Alex let the name hang there for a second. Rook. Useless without context. “Anything else?”
“The guy wouldn’t talk until he knew Ward was dead.”
Of course he wouldn’t. That was how deep whatever this was went—fear buried into the bones. Alex clenched his jaw. “Did you listen to the interrogation tape yet?”
“I’m going through the notes,” Noah said, frustration bleeding through.
“I’m going out to the prison. The guy was there thirty years, Noah. Someone knows more.” Alex felt it, that same burn low in his gut—frustration, instinct, fire.
But before he could respond, Noah cut in again. “Take Killian,” he said. “Don’t go alone.”
Alex froze, biting back the first response. He didn’t want Killian. He didn’t want anyone. But Noah wasn’t wrong. Not this time. “She knows more.”
There was a pause before Noah’s voice came quiet and hard. “I know.” The line went dead.
Alex closed out his laptop and got up. He stood there a beat longer, the hallway silent around him except for the thrum of his pulse. He slid his laptop into its case, turned and walked back into the room. Everything looked the same—but it wasn’t. Not to him.
Ethan had his back turned, spine straight with tension. He didn’t trust easily, and right now, he trusted no one. Across thetable, Charlotte and Graham sat, too relaxed. Too damn calm. Too close. They weren’t leaking anything.
Alex’s eyes moved across the room like a scanner. Everyone was busy. Focused. Immersed in their work. Except one. Nathan Stokes.
FBI. Clean suit. Clean face. Too clean. Sitting just a little too still, staring at nothing like he was waiting for the floor to drop out from under him. And there it was—sweat on his brow.
Barely visible, but there. It was March. The AC was humming. The room was cool. Fever—or guilt.
Alex didn’t believe in coincidence. Not here. Not now. He bet on guilt.
The patrol carhummed steadily down the highway, tires whispering over the asphalt. Morning light slid across the dash, but Alex barely noticed. He sat stiffly in the passenger seat, hands clasped, jaw tight. His eyes were on the road, but his mind was still back in that quiet bedroom—where everything felt close but never quite enough.
“There’s a leak,” he said finally, voice low and clipped. “Ethan got a headline. Too early.”
Brad let out a short breath through his nose. “Noah’s on it.”
“I know.”
They rode in silence for a beat before Brad spoke again. “You want to talk?”
“No,” Alex said, then, quieter, without looking over, “but you’re not going to let it go.”
From the driver’s seat, Killian chuckled. “Gonna be a long ride.”
Alex leaned back, eyes closing briefly before he opened them again. “Charlotte’s still not letting me in all the way.”
Brad stayed quiet, letting him get there in his own time.
“She’s grieving Chuck—finally letting herself feel it. But I can’t tell if I’m part of the healing or just a distraction from it.” He exhaled sharply. “Last night… I told her I loved her.”
Brad turned slightly, watching his face. “What’d she say?”
“She said, ‘I know.’ She says that all the time.”
Brad winced. “That’s rough.”
“Yeah,” Alex muttered. “It felt like I was standing there naked, and she was behind glass. She let me in physically—but emotionally? She was already halfway gone. Like she was bracing for the fallout. Am I wrong to want more?”
He ran a hand down his face, tension mounting. “She didn’t tell me she went to see Ward. She didn’t tell me about the tapes and slides. All until after. She’s made case decisions on her own, keeping things from me until after. And then she went to Cullen after not speaking with him for years.”
Brad raised an eyebrow. “You jealous?”