said, low. “It was bad, sis. Real bad.”

She froze for a heartbeat. Her hand balled into a fist and slammed hard into the wall beside her.

“I didn’t tell Mama you called,” she hissed. “I didn’t tell anyone. You know how hard that was? She deserved to know. But I thought—fuck—I thought you were saying goodbye... and I couldn’t let her hear it. I couldn’t let you break her heart again. Goddamn you, Jake.”

“I didn’t mean to—”

“Well, but you did.” Her voice cracked, and she hated it, hated how much she still gave a damn. “You knew exactly what that message would do. Christ, Jake, I thought it was a suicide note! You don’t send something like that unless—” She broke off, breath hitching. “Unless you’re about to eat a bullet or do something fucking stupid.”

“I’m sorry.”

“That’s it? Sorry?” She let out a short, ugly, sharp laugh. “You disappear for six years, and all you’ve got is sorry?”

“I am.”

“You dropped that on me like a landmine,” she spat. “And just walked the fuck away. Do you even know what it did to me?”

“I do.”

“No, you don’t.” Her voice cut. “Don’t you dare say that, unless you’ve spent the last few years wondering whether your big brother bled out alone in some goddamn ditch. Unless you’ve had to look your mother in the eye and lie. Every birthday. Every holiday. Every time she cooked your favorite food like maybe, maybe this would be the one you came home for. She still has your cereal, you know that? It’s long expired, but she still keeps it in the back of the pantry. There’s always a plate waiting for you, same as for Dad, and you’re never—never there—”

Jake didn’t answer for a long time. When he did, his voice was breaking apart. “She still sets a plate?”

“Yeah. She never stopped. When that bastard Lundgren showed up at the house, all smug and full of bullshit, she knew he was lying, same as I did, but we couldn’t prove shit, and you were gone and—” Her voice cracked completely. “Do you know what it’s been like? Six years of people looking at us like you were a traitor? Six years of Mama defending you to everyone who’d listen and half the people who wouldn’t?”

“I know what I cost you—”

“You don’t know anything!” The words exploded out of her. “You ran. You vanished into thin air, and I’ve been left here trying to hold everything together. Not knowing if you were dead or alive. Or what the hell happened to you! I mourned you twice. Twice, Jake.” She bit her lip hard enough to taste blood, to stop herself from sobbing, to make her body hurt more than her soul did. “I knew you weren’t selling no goddamn weapons. But you weren’t there to prove it, and everyone believed him. Mama kept hoping you’d call and explain, but you never fucking did.”

He didn’t argue, and she hated that it made her even angrier. How could he just let her bleed it out and didn’t try to stop her with one of his half-assed bullshit excuses?

“And then I got your fucking voicemail. I sat on it for three goddamn years thinking now you’re dead for sure, and I’m the only one who heard you say goodbye. Why didn’t you call again? Why didn’t you come back?”

“I couldn’t. It wasn’t safe—”

“Safe for who?” She barked. “You? Us? Because I’ve got news for you, Jake. It wasn’t exactly safe for us either. You think having everyone believe your brother is a traitor doesn’t put a target on your back? You think the academy was thrilled to have someone related to an arms dealer in their program? I had to work my ass off twice as hard as anyone else, just to prove I was worth the shot, and I was still just one signature away from being kicked out!”

The silence stretched between them, heavy with six years of unspoken damage.

“Why are you even calling me now?” She sobbed. “What do you want?”

“I’ve been cleared. There’s—” his voice broke off. “There’s proof I didn’t do what they told y’all I did. Real proof. I got my name cleared. It was Lundgren selling the weapons. Not me.”

Real proof. After all this time, after all the sleepless nights and the whispered conversations and careful questions she’d asked around the department, trying to dig up anything that might clear his name. She’d found nothing. And now he said there’s proof. God, please let it be true.

Her hand tightened on the phone. “What? How?”

“I can’t explain over the phone. Rebecca… I’m coming home,” he said. “Next week.”

Her brain just... stopped.

Coming home. She heard the words, but they didn’t make any sense, almost like her brain didn’t know how to process the information. She couldn’t breathe. Her hand felt numb.

Jake. Coming home. Next week.

And somehow it hurt more than anything he’d ever said to her. He’d be home next week. How dare he? How come his voice is so calm, like he was just announcing he’d be home for dinner after work, like the last six years never happened?

I don’t want to see you ever again, she wanted to scream, same as she did the night before he left for basic when she was still a teenage girl, angry and hurt and stupid. Those words still haunted her. Jake had looked at her like she’d slapped him. And every time he came home on leave after that, he stayed a little shorter, talked a little less—until one day someone else came instead of him and brought lies and heartbreak.

And she never even told him how sorry she was.

“I’ll be there,” she said instead, even though part of her wanted to hang up and scream and throw her phone across the street. “When you come home. I’ll be there.”

“Thank you.” She could swear her brother sighed with relief. “Becks…?”

“What now?”

“I’m bringing someone.”

She wiped her eyes with the back of her free hand. “You mean, like your lawyer?”

“My wife.”

Rebecca blinked hard, eyes focusing on a distant palm tree like it might help her process what the hell he just said.

“Your what?”

“My wife.”

“When? Where? How?” The questions spilled out of her mouth like the coffee she dropped on the sidewalk. “You’ve been running for six years and you found time to get married, but not to call your mother?”

“It’s... complicated.”

“Everything’s complicated with you.” But some of the sharpest edge had gone out of her voice. He’d found someone. In the middle of whatever nightmare he’d been living, he’d found someone who loved him enough to marry him. Her throat clenched. God, how did he even get there—

“She for real?” The words came out sharper than she meant.

“Yeah.”

“You love her?”

“Very much.”

“What’s her name?”

“Taylor. She’s—ah, you’ll see. You’ll like her, I promise.”

“I’ll be damned,” she muttered. “You, married. Didn’t think you were the type.”

“Didn’t think I was either.” And yeah, he was smiling now, she could hear it. That old dumb lopsided smile he used to get when he’d done something reckless and knew it, and didn’t regret a second of it. “But here we are.”

“She knows?” Rebecca asked. “About what really happened to you?”

“She knows. Everything.”

Everything? The word hit like a slap. So this woman, this stranger knew the truth that Rebecca had been trying to piece together for six years, knew what had really happened, what kind of danger Jake had been in. Maybe even why he’d sounded like he was dying three years ago. And she, his sister, didn’t. God, it hurt. She bit the inside of her cheek.

She almost said I missed you. Almost said don’t you ever disappear on me like that again. But she didn’t trust her voice, and she didn’t owe him comfort. Not yet. He didn’t say anything either, so she just ended the call. And then she stood there, hand still clenched around the phone, staring at the coffee stain under her boots.

Next week couldn’t come soon enough.

In just under fifteen minutes, Detective Rebecca McKenzie learned three new things about international calls coming early in the morning: not all of them are scams, sometimes they do bring good news, and they can even bring ghosts back from the dead.

The hard part was figuring out what the fuck you were supposed to do with them now that they were back.

Chapter Text

It was all a dream.

That was Rebecca’s first thought when she opened her eyes. She must’ve dreamt the whole damn thing—the call from her dead brother, her chief’s face when she asked for emergency leave, the flight, the long drive on autopilot, the half-hearted hug she gave her mother in the doorway before collapsing into her childhood bed.

What a cruel dream to have. Jake’s voice—his fucking voice—still echoed in her skull, telling her he was alive, and he was coming back home. It felt so real, and yet it couldn’t be.

I don’t want to wake up. Let me dream forever.

Her eyes stung. She rolled onto her stomach, shoved her face into the pillow and let the white linen soak up her tears. Wait—white? Her pillow was green. She remembered buying it with her roommate, laughing that she had to get it because it matched her red hair, then laughing even harder, because who the hell buys a pillow based on that? And just like that, it hit her. She wasn’t in her LA apartment, but in her childhood bedroom with its slanted ceiling still covered in glow-in-the-dark stars. It wasn’t a dream. Jake really wasn’t dead after all, and after six long years, he was finally coming back.

Today.

After all this time, is it even still his home? The voice at the back of her head wouldn’t shut up no matter how hard she tried to ignore it. Who the hell cares? He was still her brother, and she was still going to see him again. That was the part that counted. She didn’t know what she’d do first—punch him, hug him, fall apart. Maybe all three. But she’d get to hold his hand again, hear his voice in person, not on the damn voicemail that sounded like a final goodbye.

And maybe for a moment they’d feel like family once again. Like he never had to run in the first place.

When she opened the door to her room, the smell of cinnamon hit her nose. For one short and stupid second, she was ten again, running barefoot downstairs to race Jake to the kitchen and steal the first roll. She found her mother at the counter—apron on, sleeves rolled up, deep in dough.

“Mornin’, Mama,” she said softly, not wanting to startle her.

Her mother didn’t look up. “Thought I’d make cinnamon rolls. He always liked those. You think he still does?”

Liked? That was understatement of the century. Jake used to inhale half of the pan before it even had a chance to cool. Mom pretended to scold him, and yet still always saved him the last one. But who knows what six years on the run could do to a man. What if he didn’t like sweets anymore? What if he didn’t remember home at all?

“Well, I hope he does,” mom said, already reaching for next tray. “If not, there’s cornbread. And pot roast. I might make the baked mac and cheese too, just in case.”

Rebecca rubbed her eyes and leaned on the counter. “That’s a lot of food.”

“He’s been gone six years,” mom whispered, still looking everywhere but at her. “What if he’s hungry?”

He’s married now, Mama. Pretty sure they figured out how to feed themselves by now, she wanted to say, but bit her tongue. There was no reason to pretend it was about food at all.

“You been up all night?”

“Couldn’t sleep.” Mom glanced at her with a tight smile, already reaching for next bowl. “Had to keep my hands busy.”

Or else I’d fall apart.

She didn’t say that last part, but Rebecca had learned to read her mother’s silences a long time ago. She watched her restless hands for a moment, then walked around the counter and pulled her mother into a hug.

“I don’t even know who he is now,” she whispered, resting her chin on Rebecca’s shoulder. “Don’t know what to say to him.”

“You’ll know when you see him,” she promised her mother, hoping it sounds like she believed her own words. Truth was, she had no idea what to say to him either. In her head, Jake was still the big brother who taught her how to throw a punch and told her to never hit first but always hit last. The one who used to braid her hair like an expert, but only after making her swear she wouldn’t tell anyone. The one who got her out of trouble at least as often as he got her into it. But it was a lifetime ago. The man who called last week could have very well been a stranger.

Mom wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, then smiled. “You gonna help me crack the eggs?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I can do that.”

They moved through the morning on muscle memory alone, passing ingredients, bowls, chopping things, and carefully dancing around the elephant in the room.

She had so many questions, so many doubts. Who are you now? What do you like? How much have you changed? What do I even know about you now, really?

When they heard the sound of gravel crunching under tires, both of their heads snapped up. Mom’s hand found Rebecca’s without a word.

“You go first,” she whispered. ”I need a minute.”

Rebecca gave her hand a squeeze, then stepped out of the door before she could second guess anything.

Jake stood at the bottom of the steps.

For a second she couldn’t breathe. Her brother—her idiot, impossible, pain-in-the-ass brother—was real again, standing right there on the porch.

The last six years were etched in lines around his eyes. His hair was longer, with sun-bleached strands. She could already hear it: “Jacob McKenzie, what did you do to your hair?” Mama’s gonna have opinions, she thought, and a broken laugh almost escaped her. But it died when he met her gaze. He looked so much like their father now. Same stubborn jaw, same blue eyes that had seen too much.

The reckless teenager she remembered was gone. This was a man who looked like he didn’t sleep for a week.

Good. She barely let herself think it. Good. I hope you lay awake thinking about the empty chair at our table. About me lying every time Mama asked if I’d heard from you.

She stepped forward and punched her fist into his shoulder. It could have been harder—God, she had to stop herself mid-aim or she’d hit his stupid face—but it still made him stumble back a step. He deserved that. And then she pulled him into her arms. He deserved that, too.

God, it was an awkward hug. Her elbow landed somewhere in his ribs, her nose smashed into his collarbone, and his hand tangled in the apron she forgot to take off. It was perfect. She never wanted to let him go.

“You look like shit,” she muttered into his shirt. “And still not any taller.”

Jake let out a short, surprised laugh that sounded more like a cry. “You’re still too pointy.”

She might’ve kicked his shin in response. He might’ve pretended that’s why he cried. But neither of them moved.

“You bastard,” she said, wrapping her arms around him even tighter. “You fucking bastard.”

“I know.” His voice broke on it. “I know.”

The screen door creaked again. Rebecca turned slightly so she could see her mother.

“Hey, Ma,” Jake said, and his voice broke completely.

Mom crossed the porch and touched his face like she couldn’t believe he was real and wasn’t going to disappear again.

“My boy,” she whispered and wrapped him in a hug so full and tight Rebecca felt a wave of relief wash over her.

Her arms came around both her mother and her brother, and for a moment it was just the three of them again. The hug was awkward and clumsy, but she knew it was what they all needed. For a moment, it was enough to make everything feel right again, despite all the pain.

Mom pulled away first, brushing at her damp cheeks. “I need to check the oven,” she muttered, already heading inside. Rebecca glanced after her—there was nothing in the oven, but she wasn’t about to call it out. Mama just needed a minute to pull herself back together, let her have it. Rebecca’s hand stayed on Jake’s arm.

It took her a while to remember he said he wasn’t coming alone.

Rebecca hadn’t noticed her before. Well, no shit, she hadn’t even look that way. Her focus narrowed to one thing and one thing only: her brother, who wasn’t a ghost after all. But now she looked over his shoulder and saw the figure standing a few steps back, still next to the car, like she wasn’t sure if she was allowed to join them. Maybe she just wanted to give them space. Or maybe—Rebecca squinted at her—she wanted to run.

So that’s your wife? was her first thought, unkind as it was.

The woman looked… fragile. Drowned in a hoodie two sizes too big—Jake’s, probably—standing like she wanted to blur into background. Slim, maybe too much. Young. Eyes too big for her face. Rebecca wasn’t sure who she expected Jake’s wife to be, but it wasn’t her.

Then the woman shifted, and the picture changed. Taller than she looked at first, not fragile at all—just nervous and buried under all that fabric. And when she turned her eyes from Jake to her, Rebecca recognized that look automatically. Witnesses, victims, survivors. People who’d been through something they shouldn’t have, and refused to go under. Whatever else this girl was, she wasn’t weak.

Rebecca glanced back at Jake and gave a vague nod in the woman’s direction. “So, you gonna…?”

Jake blinked like the thought had only just hit him, then motioned Taylor over with an awkward little half-smile. Even he managed to forget about her for a moment.

“So,” he said, clearing his throat, “Rebecca… this is my wife. Taylor.”

Taylor crossed the few steps to the porch and held out her hand. “Nice to meet you,” she said with a small nod. Her handshake was as firm as Rebecca expected. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“And I’ve heard nothing about you,” Rebecca blurted out before she could stop herself. “Shit. Sorry. Didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know,” Taylor replied and her fingers lingered for a beat in Rebecca’s palm.

Rebecca coughed, pulled back, and motioned inside. “Y'all coming in, or we gonna stand out here all day?”

Taylor followed her into the kitchen, with Jake trailing a few steps back. He glanced towards the counter, then frowned when he realized his mother wasn’t there. “I’ll go check on her,” he said quietly, and slipped away before either of them could argue.

Rebecca didn’t know what to do with her hands, so she automatically reached for the coffee pot. “You want some coffee?” When she noticed a nod, she poured two mugs and slid one across the table. “Careful. It’s bad.”

Taylor took a cautious sip. Rebecca caught her wince—barely a twitch of her mouth, too small to notice unless you were looking for it. She tried to mask it, cleared her throat softly like maybe it was just hot, but it was too late. Rebecca laughed, seeing her face.

“Yeah, sorry ‘bout that. That’s the McKenzie blend. Dad used to say if it doesn’t make your soul cry, it’s not strong enough.”

“Still better than Jake’s,” Taylor smiled a little.

“We’ve been making it this way since forever.” Rebecca put her mug back on the table and ran her finger over the rim. “I used to hate this stuff. Thought I’d switch brands and do it my way as soon as I moved out. But now anything else just tastes wrong.”

She didn’t realize her throat was tightening until she tried to take another sip and couldn’t. Because suddenly it wasn’t about how terrible the coffee was. She was thinking about the holidays and the empty chairs and the smell of food and cinnamon rolls and—

She let out a shaky laugh, and then she realized she wasn’t laughing at all. She was crying. Ugly, noisy, shoulder-shaking crying, like she’d been holding it in for six fucking years and didn’t know how to stop now that it started.

Somewhere in the chaos of it, she felt that Taylor moved. One second she was across the table, the next she was beside her, arms looping around Rebecca’s shoulders, tentative at first, then firmer and warm.

She didn’t pull away. Didn’t even think about it. She just curled in and cried into the hoodie that definitely was her brother’s. He’d never get the mascara stains out, she thought, and pulled even tighter. Good. That’s what you get for disappearing. And when she finally caught her breath, she didn’t let go. Neither did Taylor.

“Sorry,” Rebecca muttered eventually, muffled by cotton and whatever pride she had left.

“Don’t be,” Taylor said. Her voice was soft and steady, like this wasn’t strange at all. And somehow, it wasn’t.

Rebecca drew back just enough to see her face. They were too close, and normally she would never allow a stranger to touch her, let alone see her break down like that. And yet, she wasn’t pulling away, maybe because Taylor wasn’t looking at her with pity or disgust. Her eyes were just… calm. Jake looked like a ghost, sure, but this wife of his looked like someone who reached into the dark and dragged him out by the collar.

What the hell happened to both of you?

Chapter Text

Jake had always been good at keeping his secrets. Even when they were still kids, he’d sometimes wall up and get that look that said don’t ask, and no matter how hard she tried, she was never able to read him or get him to fess up. Maybe it was this curiosity that led her to pick the detective career, maybe it wasn’t—but either way, it gave her enough experience to start, and even more stubbornness to keep going.

Now, watching him from the kitchen table Rebecca realized that so many things have changed—his hair was longer, shoulders broader, posture tighter—but the look on his face stayed the same. Which was absolutely ridiculous, considering it was the first time he stepped foot in their family house since six years. He owed them an explanation, for God’s sake. But there he was, just standing near the sink, shifting his weight like a teenager caught sneaking in after curfew, and glancing at the door like he was expecting someone.

Right. His wife.

Rebecca wondered for a moment if Taylor’s strategic exit had been about her reading the room and giving them space, or just her panicking and wanting out of here. She wouldn’t blame her if it was the latter. The introduction wasn’t going great—ha, what an understatement. It was a trainwreck. Rebecca hadn’t missed that Jake forgot to introduce her until she prompted him, and when he did, it was almost like an afterthought. Which would have been odd even if they were newlyweds, but from what he just said, they’ve been together for three years.

Welcome to the family, here are the numbers to therapists in the area…? Yeah, that’s what she’d say to Taylor when she came back. Poor girl had no idea what she married into.

A bitter smile twitched at her lips, but died quickly when she looked at Jake again. He was still standing there. A stranger in her mom’s kitchen. Her brother. God, what a mess. She better do something, not just sit here. She pushed herself up from her chair, grabbed a mug from the rack, filled it with coffee and set it on a table with a loud thud, then cocked a brow at him as an invitation.

He slid into the chair. The same chair that had waited empty at their table for six long years.

Mom placed a cinnamon roll in front of him like a peace offering, or maybe a bribe. He stared at it for a long time before tearing off a piece with trembling fingers.

Rebecca hadn’t said much since the porch, didn’t trust herself to speak without crying or yelling, but questions were already spinning in her mind.

Just as she opened her mouth, her mom beat her to the most important one.

“Where have you been all that time?”

“Around,” he answered.

Rebecca snorted. Seriously? This is what you’re going with? You have to be kidding me!

He must have felt her disdain, because he followed with the usual bullshit excuse. “It’s a long story.”

Sure it is, it’s been fucking six years in the making.

Mom was already moving again, mumbling something about him looking tired, or hungry, or cold, or whatever—

“We’ve got plenty of time,” Rebecca said dryly, and the coldness in her voice surprised even her. “We know the charges were bullshit. So what was it?”

Jake’s whole body changed. He ran a hand through his hair, then tightened it around the mug. She interrogated enough people to recognize when someone was calculating not exactly how to lie, but how much truth to give.

“Lundgren.” The name came out like he was spitting poison. Of course it was the damn bastard. But she knew that part already, he told her as much over the phone.

“I was going to report him. But he found out and framed me.”

Jesus. So it was even worse than she thought. The bastard let him take the fall. No. Not even let. The fucker pushed him into the abyss. Her jaw clenched at the thought.

“He sent me and Mike into an ambush. I got out in time. He… didn’t.”

Rebecca’s chest tightened. No. No, no, no.

“My only choice was to run.”

No. No, it wasn’t, you know it wasn’t! There were thousand things she could’ve said to him, but none of them made it past her throat. She wanted to scream, but she couldn’t even move.

Mike. She’d met Mike once, Jake brought him over one summer. Nice guy, loud laugh, kept calling Jake “Grandpa” for some reason she never got and offered to teach her how to play poker. Gave up after two rounds when he realized not only she knew, but was good at it. Dead at twenty-four because—

“It wasn’t your fault he died.” She heard her own voice.

Lundgren said it was, didn’t he? Of course he did. That bastard, that coward, that walking piece of shit couldn’t stop himself from pinning that on Jake, too.

Jake’s hand tightened on the mug.

“It was.” His shoulders started to shake.

No. The word screamed through Rebecca’s head. “No, you idiot. Don’t you dare. You can’t blame yourself for this.”

It wasn’t his fault. It was Lundgren’s. It was the system’s. It was the whole damn world’s fault, but it wasn’t his. She reached out, her hand landing firmly on his shoulder.

“It was the right thing to do,” she whispered, as if it was any consolation.

“And look what it cost me.”

Six years. A career. Best friend. Her mind was already filing a case. Good. Let’s channel that anger into action, she thought, her fingers tightening on Jake’s shoulder. That bastard must pay. I’ll see him brought to justice. I swear to God, I will.

Mama stepped in, her arms already around Jake, murmuring something Rebecca didn’t quite catch. She didn’t interrupt. Her mind was already moving forward.

She’d always suspected the whole story was garbage, but now there was a clear motive and a first hand witness. She’d need Jake’s full statement. Names, dates, every detail he remembered. She’d call someone from her department, because of course it couldn’t be her, not officially at least. Not unless she wanted to kill the case before it started.

Lundgren. Where was he now? What was his status? Was there a case against him? That was the first search she should run. And then Mike’s death. How was it officially reported? There had to be a report, maybe even an investigation. She should be able to dig it up, would probably need to pull some strings and call old favors, but she needed to see the official lies in black and white.

If Jake thought he’d carried this alone—well. He wasn’t. Not anymore. She’d been digging up buried skeletons her whole damn career. She’d do it again. For her brother. For Mike. For every day of the six years they had lost.

A car door slammed shut in the driveway and broke her thoughts. Jake flinched. Mom’s hands dropped to her sides.

Rebecca couldn’t help but scowl. “Your wife could really use some better timing.”

She knew she sounded like an asshole, but she didn’t care. They were finally getting somewhere, and she had to arrive exactly in that moment?

Except it wasn’t Taylor at the door. She recognized the shrill voice of aunt Linda, Mama’s eldest sister.

“I baked too much pie and figured y’all could use a little sugar. Heard you’ve got company? That your babies are home?”

Jake and Rebecca exchanged panicked looks.

Oh no. It begins.

Rebecca wanted to strangle someone. Preferably aunt Marge, who just arrived with enough potato salad to feed an army and, just like everyone else already here, zero consideration for timing.

“Where’s your brother?” Her aunt demanded, already pushing past Rebecca into the house. “I need to see him with my own eyes. Can’t believe he’s really back!”

Yeah. Good luck with that. Rebecca rolled her eyes. Jake had lasted exactly ten minutes after the first guests arrived before hiding upstairs. And she honestly couldn’t blame him at all.

She had expected his return to be big news, but she expected to have at least five fucking minutes to process it before the extended family descended like vultures. Well. Not with their folks, apparently. It looked like Jake’s wife had actually more tact then everyone else in the family combined, and Rebecca almost felt bad for automatically assuming it was her when the first car pulled up, when in fact it was aunt Linda, and then cousin Eddie with his three feral kids he immediately tried to talk her into babysitting, then great aunt Louise who was blind as a bat and couldn’t drive, but apparently made an exception, the Peterson family from two streets over who weren’t even related, but heard through the grapevine and arrived anyway. And then she lost track of who was there. It was complete chaos, and when she heard another person asking Mama “Where had he been? Why didn’t he call? Oh, he’s married? Does he have kids?” she just went out front to breathe.

Someone brought fucking folding chairs and set them up in their backyard. Have you ever heard the word ‘privacy’? She thought and kicked the porch railing. It didn’t help much, now she was angry and had an aching toe.

Another car pulled up and she wanted to scream. Who’s there now? Ah. Taylor. What a relief. She waved to her and grinned when she recognized the clear what the fuck on her face.

Taylor slowly walked in to the porch. “What happened?”

Ah. So she’s tactful and polite. A good combination. Rebecca would definitely use different words herself.

“Family,” she shrugged, as if it could explain the pandemonium. “Everyone wanted to be the first to see the prodigal son’s return.”

“How is he?”

“Gone. Went to his room upstairs.” Rebecca noted how Taylor just nodded. They both looked at each other, and for a moment she could swear she could hear her thoughts. How inconsiderate can you be…? “Welcome to the South,” she laughed. “Want me to come with you?”

Please say I don’t have to.

“Thanks. I’ve got it. I guess you didn’t come out for nothing.”

Tactful and polite and observant. Where on Earth did he find you?

Some twenty minutes later, Rebecca went back in and got immediately roped into mediating an argument between two uncles who argued whose fault the ‘08 recession was. It was going surprisingly well considering she was thirteen at the time and had absolutely nothing to say in the matter, but if it worked, she wasn’t about to push her luck.

“Oh!” Someone yelped next to her and her hand automatically went to her hip. A stupid reflex, really. She looked around and noticed her brother. He looked a bit pale, but steady enough, though his hand was grabbing Taylor’s so hard it had to hurt.

“There he is!” One of the aunts beamed and Rebecca watched Jake’s jaw tighten again. But he didn’t run. Taylor run a thumb over the back of his hand, so quickly Rebecca almost missed the gesture, and they stepped inside the room.

Rebecca stepped back, grabbed a beer from the table, and decided to see how it unfolds.

It was almost like watching a nature documentary. A pack of predators circling an unsuspecting prey. Except, it seemed, the prey actually had claws and teeth and knew how to fight back. Every time the questions got too personal and too close, the other acted as a shield. When one of their cousins—Rebecca couldn’t even remember her name, Ashley? Amanda? Amber?—asked Jake where he was hiding, Taylor looked at her plate and cooed: “Ooh, is that the famous cornbread? I’ve never actually tried it, can you tell me whose recipe is the best?” It was so fucking smooth Rebecca wanted to clap.

And then Jake got his turn, and that one caught her attention, because someone asked Taylor where she was from, and instead of letting her answer, Jake stepped in and redirected the conversation into football. Also smooth, but why?

An hour or two in, she saw her opening. Taylor hung out near the back porch, finally alone, nursing a half-filled glass of something Rebecca hoped wasn’t uncle Paul’s moonshine. Her sister-in-law (how weird it was to think of her that way!) took a sip. Hm. She was still standing, so it probably wasn’t.

“How does it feel to be the main attraction?” Rebecca asked sliding in next to her and trying to sound casual.

“Oh? Me?” Taylor grinned. “Come on. Everyone here knows Jake is the main dish. I’m just the weird side salad.”

Sense of humour: McKenzie-approved, Rebecca added to her mental notes.

Almost as if on cue, someone yelled at them to pass the potato salad.

“So, you’re a detective?” Taylor asked, already reaching for the bowl. “Should I prepare for a background check?”

Rebecca nodded “Of course. It’s a family tradition.”

It was a blatant lie, but Taylor didn’t have to know that. Technically, Rebecca could lose her badge over that, but it wasn’t like everyone else in the department weren’t doing it outside of the books. Theory and practice didn’t really align in her line of work.

“But don’t worry,” Rebecca added quickly, noting the frown on Taylor’s face. “I’ll give you the friendly version.”

“Should I be worried?”

“If you have priors in three states, then yeah, sure.”

Taylor took another sip of her drink, and Rebecca noted how her shoulders relaxed. Whatever her sister-in-law was hiding, at least apparently she wasn’t a criminal. It was strangely comforting. She didn’t want to admit it yet, but she was starting to actually like her.

“Where are you from?” Rebecca asked innocently. “Your accent. I can’t really place it.”

Taylor sighed. “It’s complicated.”

Like everything else about you two, Rebecca almost rolled her eyes. But then Taylor continued, and somehow Rebecca could tell she was telling the truth.

“I didn’t have a childhood. We lived abroad. It’s… not something I want to talk about.”

“Fair enough,” Rebecca just nodded, but the possibilities kept circling around her brain. Adoption? Child abuse? Trauma? Whatever it was, she’d have to go back to it later. “Okay. Next question. How did you two meet?”

Let me guess, another long story?

Taylor’s face softened. “Quite romantic, actually. I was flying to the Caribbean, and I had a weird dream about some guy, and then I went to the cockpit to ask about something, and—”

“Don’t tell me. You saw the man from your dreams and fell in love at first sight?”

“God, no.” Taylor howled. “Jake was a complete ass.”

Yup, that sounded absolutely like her brother.

“And you still went and said ‘yes, please, I want more of that’?” Rebecca couldn’t stop herself.

Taylor grinned. “What can I say? He can be very convincing. And I like a good challenge.”

Before Rebecca could answer, she spotted her brother in the crowd. He noticed them talking and looked… alarmed. She chuckled at his terrified face.

Taylor saw that too, took another sip of her drink and smiled at Rebecca. “I think he’s worried about us plotting.”

“Good,” Rebecca clinked her beer against Taylor’s glass. “He should be.”

Jake started to make his way, but he didn’t make it in time. Someone’s shout cut through the party chatter.

“Lucille! You made it!”

They exchanged a wide-eyed, panicked look across the yard. Before Taylor could even ask who Lucille was, Jake had pivoted and melted back into the group near the barbecue. Smart man. Rebecca was about to do the same. “Excuse me,” she muttered to no one in particular, turning away from Taylor and the porch and especially the newcomer.

Aunt Lucille pushed through the crowd with all the grace of an icebreaker and circled Taylor like a hawk. Rebecca couldn’t hear her words, but she could read the body language just fine. Her sister-in-law firmly stood her ground, calm and polite, until she said something that made Lucille gasp and clutch her chest and half of the porch go quiet. And then Jake appeared, sliding his arm around his wife’s waist and saying something calmly. The conversation ended with aunt Lucille leaving with a huff, and the couple laughing at some private whispered joke.

Huh. That was unexpected. Nobody had ever managed to face aunt Lucille and come out of it alive.

Rebecca elbowed the cousin standing next to her. “What was that about?”

“No idea,” Ashley-Amanda-Amber stared at her brother like she just saw a miracle. “Did you see it? He—”

But when she turned to finish the sentence, Rebecca was already gone.

It was already getting dark when the party started to die down. Rebecca wasn’t exactly looking for Taylor, but when she went to the kitchen to refill her bottle and caught her standing over the sink with a glass of water, she didn’t exactly turn on her heel.

“Not going for the sweet tea? Or the special punch?” She joked.

“Water is fine,” Taylor said simply.

“Uh-uh. People around here prefer drinks with actual flavor.”

She didn’t flinch, but didn’t take the bait either. “Well, I’m not from around here.”

“Touché.” Rebecca nodded. Ah, to hell with it, she grinned to herself and without a ceremony shoved her bottle under the tap, absolutely sure that her sister-in-law is very much judging her right now.

“Pot, meet kettle,” Taylor muttered, but she didn’t look offended.

“Sorry. I had to protect my reputation in case someone was listening,” Rebecca’s grin grew wider. “One glass of that and I’m in sugar coma.”

“No worries. Your secret is safe with me.” Taylor clinked her glass against Rebecca’s bottle. “We water rebels have to stick together.”

They stood in silence for a moment. Just when Rebecca started to think that it’s so nice to finally meet someone who doesn’t feel the need to fill it with the sound of their voice, Taylor sighed and turned to look at her.

“You really threw me to the wolves earlier.”

“Yeah. Sorry about that,” Rebecca at least had the decency to feel bad about it. “Aunt Lucille is… intense. I should have given you a heads up. But you two handled her better than anyone ever did.”

Taylor just grunted in response, but the corners of her lips already curling upwards.

“What happened, anyway?” Rebecca already had a rough idea, but nothing ever beats a firsthand statement.

“A culture clash, I think.” Taylor swirled the water in her glass. “Your aunt seems to have very rigid opinion on weddings and marriages.”

“Don’t take it personally. From what I’ve heard, it was quite a… romantic ceremony?”

“Yeah.”

Rebecca caught a glimpse of the same look on Taylor’s face earlier when she grilled her about meeting her brother, but it was just a preview—now her whole expression softened, open and unguarded, with a smile that caused crinkles around her eyes.

“But not entirely legal?” Rebecca blurted out.

Aaaaand of course you had to go and destroy it.

Taylor shot her a look that said not you too? but just shrugged. “Yeah. I guess we should get the paperwork sorted out now that we’re here.”

Rebecca winced “Sorry.” She let the word hang there a moment, heavier than she meant it, before adding quickly, “You know, Jake’s never brought anyone home before. I have no practice.”

“Never?”

“Not since high school. And definitely never to a family gathering. So either you’re very brave or very foolish.”

“Probably both,” Taylor admitted with a small smile. “But, to be honest, I expected to meet you and your mother. Not… all this.” She hopelessly gestured around.

“You wouldn’t come if you knew?”

“I would. But I’d definitely come prepared.”

“So about this handfasting thing,” Rebecca hoped she sounded casual. “You know I don’t actually care about the paperwork, right? I mean, half the legally married couples I know shouldn’t even be in the same room together, and you two...” She shrugged. “Whatever you’ve got, it’s real. Anyone with eyes can see that.”

Taylor’s smile softened. “Thanks. That... means a lot.”

“Just maybe don’t tell aunt Lucille I said that.”

“Yeah,” Taylor grimaced. “Don’t worry. I’m good at keeping secrets.”

Oh, I bet you are.

“You know,” Rebecca said carefully, “whatever happened out there… I’m glad he wasn’t alone. So, thank you for helping him, I guess.”

For the first time, Taylor’s careful control cracked. Her eyes went bright with tears before she blinked them away.

“He helped me too,” she said quietly. “More than once.”

Before Rebecca could respond, Jake appeared in the doorway with a stack of plates, looking between them with concern. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. Just comparing notes on avoiding sugar,” Taylor said smoothly and raised her glass. “And the special punch.”

Jake visibly relaxed. “Smart. That stuff could strip paint. Anyways, I found us work to do.”

“And that’s my cue to leave. You two have fun. Please don’t count me in.” Rebecca was already halfway out of the kitchen, but she stopped in the threshold to give Taylor a mock salute. “Nice talking to you. See y’all at breakfast, if you can even look at food again by then.”

Some people liked to do the dishes, but Rebecca wasn’t one of them. And, to be frank, neither was her brother, but after six years away from home, she was absolutely fine with letting him wash the damn dishes tonight. Or coax his wife into doing them while he took all the credit. It was definitely something the Jake she knew would try to do, only she somehow doubted Taylor would let that slide. She looked like someone who called him out on his bullshit. Good. He needed that.

Rebecca flopped on the bed and stared at the ceiling. Her mind was still buzzing, always analyzing, always cataloguing. Detective’s blessing and a curse.

She grabbed her phone and pulled up her notes, thinking she’d better write it all down while she still remembers her plan.

• Lundgren check status. still serving? is his case open? evidence agaist him ???
• Mike’s death certificate. investigation? check if official report exists
• get Jake’s statement

She hesitated for a moment before writing down the next points. It felt shitty, but her instinct told her it was one of the important details, and she knew at this point she didn’t have the luxury to dismiss any leads yet.

• Jake was flying passengers 3 years ago. ask about license. records? logbook?
• Taylor- find out last name and birthday. for the background check

Okay, she had to admit it wasn’t much of a list, but she didn’t exactly have much of a case either. Just the ever growing mountain of questions.

Her thumb hovered over the screen and finally added a second note. This one was personal.

So her brother met Taylor three years ago somewhere on a flight to the Caribbean. Same year Jake sent her the desperate voicemail thinking he was about to die. If she could believe cousin Eddie’s third-hand account, they got hitched in the same area too. Not legally, but when you’re off the grid you can’t really be picky. It wasn’t her place to judge, and besides, everyone could see tonight the bond was there, paperwork or not. Not only in words, but also in the way they moved and had whole conversations with one glance…

Rebecca sat up so fast she bumped her head on the ceiling. Ugh. She forgot about the slant again. But never mind. She realized what the tiny, almost invisible gestures reminded her of. Her and her partner at work. The kind of shorthand you only develop when the person next to you might have to save your life. And they were using it like muscle memory.

The professional note grew by one more point.

• research events from 2017 in the caribbean area

Or maybe try to narrow it down first, she sighed when she looked at the map. There had to be thousands of islands in there. It would take ages to find the right one.

Unless there was one called It’s Complicated.

Chapter Text

Rebecca jolted awake to a sudden thud. She forgot how thin the walls between their rooms were. Jake used to tap messages in Morse code on it when he was grounded, mostly variations of parents suck and bring snacks. Now, every night since he got back, it was a simple goodnight. But this wasn’t his tapping. This was—

A strangled shout cut through the night, and her hand automatically grabbed the service weapon from the nightstand. The hallway was dark, but she knew every creaking board by heart even before her eyes adjusted. Muscle memory from years of sneaking out and back in, and covering for her brother when he did the same.

His door was cracked open and she heard the sound again, a choked sob, and Jake’s muffled voice: “What’s hurt?”

Before her brain caught up with her body, she was in the room, gun aimed at… whatever danger he was facing there.

And stared right at Taylor’s terrified face instead. Her eyes were opened wide, arms trembled, and still, she jumped between the gun and Jake like a human shield.

The shock on her face slowly drained off, replaced with recognition.

“Fuck. Rebecca? That—that’s you?” Taylor stuttered. “Put that down. Don’t—don’t point it at him.”

“What the hell?” Rebecca croaked, but Taylor already turned back to her brother.

Jake was backed away into a wall between the desk and bed, hands raised like he was pushing something away. Or someone. His eyes were wide open, focused on one point somewhere beyond them both.

“Mike? What’re you…?”

Her chest tightened. Mike. Of course. Mike was already gone, but in Jake’s nightmares he kept dying over and over again. She automatically stepped forward, ready to shake him out of it. Standard procedure for bad dreams.

“Don’t touch him.” Taylor said so calmly Rebecca froze mid-step. “He won’t see you. He’s not here.”

“He’s done this before?” Rebecca asked and immediately scoffed at herself. No shit, Sherlock. But there was something in the way Taylor said it that made her look closer. Even in the dark, Rebecca could see how carefully she positioned herself. Close enough to be heard, far enough to dodge if—

If what?

“Jake, listen to me.” Taylor’s voice turned soft. “You’re safe.”

He flinched at her voice and sobbed again. “Goddammit, Mike, stop!”

“You’re safe,” she repeated, and Rebecca’s stomach twisted into knots. “You’re home.”

His hands slowly lowered. Something shifted in his posture, even if his whole body was still coiled like he might jump any second, and his breath was still ragged.

“Taylor, I was supposed to save him…”

“I know,” she whispered. “And you did. And he saved us. You’re safe now. We’re at your mother’s house. Remember?”

Jake blinked once, but his breathing slowed down.

“That’s it,” Taylor murmured. “You’re back in Louisiana. This is your old room. Your sister is here,” she continued, and Rebecca suddenly felt exposed. “She’s worried about you.”

Jake turned slowly to look at her, and Rebecca didn’t know if she felt more relieved or scared. He was awake again, but there was so much pain in his eyes it broke her heart.

“Fuck,” he muttered, hiding his face in his hands. “Fuck.”

His back hit the wall and he slid down like a puppet with all strings cut. Taylor lowered herself to sit next to him and finally reached out her hand, just fingers brushing Jake’s knee. He grabbed it like a lifeline.

Rebecca told herself she should leave them now, but her feet wouldn’t listen.

“There you are,” Taylor whispered quietly. “You’re safe. It’s over.”

Is it? Rebecca looked at the tremor in Jake’s hands and the exhaustion in Taylor’s eyes.

“Bad one?” She asked casually, like her brother wasn’t gone for years and she was there for all the other nightmares.

“Yeah.”

“It was about Mike.” No point dancing around it, she thought.

“Yeah.”

Six years. It had been six years, and her brother was still fighting battles he’d already lost. She wanted to say something comforting, but what was there? It’s not your fault felt hollow. He knew the risks felt cruel.

“You should go back to bed,” Jake said finally. “I’m fine.”

“Fuck off,” she replied automatically, and was rewarded with something that could have been a laugh. But she left, eventually, squeezing his shoulder and exchanging a knowing look with Taylor on her way out.

Like any of them could fall asleep after that.

After the darkness upstairs, the kitchen light was too bright. Rebecca squinted at the clock on the microwave. 3:56 AM. Perfect. She filled the kettle anyway, needing something to do with her hands.

Taylor appeared in the doorway maybe fifteen minutes later, almost noiselessly. It was quite surprising how fast she learned where to step to not make the steps creak, and until tonight, Rebecca didn’t fully understand why.

“Tea?” She offered, already putting down a second mug.

“Thanks.”

For a long while, they just stood next to each other and stared at their reflections in a kitchen window, both pretending this was normal, just two sisters-in-law having a bonding moment.

“How often?” Rebecca finally asked.

“Less than it used to be. This was his first one in months.” Taylor’s fingers tightened around her mug. “Storms make it worse. Loud noises. Sometimes just… bad days.”

“And you always handle it alone?”

Taylor slowly put the tea down and turned to face her. “Who else would?”

Fair point. But God, she looked just as exhausted as Rebecca could imagine.

“You know what this is, right? I knew a guy once. Afghanistan vet. His wife thought if she just loved him hard enough, if she was just patient enough…”

She didn’t want to finish the sentence.

“Let me guess. She ended up in the ER? Or in the morgue?” Taylor asked flatly, but her arms crossed over her chest like a shield, one hand slowly rubbing her wrist.

Well shit.

“Once,” she answered the question Rebecca didn’t dare ask. “I got too close. It wasn’t on purpose,” she added quickly, as if it changed anything. “Don’t tell him you know. He never forgave himself for that.”

Rebecca’s chest ached. She wanted to be angry, grab Taylor’s arms and shake her into senses, but what was the point? She knew the type all too well. “It’s not his fault. I can fix him.” They never fixed shit. It never worked. She’d seen far too many domestic cases to believe it could.

“You know that’s not sustainable, right? This kind of trauma doesn’t just go away because someone loves you enough.”

Taylor laughed bitterly. “You think I’m trying to fix him? That I’m so stupid to think you can fix everything with love and good intentions?”

“I think—” Rebecca stopped to choose her next words carefully. “I think it’s the opposite. You’re smart. You know you can’t do it alone. But you’re both so used to handling things on your own you don’t even know how to let someone else help, and God forbid you ask for it.”

Taylor bit her lip. “But he’s trying. He’s trying so fucking hard. That has to count for something.”

“It’s good. It counts. But he needs help,” Rebecca said simply. “Real help. Not just you playing therapist at three in the morning.”

“It’s not exactly easy to find help when you’re trying to stay off the grid.”

“You’re not off the grid anymore.”

Taylor nodded. “So what do you suggest?”

“There are programs,” Rebecca leaned on the counter. “I’ll ask around. You’ve kept him alive this long. Let me keep him sane.”

“Do you think he’ll listen?”

Rebecca shrugged. “Don’t care. We’ll make him.”

Taylor looked at her like she’d suggested they teach him to fly again. “How?”

“Together. I have my ways. And I suppose you have… yours?” Rebecca winked and for the first time tonight, Taylor laughed.

“We have to be careful. You know what he’s like if you push too hard.”

“Yeah,” Rebecca winced. “He’s too stubborn for his own good. But he’s not stupid. Don’t worry, I’ll drag his ass myself if I have to.”

“Thank you.”

And then I’ll drag yours, too, she promised herself. Just one stubborn ass at a time.

“There’s something else,” Rebecca said, surprising herself with the words. Maybe it was the late hour, or the shared exhaustion, but she felt like she owed Taylor this much. “I’m going to investigate Lundgren.”

Taylor went very still. “What?”

“The bastard who framed Jake. Who sent him and Mike into that ambush.” Rebecca’s hand curled into a fist. “He doesn’t get to just walk away from that. I know people. I can dig up evidence. Even if it take years, I’ll see him brought to justice.”

“Rebecca—”

“He killed Mike. He destroyed my brother’s life. He took six years from all of us.” Rebecca was shaking with anger. “That son of a bitch will pay for what he did.”

Taylor run her finger around the rim of her mug. When she looked up, her eyes were strange. Empty in a way that gave Rebecca goosebumps and made her want to look everywhere but at her sister-in-law.

“He already did.”

“What?”

“Lundgren is dead.” Taylor’s voice was perfectly calm. “I was there. I saw it happen.”

Rebecca’s mind raced. “What? How—?”

“Violently,” Taylor said simply. “And much faster than he deserved.”

The kitchen felt colder suddenly. Rebecca’s cop brain was running calculations. Taylor or Jake? Which one of them had—

“Did you—?” She looked up at Taylor and immediately took a step back.

This wasn’t the woman she knew. Her expression twisted her face into something that looked… wrong. A monster wearing a human face, smiling without understanding what a smile is, eyes filled with pure hate.

“Neither of us killed him, if that’s what you’re asking. It turns out he pissed off a lot of people.” Taylor laughed bitterly and shook her head, and the strange look vanished. “The thing is, Lundgren is dead. That’s all that matters.”

Rebecca stared at her sister-in-law, trying to reconcile the woman who’d cracked jokes with her and held her when she cried with this… whatever this thing she saw a moment ago was. Someone who could speak about violent death with so much satisfaction. Someone who could look at her with such inhuman—

No. Rebecca blinked, and when she looked again, Taylor was still only herself. A sad woman who had been through too much, awake in the middle of the night, talking about the death of a man who hurt someone she loved.

I must have imagined it, Rebecca thought. They were both running on fumes, and Lord knows lack of sleep does weird things to your brain.

“I should go back to bed,” Taylor said as if she could hear her mind, and she just sounded tired. Normal-tired. Human-tired. “What if Jake wakes up and I’m not there?”

“Taylor, wait—”

Rebecca’s hand landed on Taylor’s arm. What did I even want to say?

“Some justice happens outside courtrooms, Rebecca.” Taylor looked her in the eye and didn’t flinch. “You know this as well as I do. Sometimes it’s all there is.” Her hand squeezed Rebecca’s. “Thank you for wanting to help. He needs that.”

Rebecca nodded, but the knot in her chest remained. Her eyes followed Taylor to the doorway, almost like she wanted to make sure she wouldn’t be turning around to stab her in the back.

Don’t be ridiculous, Rebecca scolded herself. Her hands trembled only slightly when she washed the two empty cups. It was just the weird light. Occam’s razor.

But still. Lundgren’s case might have been over before Rebecca even started digging, and yet she couldn’t shake off the feeling that a much stranger one had just opened.

Chapter Text

Rebecca made the call from a car parked in the driveway, where nobody could overhear. It was still early, but the chief was always the first one in the office. He picked up on first ring, like he expected her call.

“You coming back tomorrow or what?”

“I need a few more days, Chief,” she said, watching the rising sun. “Family stuff.”

He grunted. “How’s your brother doing?”

“Getting there.”

“Good. That’s good.” She heard him shuffling some papers on his desk. “Fine. Take the week. But McKenzie?”

“Yes, Chief?”

“Whatever you’re thinking about this old case of his, don’t.”

Too late.

“I won’t,” she lied smoothly. “I just need more time with him, that’s all.”

“Uh-huh. Sure. Just promise to stay out of trouble.”

The photo albums came out on Saturday.

Rebecca and Jake volunteered to show Taylor around, and when the three of them came back, all wet, dirty and itchy from the bites, they caught their mother curled on the couch with an album in her lap and a handkerchief in her hand. She looked embarrassed at first, but when Taylor leaned in and asked if she could see the photos, there was no turning back.

Three hours later, they were all sitting on the floor between albums, trading stories about birthdays, family trips, and holidays. Mom flipped a page and started laughing.

“Oh, I remember that one,” she tapped a photo of Jake with a very uneven bowl cut. “Your daddy insisted we cut your hair at home to save money, bless his heart, and, well. You can see how it went.”

Jake groaned and tried to snatch the album from her hands. “Absolutely not. You’re not showing that one. I looked like an idiot.”

“That’s your face, not the haircut.” Rebecca couldn’t stop herself.

“Fuck—” Jake immediately bit his tongue when mom raised a brow. “I mean. Shut up.”

“Hmm, I don’t know.” Taylor squinted at the photo, and the corner of her mouth twitched. “It’s not that bad. How about we bring it back? The 90s are in fashion right now. And it kinda suits you.”

“Absolutely not.” Jake managed to flip the page to a photo of Rebecca on a track with a scraped knee and big trophy in hands. “Hey, Becks. You still run?”

“Sometimes,” she replied automatically. “It clears my head.”

“She used to be the fastest one at school,” Jake turned to his wife to explain. “Nobody could beat her. You two should go for a jog sometime.”

“You run?” Rebecca looked at Taylor.

“Yeah. Nothing professional, but I like it,” she nodded at Rebecca. “I’m not really cut out to sit still.”

Rebecca hesitated for only a moment. Running was her sacred me-time, but it could be a chance to get to know her sister-in-law better.

“There’s a nice trail by the river. We’d have to start early though,” she warned her. “Tomorrow at seven?”

“Okay,” Taylor smiled at her.

“But don’t expect me to slow down for you.” She caught Jake’s smirking in the corner of her eye. Interesting.

Her eyes dropped to the album in her lap and a photo of her, Jake and Mike at the old dock. She held it up.

“Remember that summer you brought Mike home? We tried to get him on uncle Pete’s schooner, but he just went green and said he gets seasick when he looks at boats.”

“He was full of it,” Taylor chuckled. “Don’t tell me you bought that? He wasn’t sea—” She bit her tongue mid-word.

Rebecca looked up. “How would you know?”

“I mean—” Taylor caught herself. “They were in the Navy. Those guys don’t get seasick.”

“Guess he just didn’t want to sail with us then,” Rebecca shrugged.

But Jake shot Taylor a look Rebecca immediately filed away as suspicious.

“Alright,” mom closed her album. “Time to think about dinner.” She turned to Taylor with a shy smile. “Next time you visit, you need to bring your baby photos. I want to see if you were just as mischievous as my kids.”

“Oh,” Taylor managed. “I—I don’t have any.”

“Your family doesn’t have photos?” Mom looked at her, surprised.

Taylor just shook her head and started to blink fast, looking through the window. “I don’t know. I don’t—don’t have any family.”

Jake’s hand squeezed hers under the album she was holding. Rebecca studied her face and made mental notes. No family. No photos. Doesn’t want to talk about her past. What happened? The distress looked genuine, so she knew better than to push right now. But a quiet search through the usual channels wouldn’t hurt for sure. Just to make sure Jake knows who he married.

Mom cleared her throat, breaking the awkward silence. “Well then. Let me fix you something to eat. And you two—” she pointed at her children “—I need you to set the table.”

Jake gave her a grin and a mock salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

You should not judge book by the cover, but you could absolutely judge a runner by their shoes. And Taylor’s shoes definitely passed Rebecca’s check. Sensible, obviously well-loved, soles worn out in all the right places. Laces double-knotted. When Rebecca caught her doing that, Taylor flushed a little.

“I tripped and kissed the pavement once, and Jake never let me live that down,” she explained. “So better safe than sorry.”

They set off at a steady pace. The air was already thick from humidity, but at least still cool enough to breathe. For the first few minutes, neither of them spoke, and Rebecca found herself impressed. Taylor had no issues matching her pace, and her breathing was still controlled, even when Rebecca picked up speed just to test her. That explained Jake’s smirk last night. His wife was either a natural, or not a casual jogger at all, and the bastard knew it.

“You a morning person?” Rebecca asked casually.

“Not really.” Taylor’s voice was barely strained. “I’m more of a ‘don’t talk to me before coffee’ person.”

Rebecca chuckled. “Sorry. But if we went any later, we wouldn’t be able to breathe.”

“I figured.”

“But I promise the view is worth it. There’s a lookout point. We’ll stop there for a moment before going back. It’s beautiful.”

“If you like swamps,” Taylor murmured, but her grin was too wide for Rebecca to even consider feeling offended.

“Get used to it,” she bit in response, and Taylor grinned even wider.

They reached the halfway point, a wooden platform over the sprawling river. The first rays of the morning sun filtered through the trees, burning off the mist rising from the river and painting golden sparkles over still water.

“Woah. You weren’t kidding.” Taylor leaned on the railing and stretched her calf. “The view really is great.”

She grabbed the hem of her shirt to wipe the sweat off her face, and that’s when Rebecca saw it. Three parallel lines on her side, two pale and barely visible, and one much darker, jagged, raised scar under her ribs.

Claw marks, Rebecca’s brain supplied.

“Holy shit,” she managed. “What happened?”

Taylor followed her gaze and flinched a little bit. Her fingers brushed the side, tracing the scars.

“It’s nothing. Just an old scar that didn’t heal properly.” She gave Rebecca a small smile and tugged her shirt down. “Besides, you should have seen the other guy.”

“What was that? It must have been massive.” Mountain lion? No, that’s way too small. Bear? Probably wouldn’t get out alive if it was a bear. What the fuck left that kind of marks?

“Tiger,” Taylor said quietly, not looking at her.

“…Tiger,” Rebecca repeated blankly. No fucking way. But Taylor’s face had already closed off, and she had to bite down her next questions. “Alright,” she croaked. “Keep your secrets.”

Taylor smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Let’s get back before we cool down completely.”

Without another word, Rebecca gave her a sharp nod, turned, and started running back down the trail. The easy rhythm between them was completely gone. Rebecca’s mind raced. There are no tigers in the Caribbean. So either she's lying, or something happened on that island that makes no goddamn sense.

The case file in her head got bigger once again.

When they reached the house again, Jake was already waiting for them on the porch, feet propped on the railing.

“Well, well, well if it’s not Scully and Mulder. How did your run go?”

“I’m going to grab some water.” Taylor gave him a quick squeeze and looked at Rebecca. “You want anything?”

“Nah, I’m good.”

Her eyes remained on Taylor’s back until she disappeared inside the house.

Jake turned sharply. “Okay, now spill. What happened between you two? And don’t tell me nothing. I’m not stupid. I can tell.”

Rebecca pushed his legs away and dropped on the bench next to him.

“I saw her scars,” she said simply, keeping her eyes on his face. Jake didn’t flinch or ask which ones. Good. At least he wasn’t playing dumb. “What happened, Jake?”

He suddenly developed an interest in a stain on his jeans.

“We were running,” he said quietly, rubbing it with his thumb. “From a—a tiger. It got close to one of our friends. Taylor stepped in front of her, and it got her instead.”

“Jesus,” Rebecca gasped. “You didn’t think to get it checked in a hospital?”

“There weren’t any hospitals on the island. A friend patched her up. She was lucky it didn’t get infected.”

“So let me get it straight: there were no hospitals on the Caribbean island of yours. But there were tigers.”

She looked him right in the eye. This was simply impossible. They didn’t have a chance to align their stories before Rebecca cornered him on the porch. If they made it up beforehand, why pick a tiger and not… whatever was native to the region? Unless... unless that part was true.

“I don’t know how to explain it.” Jake’s voice was calm. “Neither of us wanted to stay there long enough to find out.”

Just as Rebecca opened her mouth to press him further, the screen door creaked. Taylor stood there with a bottle of water in hand. Her eyes flicked from Jake’s tense shoulders to Rebecca’s accusatory gaze.

“Everything okay?” She asked, but the look on her face said she already knew the answer.

Rebecca stared back at her.

“I need you to tell me the truth. What did you two get into?”

Taylor’s fingers rested on Jake’s arm, but neither of them said anything.

“For fuck’s sake, Jake. I need some answers.”

“We can’t,” he said quietly.

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Does it matter?”

Rebecca’s throat was tight. “Three years ago, you sent me a goddamn goodbye message. I thought you were dead. And now you’re back with some impossible story about tigers in the Caribbean, and you won’t explain?” She gestured between the two of them. “Whatever happened, I deserve to know the truth.”

Jake looked up at his wife, and Rebecca caught her tiny nod.

“We were on La Huerta,” he said slowly. “I don’t know if you’ve heard of it?”

Something itched at Rebecca’s brain. “The Rourke island? Where the volcano...?”

“Yeah.”

“But what does that have to do with you? What were you doing there?”

Taylor took a deep breath. “I was there investigating a tip. About unethical experiments Rourke was conducting in a secret lab.”

Rebecca turned to Jake. “And you? Also tracking something off-the-books?”

“I was tracking Lundgren,” Jake scoffed. “All my intel pointed to him working security for whatever shady operations Rourke was running on that island.”

Rebecca leaned on her elbows and tried to process it. Two separate investigations leading to the same point. Either an incredible coincidence, or...

“Okay. So you were both there, undercover. What did you find? What kind of research facility was it?”

“Research? Yeah, you could call it that.” Jake grabbed the edge of the bench so hard his knuckles went white. “Rourke was a psychopath. Piece of shit. Murderer.”

“All of that and then some,” Taylor agreed.

“And you know it how?”

“I’ve been there.” Taylor wiped the condensation off her bottle. “It wasn’t just a research lab, Rebecca.”

“What kind of experiments are we talking about? What kind of experiments need tigers?”

Taylor and Jake exchanged a glance.

“The illegal kind,” Jake said flatly.

Rebecca blinked slowly and let her trained instincts take charge.

On the surface, their story made sense. There were rumors of some kind of illicit activities involving Rourke, but then billionaires weren’t exactly paragons of virtue, so no surprises there. She couldn’t remember anyone feeling truly sorry when the headlines announced his demise. But her detective senses were tingling.

“Never took you for an environmentalist.” She looked at Taylor. “You were working with someone?”

“No.” Taylor winced. “I heard a rumour and decided to check it out myself, see what I could find. Photos, documents… anything to make it stick.”

“Sorry for asking, but are you qualified to do any of that? Did you even know what you’re looking for?”

“Not really,” Taylor admitted. “Look, I was twenty-one. Young and stupid. Full of ideals and shit. I thought I could make a difference. You know that saying? Hindsight is 20/20.”

“Okay, I get the ‘young and stupid’ part. But how did you get to a private island? It’s not like you could just buy a ticket.”

Taylor shook her head. “I didn’t. Rourke Industries was sponsoring a contest for students. A free, week-long trip to the resort. I knew getting on that winner’s list was my only shot.”

“And you won, just like you wanted?” Rebecca snorted. “That’s very convenient.”

Taylor stared at the bottle in her hands. “No. But I knew someone who could put me there. Shitty move, I know. I was desperate.”

“Who?” Rebecca pressed. “How do you just rig a corporate contest?”

“Someone with access to the systems.” Taylor’s voice was tight. “That’s all I can say.”

Rebecca’s eyes slowly moved to her brother.

“And you were their pilot? Last time I knew, you were flying fighter jets, not commercial.”

Jake scowled. “I did whatever got me paid. Private charters don’t ask too many questions.”

“Bullshit. A billionaire doesn’t just hire random pilots. Someone had to vouch for you.”

“Maybe they did.” Jake shrugged. “Maybe Lundgren wanted me there to set me up again. How would I know. I didn’t care as long as they paid. I just wanted to get dirt on him. Prove it wasn’t me.”

“And how did you get the intel exactly?”

“I still had friends.” Jake rubbed at the stain on his jeans again. “Guys from the unit who knew the charges were bullshit.”

Rebecca felt the familiar knot tightening in her chest. So he was in contact with someone from his old life when he was on the run. Just not her. Not their mother.

“Fuck you,” she muttered under her breath, and his head snapped up.

“What?”

“I said ‘fuck you’. Your old friends had your number, and Mama and I didn’t have a damn thing?!”

“I was trying to protect you.”

“From what?” She asked bitterly. “We could have helped! Instead you went off alone, confirmed a billionaire was running a black site with Lundgren as his head of security, and then what? Why didn’t you report it before it all blew up? Local authorities, FBI, anyone?”

Both Taylor and Jake let out a sharp, bitter laugh.

“Report it to who?” He asked. “Rourke owned that island. The local authorities were on his payroll. And who do you think the feds were going to believe? A disgraced pilot and a college kid, or a guy with that much money? We would have disappeared before we even ended the call.”

“So what was your plan?”

“Survive,” Taylor said softly. “That’s all we could do.”

Rebecca sat back. Fuck, what a mess. One thing for sure: they told it with conviction. And it didn’t sound entirely fake, the emotions certainly weren’t, it’s just… parts of it sounded way too convenient. Rehearsed rather than remembered. Pilot with no commercial cert flying private charters for a billionaire? Amateur sleuth somehow infiltrating a secret lab and getting mauled by a tiger? And then miraculous survival of a volcano eruption that killed hundreds?

“I need to think,” she said finally. “This is a lot.”

Before either could respond, she stood and walked inside, thinking of her chief’s words. “Don’t get into trouble.”

Too late for that, too.

Chapter Text

Rebecca’s apartment felt smaller than she remembered. She spent all of ten days in her hometown, and it was enough to forget how noisy and cramped LA really was. Her bag stayed by the door where she dropped it four days ago. Since then, she’d barely left. The blank wall across from her couch was now covered in sticky notes and printouts. She briefly considered adding red strings, too, but then she remembered how much was the deposit, and settled on washi tape instead.

The basic check on Taylor took her just an hour on day one. Rebecca felt a pang of guilt remembering the speed with which she’d photographed the permit in Taylor’s wallet while everyone was out. If her chief found out, she’d be suspended at minimum, possibly fired. But the end justifies the means, or at least so she told herself.

The check itself came back clean: valid SSN, no criminal record. But it was the source of the information that gave her two things that didn’t sit right.

First was the discovery that Taylor wasn’t her sister-in-law’s first name. Rebecca almost choked when she read the license. To be honest, if her parents gave her a name like that, she would go by her middle one, too. But then—her own mother had found her baby names in the Bible, and Taylor’s parents had clearly looked to the sky instead. All just mythology in the end. Who was to say which was stranger?

Second was the type of her document: learner’s permit, not a full license. Highly unusual for someone their age. Especially, Rebecca’s mind added, for someone she had personally watched drive.

Alone.

Busted, she thought with a wry smile. The permit required a licensed driver in the passenger seat. She decided to let it go for now. It was small potatoes compared to much bigger questions, but it gave her another piece of the puzzle: Taylor didn’t hesitate to break the rules, if she felt justified.

It was actually another thing they had in common. By the second day of looking at the meagre results, Rebecca knew her access was a joke, and she needed someone who knew how to walk through digital walls. She did: Marcus from cyber crimes. He still owed her big time for keeping his name out of that internal report last year. She’d been saving that favour for a special occasion.

Guilt pricked at her conscience. It wasn’t even a real case, just her own curiosity. She shouldn’t be using him. What if he gets in trouble? What if—

She shook it all off. She was so far gone already, might as well see it until the end.

Pot, meet kettle, eh?

Rebecca shoved away from her desk and stretched. Her coffee had long gone cold. She’d been staring at sanitized news reports about La Huerta for hours, and it wasn’t getting her anywhere. Outside, normal people were living normal lives, not obsessing over volcano eruptions and Caribbean tigers.

Her phone buzzed. Finally.

“Hey, Becca. Got the info about your cosmic girl.”

“Took you long enough.” Rebecca grabbed a notepad. “Okay. Shoot.”

“Name and date of birth checks out. SSN is valid. No criminal record.”

“Yeah. That’s what I found. Anything more?”

“I ran her through everything I could find. And honestly, her name is the most interesting part. She’s terribly boring. Worked a few months at a coffee shop, then in retail, a summer in a library. There’s a record of one semester at a community college four years ago, but she dropped out.”

“What was she studying?”

“Environmental science.”

Rebecca grunted, jotting it down. Figures. “Mhm. Anything else?”

“No. On paper, she barely exists between 18 and 21, and then nothing until that permit she got two weeks ago.”

“Any family?”

“Ah, now that’s the depressing part. I found a match for parents linked to her birth record. Both deceased. Died in car crash back in ‘98.”

Rebecca’s pen stilled. Her own breath caught in her throat. “Any trace of what happened with her after that? Guardianship? Adoption? Foster care?”

“No records I can touch without a warrant. And I’m not putting my head on the chopping block even for you.”

“Okay. Thanks, Marcus. I owe you a big one.”

She set down the phone and stared at her notes.

The story had all the right beats: orphan who doesn’t remember her parents. If she ended up in foster care, good luck. Everyone knew what a terrible mess it was. Taylor could have easily fallen through the cracks, been chewed up by the system and spat out at eighteen with nothing but trauma. And then she tried to build a life and failed. Dead end jobs, dropped classes. Vulnerable. Alone. Perfect target for whatever mess she’d gotten into.

Or a carefully constructed cover for a past she doesn’t want to talk about, the voice in her head insisted. A sob story, too sad to be questioned.

She told it to fuck off and went back to the La Huerta articles instead.

The official company statement was the usual corpo bullshit. Pioneer and visionary, great loss, yeah, sure. For shareholders’ pockets maybe.

Rebecca read it twice, scowling each time she reached the line about the workers who died. It made her think of Lord Farquaad with his “some of you may die, but it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.” Shared mission, my ass. Her sympathy definitely was with the staff.

There was a short video attached on the company page, and when she clicked on it, she thought she was seeing ghosts. The man was a spitting image of Everett Rourke, except… colorless. Pale face, white hair, even his goddamn blazer was white. It took her longer than she’d like to admit to understand she’s looking at Rourke Jr. His mother’s genes didn’t even try, she sighed and forced herself to focus on his words and not the uncanny resemblance.

Interestingly enough, where the press release was just one big puff piece, Aleister’s speech wasn’t really about his father at all. She was willing to bet he wasn’t really mourning his passing. Or if he did, the money he was about to inherit certainly dried most of his tears away.

Rebecca closed the video and searched for more information about the heir. The results were mostly sponsored profiles in business magazines, all praising the young CEO taking over his father’s empire. One headline caught her eye: “Rourke Heir Among La Huerta Survivors: ‘We’ll Honor My Father’s Legacy’”.

Wait, he was there too? The son survived while his father died. That’s… convenient. Rebecca clicked the link.

Improve lives rather than complicate them. What a strange word choice. Not exactly a ringing endorsement of dear old dad’s life work, for sure. What Rourke Senior was doing that complicated people’s lives? Rebecca marked it for later and kept scrolling through US articles.

Each outlet said basically the same thing: tragic accident, natural catastrophe, billionaire dead. Only ten people made it out alive, all Hartfeld University students. Aleister Rourke, Sean Gayle, Michelle Nguyen, Quinn Kelly, Diego Soto, Zahra Namazi, Craig Hsiao, Estela Montoya, Grace Hall, Raj Bhandarkar.

Rebecca scribbled the names in her notepad. Jake said they were rescued by the coast guard with a group of students. Taylor confirmed it. So why weren’t they on the list, too? Who would go through so much trouble to scrub them off the official records?

She opened a new tab and kept searching. Most post-accident articles about the island were just brief warnings posted on travel agencies’ websites. But the message was consistent:

Rebecca clicked through three more articles, just to make sure she hadn’t missed anything. All said the same story: Aleister had closed the island permanently, and wasn’t planning on reopening it ever again. No tourists, no journalists, no researchers. She tried to look up some geological surveys or safety assessments, and found absolutely nothing. Either the reports were sealed, or they’d never even been done in the first place.

Convenient, she thought. A volcanic eruption destroys a luxury resort, kills its billionaire owner, and the son immediately shuts down the entire island citing safety concerns that can’t be verified because no one’s allowed to check.

She tried to pull up La Huerta’s satellite images to see for herself, and to her surprise, all she found was a green blob.

What the fuck?

She tried to zoom in, but the entire island was blurred out. There was no sign of any buildings or rubble whatsoever, even though the timestamp said the images were quite recent. That was impossible… unless she picked a wrong island. She went back to a travel blog she dismissed earlier, and stared at a tall fitness model posing in front of a hotel decorated with the spiral logo of Rourke International. “The Celestial, La Huerta,” the caption read. Rebecca downloaded the photo and checked the metadata. Bingo. Someone forgot to remove the coordinates.

They were the same.

She switched to other map websites, but the result was identical. La Huerta was deliberately obscured. What kind of tourist destination required that kind of secrecy? What resorts had to be scrubbed from satellite maps? Military installations, yes, sure. Billionaire playgrounds? Not so much.

Not unless someone’s trying to hide something dark.

Nobody mentioned any secret experimental facilities in the official reports. Technically, that didn’t have to mean there wasn’t one.

To be honest, nobody wasn’t exactly a good way to put it. More like nobody Rebecca could trust. Her search led her to really weird corners of the internet, including a forum for “truth seekers” looking to “open their minds.”

Rebecca took one look and realized they all opened their minds so wide all of their wits fell out.

She never closed a tab so fast in her entire life. Their main theory was that there was no volcano, and the eruption was a cover-up for some kind of weapon test. That was easy to prove. It took her all of ten minutes to find the seismic records from June 1st, 2017. The spike of tectonic activity was visible even if you had no idea what you’re looking at. So, the eruption was real.

Another dead end.

That left her with one last, desperate option: a deep dive into the international press, hoping to find something that wasn’t just a translation of a bigger press agency statement. Her high school knowledge of French was rusty, but she could make out enough. And on the third page of results, she noticed a word that caught her attention.

Douze survivants ont été secourus par les garde-côtes dominicains.

Douze. Dozen. Twelve.

There was a grainy photo attached, and her hands were all shaky and sweaty when she clicked on the thumbnail. Ten people sat in the front, huddled together under the silver emergency blankets, and two more stood in the background, almost out of frame. She zoomed in until the figures were just blurry shapes, and cursed the TV gods for making up the fictional CSI detectives having photo enhancing superpowers. She would sell her soul to have those, too.

But even without the Photoshop magic, she knew who she’s looking at. Both the man and woman were facing away from the camera. His shoulders were slumped and his head down. She was drowning in a green jacket draped around her arms, and her fingers rested on his wrist.

She’d seen the same gesture countless times those last two weeks.

Between her brother and his wife.

As if on cue, her phone buzzed with a text from Jake. “Guess who just sold his soul to the landlord?”

She opened the photo: him and Taylor standing in front of a small house with peeling paint and overgrown yard, both grinning. Her brother looked genuinely happy in a way she hadn’t seen in years.

She typed back: “Congrats! It looks nice!”

“Come on, we know it’s a dump. But it’s OUR dump,” Taylor replied. “Come visit when we’re done renovating?”

“Definitely.”

Rebecca put the phone down and looked out the window.

What right did she have to dig in something they obviously wanted to move on from?

Chapter Text

Quinn Kelly shouldn’t be alive.

Rebecca read the PubMed article three times to be sure. The young woman beaming from the photo she had taped on her wall had suffered from an incurable degenerative disease. Incurable. No pills, no surgeries, just managing until the inevitable comes. Except Quinn got miraculously cured, and was now the face of a charity for people battling chronic diseases, healthy enough to run fundraisers and give empowering speeches at conferences.

In the weeks since she discovered the survivors list, Rebecca managed to squeeze the investigation between shifts, late night rabbit-holes, and the steady stream of texts from Louisiana: Jake’s photos of paint swatches he swore were identical, Taylor’s complaints about humidity and careful check-ins about whether Jake was really keeping up with therapy. When Rebecca asked, Taylor was honest: “Some sessions are harder than others. But he seems better.”

Rebecca didn’t mention the investigation board covering her wall and instead focused on mutual grumbling about workload and stupid bosses. It was easier to keep pretending everything was normal.

And she started to notice a pattern.

Raj Bhandarkar, celebrity chef loved by half of her precinct, not to mention her own mother, who always insisted a good cook needs to look their part and know their spices, and Raj got both.

Diego Soto, an aspiring writer whose debut book became a New York Times bestseller overnight.

Zahra Namazi, an elite cybersecurity consultant charging rates that made Rebecca reconsider her career path.

Sean Gayle, a rising star quarterback with a multi-million dollar contract.

Grace Hall, a talented painter who just received raving reviews for her newest gallery exhibition.

Michelle Nguyen, an intern in a prestigious teaching hospital who already co-authored an article published in The Lancet.

Craig Hsiao, a lead developer at a major game studio.

And Aleister Rourke, the heir of Rourke fortune.

Rebecca sat back and stared at the ten photos taped to her wall. The tenth survivor, Estela Montoya, was a ghost. Beyond the articles putting her name on survivor list, Rebecca found only one mention: in her mother’s obituary. Dr. Olivia Montoya, died on December 31st, 2011, leaving behind a fifteen-year old daughter. Quick search revealed the mother had been working for Rourke International.

Of course. Of fucking course. There are no other companies in this story. Everyone’s on Rourke’s payroll. She circled Dr. Montoya’s name so hard the pen tore through the paper.

For just a handful of people, all 25 or below, the rate of success was just staggering. Some of it made sense, like Sean who followed his father’s NFL footsteps, or Aleister and Grace, two trust fund kids who probably read The Wall Street Journal instead of bedtime stories. But the rest?

One name bothered her more than the others. Zahra Namazi. Cybersecurity consultant at 25, charging Fortune 500 rates. Was she really that good, or was she one of the hackers who changed sides? Taylor mentioned knowing someone who rigged the Rourke contest and put her on the winners list. Was it Zahra?

She picked up her phone and texted Marcus. “Ever heard of Zahra Namazi? IT security expert?”

His reply came quick. “Yeah. Best in the field. Works with the feds sometimes. Picky with cases and hella expensive. Why? You’re in trouble?”

Depends on your definition of trouble, she thought to herself. “No, just curious,” she texted back.

“You couldn’t afford her anyway. Let me know if you need someone cheaper.”

Rebecca stared at the screen. Federal contracts. That was… unexpected, to say at least. Whatever Zahra was doing in the past, it looked like she’d cleaned up her act.

That still left the others.

Raj started with a YouTube cooking channel that got viral sometime in 2018, and he quickly took the opportunity to snag a contract for a TV show. Of course, he wouldn’t make it beyond the first season if his cooking was bad and his personality was awful, but both were far from that. Rebecca herself had tried following a few of his recipes, and she had to admit Raj’s love for cooking was simply contagious. He always emphasized how food brings people together and how cooking for someone was a way to show them love. He’d feel at home with her mother, that’s for sure. Still, she suspected there were hundreds of young cooks just as passionate and just as talented who never got their chance at stardom.

And Diego Soto? She’d bought his bestseller, and while the book wasn’t bad, it was kinda… meta. A story about the power of storytelling. She swallowed it in one afternoon, crying and laughing in turns, and then closed it thinking that while it was witty and funny, it was actually just a hyped up textbook. Would she buy it if it wasn’t for her investigation? Probably not. Were there enough people interested in film theory to catapult it to the top of the sales chart? She doubted that, too.

But the biggest mystery was Quinn, healed from an illness that had no cure. Was she just a fraud pretending to be sick for sympathy and cash? Stories like that weren’t unheard of. But from what Rebecca could gather from the charity’s publicized financial statements, all donations went to the beneficiaries. Impressive, she thought. But incurable diseases don’t just disappear overnight. What could it be then?

Experimental treatment? She wrote in her notepad and the pen stilled over the page.

Jake mentioned an experimental facility on La Huerta. Taylor insisted whatever was done there was unethical. Rourke Jr. talked about pivoting to medical research.

What if Quinn was a test subject, and something actually went right for once?

What if someone paid to kickstart Raj’s and Diego’s careers?

What if someone directed high-profile customers to Zahra’s business?

What if—

Holy shit.

Jake’s name didn’t clear itself, did it?

Rebecca would bet neither Michelle nor Craig had to worry about their student loans.

There was only one person on the list with that kind of money, and a reason to pay for everyone’s silence. Did he also have enough influence to make Jake’s charges go away? Six years for being wanted for treason, and suddenly his case just… went away. Poof. Gone without a trial. She had been so relieved she hadn’t questioned it.

Rebecca’s blood went cold. Holy shit, Jake. What did you get into? And then another, darker thought punched her gut. What if Estela was the only one who didn’t accept the deal, and got silenced anyway—permanently?

Her phone buzzed. Jake. Rebecca stared at the screen for a few seconds before picking up.

“Hey, stranger.” She hoped she sounded happier than she was. “To what do I owe the honor? Run out of walls to paint already?”

Jake laughed. “You offering? I’m actually calling to ask if you have any plans for Memorial Day weekend.”

She glanced at her investigation board. “Not really. Why, what’s up?”

“We’re throwing a housewarming party. We have some of our old friends coming over, and Tay and I were hoping you’d come, too.”

Old friends? What old friends? Navy buddies? Taylor’s roommate from four years ago?

“A party? Yeah, of course. Count me in. Wouldn’t miss it.”

“Cool. We’re starting Saturday afternoon, but you can come earlier and stay as long as you want, if you don’t mind sleeping on the couch.”

“Okay.” She noted it down. “But if you turn it into a flatpack assembly or wall painting competition, I’m out.”

“I won’t. It’ll be good to have you here, Becks. Really.”

“Yeah. See you Saturday. Tell Taylor I said hi, and I hope she makes that salad she posted last night.”

“That might be hard,” he chuckled. “She improvised. But I’ll ask.”

“Thanks. Love you.”

She hung up and stared at her phone. Where the hell that last thing came from? Her eyes landed on the photos taped to her wall again. Ah, to hell with it all. I could use a break and be just a sister for a weekend. The case will still be here next week.

Right?

Rebecca promised herself she would really take a break. One weekend without any investigations or conspiracy theories, no staring at photos until her eyes watered. Just her brother’s housewarming party, some small talk with their friends, maybe a few drinks. That’s all.

She’d lasted exactly forty minutes into the flight before pulling up her notes app and scrolling through the survivor list agan.

Pathetic. She squeezed her eyes shut. Let it go, McKenzie, she told herself for the umpteenth time. Just for one fucking weekend, like you promised yourself.

If only it was so easy. Before Rebecca even reached the baggage claim, her head was already splitting open from all the noise and stale air, and she knew outside wasn’t going to be much better. She dropped on a bench and idly scanned the crowd. Her eyes settled on a woman a few feet away. In the midst of the airport chaos, she was the only person perfectly calm and not rushing anywhere. And when she smiled at her phone, Rebecca felt a flutter in her chest. It was one of the genuine smiles that made you want to smile, too.

The woman looked up like she felt Rebecca’s gaze, and that’s when it hit her. That striking face with dark eyes and a thin, silvery scar that ran from her forehead down her cheek. She’d seen it. She stared at it every day for weeks. The blurry photo from the obscure blog… the one person she couldn’t find.

Estela Montoya.

It had to be her.

Rebecca quickly turned her eyes away, pulling her phone out of her pocket as an excuse. Her stomach, full of butterflies just a few second ago, now felt filled with lead. What were the odds? She’d been admiring a beautiful stranger, and it was the same person she desperately wanted to find for weeks.

When she finally risked a glance up, Estela was already gone. Rebecca bit back a curse. What should she do now? She stood up to get a better look. There it was—a flash of dark hair gathered in a high ponytail disappearing towards the exit. She started after her, then stopped. Fuck. I have to wait for my bag. Whyyyy??

By the time her luggage decided to appear on the carousel, the trail went cold. Rebecca pushed through the crowd and stepped out straight into the scorching sun, but Estela was nowhere to be found.

At least I know she’s alive, Rebecca thought. That has to count for something.

“You arrived at your destination,” the mechanical voice of Rebecca’s GPS announced.

The house was small, but comparing it to the photo Jake sent right after signing the lease, Rebecca was truly impressed with all the work they put into it. Probably more than it’s worth, she thought with her usual dose of cynicism. Who puts so much money into a rental? But then she stopped herself. For Jake, this was probably the first permanent place he could call his home in six years. For Taylor… Rebecca’s mind went back to the background check. For Taylor, this could be the first home she’d had. Like, ever. And when she put it like that, maybe a few cans of paint weren’t a waste of money at all.

Rebecca grabbed the bottle of wine she picked up on the way from her mother’s and flung her jacket over her head to shield herself from the sudden rain. Before she even opened the door, she could hear her brother’s laugh.

Jake pulled her into a hug the moment she stepped inside. “Glad you made it before the storm.”

“Beat the crowd, huh?”

“Yeah. But don’t worry, we would have saved you the salad anyway.” He flashed a grin. “Come on in.”

Rebecca stepped inside and took in the space. “Cozy,” she said.

“I’m afraid it’s not any bigger on the inside,” Jake chuckled.

Her eyes were already on the photos they put on the wall. Two of them from Jake’s childhood, one with them both standing in a muddy river, Jake holding a crab—she still remembered how he tried to spook her with one—and another from a birthday party. Then a photo from the Navy, with Mike and the rest of his unit standing next to a fighter jet. One with Taylor sitting on a cliff admiring a sunset. And the last had to be the handfasting photo. Jake and Taylor with hands wrapped in a pink ribbon, looking at each other like nothing else in the world mattered.

“Holy fuck,” Rebecca managed, then whistled. “What a dress. I’m surprised you were able to look her in the eyes.”

“I borrowed it!” Taylor’s voice rang from the kitchen. “Beautiful, right?”

“Stunning,” Rebecca agreed. “You both looked great.”

She gave her brother a side look. If he was in a cartoon, the artist would definitely draw his eyes as two big hearts.

“Stop staring.” She elbowed him in the ribs. “I’ve been promised food and drinks. So, entertain me.”

“Come on.” Jake guided her towards the kitchen. “Let me introduce you to—”

Rebecca froze mid-step.

The woman from the airport was here. In her brother’s house. Standing by the counter with a beer in hand, laughing with Taylor like they’ve known each other for years.

“—Estela,” Jake finished, oblivious to Rebecca’s internal short-circuit. “Estela, this is my sister Rebecca. Becks, this is Estela Montoya.”

A flicker of recognition passed through Estela’s face, or maybe Rebecca imagined it.

“Nice to meet you.” Estela extended her hand. Her grip was firm and short.

“You too. I think I saw you at the airport,” Rebecca blurted out and immediately felt the blush creeping up her cheeks. You’re an idiot, she scolded herself.

Estela nodded. “I flew in this morning. Small world. I thought you looked familiar.” She looked between her and Jake. “Now I understand why.”

“I don’t think we look that much alike,” Rebecca protested weakly.

“Your face shape and expressions are similar. Trust me, I have an eye for details.” Estela gestured at her. “But you’ve got better hair.”

“You wound me, Katniss.” Jake put a hand over his chest. “You have no idea how much effort it takes to make my hair look that good.”

“Five minutes?” Estela winked at Rebecca.

Rebecca’s stomach did that stupid flutter thing again. Shit. She forced herself to look away. This was Jake’s friend. One of the survivors. Someone she’d been investigating. She shouldn’t. That would be…

Unethical? Her brain supplied. Like everything else you’ve done in those past few weeks?

Taylor slid a beer into Rebecca’s hand. “Here. You look like you could use this.”

“Thanks.” Rebecca took a long sip and tried to collect her thoughts. “You’re living nearby?” She asked Estela and wanted to facepalm herself. Jesus, and you’re a detective? “Sorry. Brain fart. Forget I asked. I must be tired from the flight.”

Taylor’s eyes went wide. “Oh! Why didn’t we think about it earlier! You see,” she turned to Rebecca, “Estela is from LA, too. You two could have shared a ride.”

“Oh?” Rebecca blinked.

“Yeah! She runs her own self-defense studio. And trust me, she’s good.” Taylor beamed at Estela. “She taught me a few moves.”

Rebecca looked at her, too. So the mystery had been hiding under my nose all the time?

“That’s—”

The door burst open, cutting her off.

“We made it!” A short guy stepped inside, shaking rain from his hair. “Sorry we’re late. The traffic was insane.”

“Diego. Stop. Talking.” A flat voice sounded from behind him. “Or I’m changing all your passwords.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Try me.”

“Is she joking? Please tell me she’s joking,” the man pleaded.

“I don’t think she is, Diego!” Taylor shouted from the kitchenette. “Do you want to find out for your—oof!”

Before Taylor could even finish, the man wrapped her in a bear hug, mumbling something into her hair. Rebecca could only make out some words. “missed you—please don’t kill me—I can explain—”

Interesting. Why would her sister-in-law want to kill the famous Diego Soto? And what does he want to explain?

Jake joined the hug, grinning. “We’re happy to see you too, Short Stuff.”

Bold of you to tease people for their height, she scoffed, even if Diego didn’t seem to mind.

“Of course I made it! Do you think a little rain was going to stop me? I’m not made of sugar. I’ve been looking forward to this for weeks.”

The short, sharp-eyed woman who threatened Diego pushed right past the group hug without a word of greeting and made a beeline for the liquor bottle on the counter.

“Great to see you too, Zahra,” Jake chuckled. “Help yourself.”

“That’s the plan.” She grabbed the whiskey and poured herself a generous glass. “Almost six hours on a plane with Diego. I’ve earned it.”

“It wasn’t even six hours—”

“It was, if you include the layover. And it felt like six days to me, Diego.”

Rebecca tried to count her piercings, but gave up after the tenth. So this was Zahra Namazi. The cybersecurity consultant Marcus called “the best in the field.” The woman who might or might not have hacked the Rourke contest to get Taylor on the island. She didn’t really look like a hacker. Then again, Rebecca didn’t look like a cop when she was off-duty either. Maybe that was the point.

Diego turned to Rebecca, apparently unfazed. “You must be Rebecca! Jake told us so much about you. I heard you’re a detective? That’s so cool. I’ve been researching police procedures for my next book, and I think you could help me a lot!”

Rebecca blinked.

“Your book,” she managed. “I just read it.”

“Really?” His whole face lit up. “What do you think?”

I think someone paid to make it a bestseller. “It was… very engaging.”

“That’s what I was going for! So, what would you say to a partnership? We would be like Castle and Beckett. Maybe I could even get a vest that says ‘WRITER’ like he did on the show!”

“Diego.” Taylor grabbed his elbow and gently steered him towards the food. “Let her settle in before you start pitching ideas, okay?”

Diego looked like a kid whose mom had taken his toys away. Rebecca almost laughed, but her brain was ringing an alarm bell.

Jake said they invited ‘old friends’. And so far all three of them are survivors.

“So, uh, how do y’all know each other?” She asked casually.

“We were on La Huerta together,” Estela said simply.

Tell me something I don’t know, Rebecca thought.

Jake caught her frown. “You okay?”

“Yeah. I have a headache, that’s all. Anyone else comin’?”

He squeezed her shoulder. “Just one couple. Want something for your head? I think we should have—”

As if on cue, the door opened again.

“I’m so happy to see you, Grace!” Taylor hugged the short woman. “Where did you lose your fiance?”

“God, don’t ask.” Grace laughed. “He’s wrestling his car from the mud pit you call your front lawn. He insisted I come in before I melted.”

Taylor kept her arms around Grace and gestured at Rebecca. “Grace, this is my sister-in-law. Rebecca, this is Grace Hall.”

“Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Rebecca said, shaking Grace’s hand. The big rock on her finger probably cost more than Rebecca’s yearly salary.

Grace Hall, the trust fund kid slash artist. That makes four survivors so far.

Diego swallowed a big bite of his salad. “Does he need any help?”

“I’m not going out in that weather,” Jake grumbled, sliding a drink into Grace’s hand. “Malfoy can afford a tow truck. What did he expect, a red carpet?”

The door creaked open, and the man himself stepped inside, his expensive shoes covered in mud.

Rebecca’s beer stopped halfway to her mouth.

Before he could even take another step, Taylor pointed a wooden spoon at him from across the room.

“Hey! Mind the mud on your shoes, I just mopped!”

The man stopped, looked down at his shoes, and gracefully toed them off by the door. “Ah. The eternal struggle against entropy. My apologies.”

He stepped into the room, smiling sheepishly, and for the first time in her life, Rebecca thought she was going to faint.

Rourke. Aleister fucking Rourke.

A spitting image of his father, with the same pale face that haunted her for weeks. A goddamn billionaire, standing in the middle of her brother’s tiny living room in socks, because her sister-in-law told him off.

This wasn’t a housewarming party. This was a damn reunion.

And Rebecca was the only one who wasn’t in on it.

Chapter Text

This?

Rebecca stared.

This was the villain? The mastermind pulling strings from behind the scenes? The billionaire who paid to silence all survivors and swept all evidence of daddy’s wrongdoings under the rug? The man with enough power to erase two people from an incident that hit international headlines? The person who she had almost convinced herself had disappeared Estela?

This was Aleister Rourke?

The guy standing awkwardly in his socks and apologizing to her sister-in-law who scolded him for tracking mud?

What the fuck was going on?

“Here.” Taylor handed him a towel. “Go dry off.”

Rebecca blinked and tugged at her brother’s sleeve. “Can you pinch me? Is this who I think this is?”

“If you’re thinking this is Aleister Rourke, then yeah.”

“But he’s… he’s…”

“Filthy rich?” Jake shrugged. “Yeah. But he’s alright.”

Rebecca stared at her brother. Alright? ALRIGHT?! This was the son of the man who was running illegal experiments on the island, and Jake thought he was alright?

Jake leaned in. “Breathe, sis,” he lowered his voice to a whisper. “Don’t look so starstruck.”

Starstruck? It was so absurd Rebecca almost scoffed at him. She was a detective with a case crumbling in real time, not some silly girl intimidated by the guy’s wealth.

Okay, maybe a little.

“That’s just Malfoy,” Jake continued, completely oblivious to the storm in her head. “Underneath all that money, he’s a regular guy like you and me. He doesn’t bite.”

She forced a tiny smile. “Yeah. It’s just… it’s a lot to take in. A heads up would have been nice.”

“Sorry.” Jake grinned and ruffled her hair like he used to when she was eight. “Go grab another beer and don’t worry about him. He doesn’t even have shoes right now. If it helps, you can imagine he has a hole in his sock.”

“Riddikulus,” she mumbled and pretended to wave a magic wand before tactically retreating to a corner. It helped a little bit.

Taylor appeared at her side with a bowl of greens and a calming smile.

“Here. Jake told me you wanted to try my salad? I hope it tastes as good as it looks. Everyone went after your mom’s like crazy,” she sighed.

“Thanks.” Rebecca took a bite and the sweet and crunchy combination hit her taste buds. “Holy shit, that’s amazing. Especially the dressing. What’s in it?”

Taylor beamed. “Mango and chillies. It’s a secret recipe, but… I’ll send it to you anyway. I don’t think Raj would mind.”

Rebecca nodded. She could bet she knew exactly which Raj it was, and yeah, if his TV personality was anything like his real one, he wouldn’t mind sharing the recipe at all.

“Taylor, we need you here!” Grace and Estela waved from the couch on other side of the room. Zahra, sitting next to them on the armrest, looked like she wanted to run, or drown herself in the glass of whiskey in her hand. “Important wedding business!”

“Gotta go,” Taylor squeezed Rebecca’s arm apologetically.

Rebecca’s eyes drifted to the group. Grace was showing them something on her phone, her face all lit up with excitement that was impossible to fake. Is she excited to marry the guy, or his money? Rebecca grimaced at herself. No, wait. Grace Hall comes from money, why would she—

God, she was really grasping at straws now.

“—and for the bridesmaid dresses, I was thinking light sage green—”

“Count me out, please.” Zahra protested. “I hate pastels.”

Grace’s face fell.

“How many bridesmaids are you planning to have?” Taylor leaned on the backrest and squinted at the screen.

“Six. Five of you, and my cousin.”

“Hmm.” Taylor fished a phone out of her pocket and tapped something, then scrolled through the results and turned the screen to Grace. “How about something like this? We can all have the same dress, but everyone gets a different shade of green. Zahra could go for the darkest one. What do you think?”

“I think it’s a brilliant idea!” Grace beamed again. “Zahra, how do you feel about hunter green?”

“I think you’re making up color names,” Zahra sighed and took a long sip. “Whatever. Are you guys having an open bar? And if not, is it too late to back down?”

Rebecca chuckled. Who would have thought she had something in common with the elusive cyberexpert?

Her eyes moved to the buffet laid out on the kitchen island and three men gesturing between bowls like a bunch of culinary critics. Aleister, with his hair still sticking in all different directions, noticed Diego struggling with a wine opener and helped him without a word. Estela appeared at Aleister’s side, reaching past Diego for a plate.

“Move. You’re blocking half the food,” she said, elbowing him in the ribs.

“I’m deciding.”

“You’re hoarding.” She gestured at his plate. “Al, you should try the potato salad before Diego licks the bowl clean.”

Aleister obediently scooped some and tried it. “It’s quite good, actually.”

“My mom’s recipe,” Jake announced, looking so proud as if it was his own.

“Send Mrs. McKenzie my regards,” Aleister muttered, swallowing a bite.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full.” Estela clapped Aleister’s back. “And either move your ass too, or pass me a beer.”

“My apologies,” Aleister blushed and slid her a bottle.

Rebecca’s theory shattered piece by piece. This was the man she’d seriously suspected of ordering a hit on Estela. Instead, they were bickering like… siblings. Nothing about this made sense. Nothing.

She’d been thinking of the man as a monster, the architect of a massive cover-up, and he was… absolutely normal. A bit stiff, polite to a fault, with a fancy accent straight out of BBC that sounded very much out of place here in the middle of swamp town. If Aleister paid them off to keep his father’s sins hidden, would Taylor dare to scold him about the mud on his shoes? Would Estela tell him to move his ass? Would Grace want to marry him? Rebecca interviewed enough liars to know it wasn’t a performance. These people didn’t act like hostages or victims of blackmail. They were simply… friends. Good friends, from the looks of it.

The investigation board back in her apartment suddenly felt like the ravings of a paranoid person, not a work of a detective following evidence. She’d been chasing goddamn ghosts.

“Sooo, detective.” Diego materialized by her side and smiled sheepishly. “Did you have time to think about our partnership?”

“Diego.” Taylor’s voice carried a warning from across the room.

Rebecca chuckled and gestured to her that she’s handling it, then turned to Diego. “No.”

“No, you didn’t have time to think about it, or no, no partnership?”

“No partnership.”

“Come on, just give me a chance?” Diego looked like a kicked puppy. “I’m a fantastic sidekick, you can ask Taylor or Jake. You’ll barely even know I’m here.”

“Don’t listen to him.” Taylor looped her arm with Diego’s and tried to steer him away. “He’ll talk you to death, and then try to set you up with everyone you look twice at.”

“And see how it worked for you and Jake? If it wasn’t for me, you’d never make that first move—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Taylor rolled her eyes and winked at Rebecca. “Like I said. Don’t listen to him. He’s full of shit.”

Rebecca rubbed her temples. Her head was splitting again.

“Sorry,” she managed, setting down her plate. “I need some air.”

“Oh!” Diego’s face fell. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s okay. I just need a minute.” She slipped out of the door before anyone else could start talking to her.

The porch was blessedly quiet. The rain stopped falling a while ago, leaving everything wet and glistening in the golden afternoon light. Water dripped from the roof. Rebecca leaned against the railing and closed her eyes.

Her entire case, the one she spent weeks building, crumbled into dust the moment Aleister Rourke stepped into her brother’s house. She was so sure, so arrogant in her deductions that he was the only one with a perfect motive, means and opportunity, and it was all bullshit. Detective of the year, she thought bitterly and let out a shaky breath. The damp, suffocating air did nothing to cool the burn of failure in her chest.

The door behind her creaked.

“You okay?” Jake appeared beside her with two beers in hand. She took one.

“Yeah. Just need a moment to breathe.”

“Sorry about Diego. He means well, but he’s… not exactly subtle.”

“Tell me about it,” Rebecca laughed and took a sip. “Those friends of yours. They are all from the island, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Y’all seem really close.”

“Bad experiences bring people together,” he tried to shrug it off, but she saw right through it.

Sure, surviving a volcano eruption together had to leave a mark. But was it enough to make five people fly across the country three years later? Enough to explain the way they looked out for each other, like they’d been a family? She turned over her shoulder and looked inside. Taylor refilled Zahra’s drink, laughing at something Aleister said, then scooped extra salad onto Diego’s plate and moved to Grace gesturing at something on her phone. You didn’t have to be a detective to see everyone’s attention tracked her movements.

“She’s the center of it all,” Rebecca noticed. “Not you. Taylor.”

“Yeah.” He followed the line of her sight and smiled. “She is.”

“She’s always like this? When you first arrived, I thought she was rather shy.”

Jake laughed. “Shy? Taylor? God, no. I think she was just afraid to blow up her first impression. She’s…” His face went soft. “She’s good with people. A natural leader. Got us through more bad times than I could count.”

Rebecca nodded. Her mind went back to the night when she saw Taylor handle his attack without flinching. Hell, just moments ago, it was Taylor who saved her from Diego’s overwhelming enthusiasm. Twice. If she was always that calm during crisis, Rebecca could see why the whole group leaned on her. She’d want to have someone like that by her side, too. Someone who not only shows the way, but actively protects people she loves.

“I keep thinking about the tiger,” she said quietly. “You told me she stepped in front of it. To protect someone.”

“She did.”

“But why her?” Rebecca turned to face her brother. “Why not you?”

Jake’s jaw tensed as he stared into his beer.

“Because I wouldn’t have,” he said. “Becks, back then… I was at a lowest point of my life. I drank half of my days away just to stop feeling anything. I wouldn’t have stand up in front of anything for anyone. I would have pushed someone else to save my own ass and called that survival.”

The words hung between them.

“I was ashamed of who I was back then.” Jake’s voice got rough. “Of the man I’d become. Taylor… she saved me.” He shook his head. “In more ways than one.”

Rebecca’s throat tightened. She remembered the message he sent her three years ago. I’m ashamed of me. You’re the hero I’ll never be.

“Was it really that bad?” She asked softly.

“Worse. Worse than you can imagine.” He looked at her. “I’m not proud of it. But I’m trying to get better. Every day.”

“When I got your message, I was so angry.” Rebecca felt the tears welling in her eyes. “At you. At the situation. At the fact that I couldn’t call you back. I was sure you—I thought you killed yourself.”

Jake flinched.

“And I couldn’t even tell you what an idiot you were,” her voice broke. “Couldn’t tell you that you were still my brother, and I still loved your stupid ass—” she wiped her eyes. “I hated that I’d never get the chance to talk to you again.”

“Becks, I’m—”

“That message is why I pushed so hard to make detective. I’ve always wanted to know the truth, about everything. And I thought… maybe one day I’ll find out what really happened to you. Maybe I could bring you home, or what was left of you.” She laughed wetly. “But I guess you beat me to it.”

Jake pulled her into a hug so tight she couldn’t breathe. “I’m sorry. For all of it. I’m so fuckin’ sorry you have no idea. I hope one day you can forgive me.”

“You’re here now,” she sobbed into his collarbone. “That’s all that matters. That we’ve got you back.”

They stood like that, watching the golden light fade over the wet road. Rebecca thought about Jake’s trauma from seeing Mike’s death, from the military, from years of trying to outrun his demons. The island couldn’t have helped. Whatever happened there, it had left its own scars.

“Can I ask you one more thing?” She pulled away and wiped her eyes.

“Sure.”

“Do you regret it? Going to the island, I mean?”

Jake was quiet for a long time. “No. I regret who I was before it. What I’d become after Mike was gone. I regret not calling you or Ma earlier. I was thinking of my own ass, and didn’t even realize how bad I hurt you. You deserve better. But this?” He gestured at the house. “Taylor? The Odd Squad? I’d do it all over again if it meant ending up here.”

“Even the bad parts?” Her chest ached.

“Even the bad parts. They made me who I am now.” He squeezed her shoulder. “Someone who can actually look in the mirror again.”

She nodded. Her throat was too tight to speak. Someone called Jake’s name from inside the house, and he looked at her questioningly.

“I have to go. You’re gonna be okay?” He asked.

“Yeah. I’ll just need a minute out here.”

“Take your time.” He stopped on the doorstep. “Hey, Becks?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m really glad we talked.”

“Me too, Jake. Me too.”

“And I’m glad that you’re getting to know them,” he added quietly. “They’re good people.”

Rebecca caught the warning in his voice: these are my people. Be careful with them. She wondered what he meant by that. Careful how? Careful because they’d been through enough? Or careful because there were things she shouldn’t dig into?

But instead of asking, she just nodded.

“They are.”

Jake smiled and went inside. She caught him murmuring to himself he needs to oil the hinges. Her temple fell on the damp porch post, and she closed her eyes again. For the first time since he returned, it felt like the air between them had cleared a bit. Not that her anger and her grief went away—wounds like that don’t heal so easily—but at least it got easier to breathe. He was really trying, she could see it. And it meant more than he could imagine.

When the door creaked open again, she didn’t turn, sure it was just her brother coming back for the beer he forgot.

“Mind if I join you?”

Rebecca’s head snapped up at the voice. Estela was standing on the porch, bottle in her hand, leaning on the other side of the post.

“Not at all,” she mumbled.

For a moment, they just stood next to each other in comfortable silence, watching the drops falling from the roof.

“Jake talked about you a lot, you know?” Estela said finally.

“So I’ve heard. You’re at an advantage then,” Rebecca sighed. “He didn’t tell me about any of you until today.”

“I’m sorry.” Estela’s voice sounded honest. “I don’t think your brother is used to trusting people.”

“Neither am I,” Rebecca admitted. “How about you?”

“I don’t trust easily. Never have.”

Rebecca turned to look at her. They had more in common than she’d expected.

“Comes with the territory,” Estela continued.

“Territory?”

“My life. Growing up the way I did.” Estela took a sip of her beer. “I learned early that people leave, or hurt you, or both.”

Rebecca thought of the obituary she found. Was Estela talking about her mother, or someone else?

“Sounds familiar,” she said instead.

“Police work?”

“Yeah. You see the worst in people, it gets hard to believe in the best.”

“Exactly.” Estela’s eyes met hers, and a flicker of understanding passed between them. “But still, it’s hard to go through life without trusting anyone.”

“Speaking from experience?”

“Yeah.” Estela glanced at the window and her lips curled in a smile.

“You trust them.” Rebecca gestured at the group inside. She meant it as a question, but it came out as more of a statement.

“With my life.” Estela said simply. “Every single person in that room. I’d take a bullet for any of them, and I know they’d do the same for me.”

“It must be so nice,” she said quietly. “Having that kind of certainty.”

Estela turned to face her fully. “It is. But it’s also terrifying.”

“How so?”

“Because once you let people in, they can hurt you worse than any enemy ever could. Trusting someone is the bravest thing you can do. And the scariest.”

“And you think it’s worth it in the end?”

“Yes.”

The golden light caught Estela’s face, highlighting the scar on her cheek. Rebecca’s breath caught.

“You stared at me at the airport.” Estela’s voice dropped lower. “I’ve been trying to figure out why.”

Because I think your smile is beautiful. Or maybe because I have your photo on my investigation board. Rebecca took a breath. She didn’t want to confess to either, but lying felt wrong after the talk about trust they just shared. Ah, to hell with it.

“After Jake came back, I was trying to understand what he’d been through. Where he’d been. Who he’d become.” She met Estela’s eyes. “I looked y’all up. So, yeah. I recognized you. I saw your photo.”

Estela didn’t respond, and instead just looked at Rebecca with that unreadable face. It made her feel like she was the one under interrogation, and it wasn’t a pleasant feeling at all. She felt the heat creeping up her neck. She just confessed to snooping on her friends to someone who does not trust easily. Maybe she should have went with a compliment.

Well shit, she thought. Great move, McKenzie. You didn’t just kill the conversation, you killed any chance you had before you even got it.

Estela pushed off the post, but didn’t move towards the door. She was standing so close Rebecca could see the flecks of gold in her dark eyes. “And you’re trying to figure me out as a person of interest?”

Rebecca’s mouth went dry. “How about an interesting person?”

“Fair enough.” Estela’s smile was almost challenging. “But here’s some advice, detective: I’m not easy to figure out.”

“I like mysteries.”

“I figured.” Estela smiled at her. “Come on. If we stay out here too long, Taylor will send a search party.”

“Can’t have that,” she agreed.

“Definitely not. Imagine she sends Diego?”

Rebecca laughed, but even when Estela disappeared back inside, she stood on the porch for another moment. Her heart was still racing.

What the hell had just happened?