by G. R. Lyons
Charlie froze, bent over her, and suddenly couldn't make himself move.
“Stay with me,” she whispered, lightly running her hands over his face and shoulders. “Please?”
She lifted up toward him, their noses almost touching, and Charlie saw her lips part as she silently asked for a kiss. Charlie held very still, looking at her, sorely tempted but knowing it was just completely wrong.
“I can't,” he whispered back.
“Why not?”
“Because I made a promise.”
She watched him silently, and Charlie closed his eyes, feeling his heart race. He leaned closer, their lips almost touching, then tore himself away.
He stood up, hands on his hips, and kept his gaze fixed on the door.
He was tempted. Gods, he was tempted. But he'd never cheated on Saira, and he wasn't about to start now.
Sure, there had been plenty of lonely, drunken nights when he'd been at home—his and Saira's home—and was desperate for physical contact, the phone in his hand with a number for a local escort service dialed but not yet connected. But then he'd look up and see some little domestic touch of Saira's shining through the filth he'd allowed to accumulate in the house in his married bachelorhood, and he'd cast the phone aside in disgust.
He just couldn't do it. It would mean firmly and finally admitting that Saira was never coming back.
And that was one thing he certainly wasn't ready to admit. Especially now.
“Get some sleep,” he finally said over his shoulder, his voice gruff, and walked away without looking back.
Charlie stepped out into the hallway, listening to the lock engage behind him, then marched straight over to the next room and banged on the door.
The chief answered the door, barefoot and yanking on a shirt, his gun in one hand. He took a look at Charlie and relaxed his arms, looking suddenly weary.
“I thought something had happened, with the way you knocked like that,” Benash said, rubbing his eyes and tossing his gun on the bed.
Charlie crossed his arms over his chest and leveled a look at Benash as he turned back to face him. The chief froze, looking at him, and Charlie pointedly glanced toward Asenna's room and back again.
“I told her she could as long as she stayed put,” Benash said with forced patience.
Charlie looked at him silently, shook his head, and walked away.
Chapter 21
THE NEXT morning, Benash sat at his desk, going through the painful but necessary paperwork for the murder of Ashyn's daughter. He called for another cup of coffee and pushed his way through it, hating every mention of blood, shot pattern, and failed attempts at resuscitation.
A cleared throat interrupted his concentration, and he looked up to see Charlie Crawford standing in the doorway, two cups of coffee in his hands.
“Chief,” he said coldly.
Benash pushed aside his report and sat back. “Crawford.”
They looked at one another for a long moment, until Charlie walked over and set one of the mugs on the desk.
Benash contemplated the steaming mug, then looked back up.
“I'm sorry.”
Charlie looked at him for a second before he nodded. “Thank you.”
Benash cleared his throat and grabbed the mug in one hand and pulled his report closer in the other. “You're late.”
“Well, I've been cleaning up your mess all morning,” Charlie said, taking a seat across from him and casually sipping at his coffee.
Grimacing, Benash looked up again. “How is she?”
“Got a headache the size of Ceynes, and spent the morning pretty much draped across the toilet, but otherwise she's fine. I got her some water and painkillers, told her to stay in bed. Guards are still posted, by the way, with orders not to let her out unless one of us is there.”
Benash nodded to himself, sinking back into his chair. “Thank you.”
They fell silent, staring into their coffee mugs. Benash glanced over at his unfinished report, cringing at the words written there.
“I'm sorry about Jessa,” Charlie murmured, and Benash nodded his thanks. “I didn't get a chance to talk to Vik or Ashyn last night after you left. Figured they'd had more than enough questions for one day.”
Benash kept nodding absently, drumming his fingers on the side of his mug.
“Was it bad?” Charlie asked.
Benash glanced up at him, then dropped his eyes back to his mug, taking a deep breath before he answered, “Almost as bad as finding Saira–” He cut off and looked away, shaking his head. “Just another failure. I couldn't save Vorena. Couldn't save Jessa. Couldn't save my own daughter.”
“It's not over yet, Chief,” Charlie murmured. “New day, new opportunities, remember? You always used to say that.”
“Now he's stealing my lines,” Vorena joked, popping up out of nowhere. Benash looked up and gave her a half smile. “And he's right, you know.”
“I know,” he mumbled.
“Been making the rounds this morning,” she said, perching on the edge of his desk and shifting a tablet out of the way. “Ashyn's holding up pretty well, keeping it together for the sake of her family. Went and checked on Asenna. She threw a book at me when I jostled her bed.”
Benash snorted a laugh. “Can't say I blame her.” He glanced over at Charlie and saw the man staring at the corner of the desk. “You alright?”
Charlie shook his head, pointing at the tablet. “That still freaks me out, things moving on their own.”
“Can I play with him?” Vorena asked.
“No.”
Charlie looked up, glancing at Benash and then looking around the room.
“She's harmless, Charlie, I promise.”
“Harmless, eh?” Vorena said, picking up the tablet and waving it around.
“Would you stop that?” Benash said, half irritated and half amused as he yanked the tablet from her hands and set it down.
“I'm…gonna…go,” Charlie said, rising slowly from his seat and then bolting for the door.
Benash watched him go, shook his head, and looked up at Vorena.
“Go ahead, you can say it,” she said with a grin. “Infuriating woman.”
“Yes, you are,” he said, turning toward her and drawing her down onto his lap. “And I'm going to ask you to be more so for a change.”
“Oooh, really? Do tell.”
“Would you go sit with Asenna and keep an eye on her for me today? Tell her she's stuck with you if she tries to kick you out.”
“Not that she actually can kick me out,” Vorena said with a wink. She kissed him on the cheek and disappeared.
Benash laughed to himself, shaking his head, then felt his smile fade and his heart sink as he turned back to his desk, the unfinished report glaring at him. He picked up his mug, chugged down the rest of his coffee, and went back to work.
* * *
THE NEXT day, Asenna rode with Chief to the agency, and went straight down to the training room while he went up to his office. With her hangover gone, replaced by that familiar sense of failure from having not been able to save Jessa Gael in time, she spent a good hour with a gun, letting out her frustrations on the humanoid dummies.
As usual, all her shots went exactly where she wanted them, until she made another attempt at Chaos Mode, and had to stop herself from throwing the gun across the room when she saw how poorly she'd performed, the noise and flashing lights too much for her senses.
Instead, she slammed a fist down on the table.
“Fuck,” she growled. “Gods damned bloody fucking hells–”
“Oh, is that all?” Vorena asked, appearing in front of her and leaning casually against a dummy, her arms crossed over her chest and a cheeky grin on her face.
“Don't mess with me,” Asenna said, slamming a new magazine into the gun. “I'm not in the mood.”
“Oooh, testy today, aren't we?” Vorena straightened up and turned around, examining the shots in the dummy. And a bit distrac
ted, if I'm not mistaken.
Asenna froze, staring at her. “What was that?” she asked.
Vorena looked back over her shoulder. “What was what?”
“I heard your voice but…you didn't say anything.”
Vorena started to frown, then her face lit up.
“Interesting.”
“What's interesting?”
“I always wondered if you could hear projected thoughts. Guess you can.” Vorena paused, tilted her head to one side, and frowned in thought. “Hang on. I am projected thought. Hmmm…”
Ignoring her, Asenna thought back to the aftermath of the robbery two days before.
“So they were talking to one another,” she mumbled.
“Who?” Vorena asked, twisting the dummy to one side and examining the back of it.
“Chief, and that woman,” she said. Shaking herself, Asenna hit the kill switch and waited just long enough to see the conveyor reclaim the gun before she bolted for the door.
“Asenna?” Vorena called after her.
Asenna ignored her, hurrying to the elevator. She was done with the unanswered questions and the mysteries. She was going to confront the chief, and this time, she was going to get some answers.
* * *
BENASH SAT at his desk, going over Saira's file for the millionth time. He flipped through every piece of evidence, then went back through it all again, getting almost to the end when he was interrupted.
“Hey, Chief?” Charlie Crawford poked his head into the room as he knocked on the door jamb. “Malrin's in the conference room. Says he has a question about one of the files.”
Benash rolled his eyes. “Couldn't come ask me himself?”
Charlie shrugged. “He's got a mess of evidence laid out on the table. Said he wanted to show you before he lost his train of thought.”
“Alright, alright.” Benash sighed, rubbing his eyes as he got up and followed Charlie out the door.
* * *
ASENNA RUSHED up the stairs and headed straight for the chief's office. The door stood open, so Asenna pushed it wide and stepped into the room, but there was no sign of him. With a heavy sigh, she turned to leave, but the sight of an open safe caught her eye.
Asenna froze, listening, and pulled a gun from the holster she wore under her jacket. Holding her breath, she raised the gun in both hands and stepped quietly back into the room, covering all the angles in case there was an intruder hiding somewhere.
The room was silent, and the last place to check was under the desk, so she tiptoed around, aiming the gun downward, and when she reached the corner of the desk, she spun into a crouch, the gun pointed at nothing but air.
She let her arms drop with a sigh, tucking the gun away as she rose. It wasn't like the chief to leave a safe open, but there didn't seem to be any sign of intrusion.
Shaking her head, Asenna turned to leave, but then she noticed the box tucked into the safe.
An evidence box.
Labeled Crawford.
“Holy shit.”
Asenna glanced back over her shoulder before dropping to her knees before the safe. She carefully eased the box out onto the floor and lifted the lid.
Inside, she found rusted tools, each in their own evidence bags and still stained with blood. There were also scraps of white fabric—Saira's wedding dress, or what was left of it—but no documents or data discs in sight.
Carefully tucking the items back into the box, she shoved it back into the safe and pushed the door halfway shut, hoping that's how it looked before she'd gone in there. She rose and glanced over her shoulder again, then double-checked the office to make sure nothing else looked out of place.
A tablet on the desk with an open file made her freeze.
She stared at the file, her hands shaking as she took in the sight of a gruesome photograph, showing a woman's legs bearing multiple cuts and bruises. Moving behind the desk, she reached out and touched the tablet, certain that the injuries were familiar.
Taking a deep breath, she touched a button on the tablet and read the name on the file.
Saira's file! Asenna swallowed hard, looked around to make sure she was unobserved, and bent over the screen, flipping back through the pages, from the photographs at the end, back through the case details, and toward the front, item by item, on her way to the victim's identification.
Photographs showed compound fractures, knife wounds, and bruises all over the body. She rushed through those, sparing them hardly any notice as she was already familiar with most of them through her recurring visions. Then came several pages covered in tiny print, detailing evidence gathered from the medical examiner, the assault location, and anyone at Saira's wedding. More photos showed bloody instruments, shreds of white fabric from Saira's wedding gown, and a single wet footprint leading out of the basement where she'd been found. Newspaper clippings showed reports on the progress of the case, ending with one that included a photograph of Crawford leaving the hospital's morgue, carrying an urn.
She paused, looking at his face. It was difficult to tell in the small photograph, but she thought he looked more confused or stunned than grieving.
Her chest tightened as she studied the image. Somehow, the almost blank look on his face was more painful than the sight of outright tears.
Shivering, she flipped through the rest of the file until she neared the front, reaching the identification and summary case details.
Name, birth date, and family told her nothing that she didn't already know. Details of Saira's rape and other injuries were so familiar to her as to be almost comical. Frustrated, she almost flipped through each page again, until she noticed the date of Saira's assault.
Shysais thirteenth through fifteenth, 3483? she thought, reading the detail over two more times to make sure she'd read it right. That's impossible. That was…five weeks before I woke up…
Asenna's heart raced as she stared at the page, the tiny detail of the date taunting her with impossibility. Then again, Crawford had pointed to those same dates just the other night, though she'd been so drunk that she hadn't registered the importance of that detail at the time. Still, there was no way she could have had a Spirit vision of Saira's assault if it was before she even woke up from her own accident.
Unless…No, I couldn't have remembered that, could I? Or…Oh gods…
With shaking hands, she swiped over one more page, revealing a clear photograph of Saira's face.
* * *
CHARLIE FOLLOWED Benash back out of the conference room, listening to the boss grumble, “Well, that was a complete waste of time.”
The chief glanced around the main office, asking the nearest officer, “Has anyone seen Asenna?”
A few people looked around, and one shrugged. “I think she went upstairs looking for you, Chief.”
Benash started, his eyes wide, and he rushed toward the stairs.
“Benash?” Charlie asked, following him. “What's wrong?”
“I left Saira's file open on my desk,” he said, looking over his shoulder.
“Shit,” Charlie muttered, hurrying after him, taking the steps two at a time.
They found the office door wide open, and from behind the desk, they saw a woman's arm stretched out on the floor.
“Gods be damned,” Benash breathed, hurrying into the room. Charlie was right behind him, and they found Asenna lying unconscious on the floor, the tablet displaying Saira's photograph in her hand.
Benash shook her gently while Charlie squeezed around to her other side, crouching down beside her.
She flinched and turned her head, just barely opening her eyes for a moment while the two men bent over her.
“Charlie…”
His name came out on a breathless whisper before she slipped into unconsciousness again, but while Benash tried to revive her, Charlie went very still.
“Asenna,” Benash growled, shaking her. “Come on, now. Wake up.”
“Dad,” Charlie murmured.
“Come on
, Asenna, wake up–”
“Dad.”
Benash froze, slowly straightening until their gazes met.
“She called me Charlie.”
The two men stared at one another for a long moment, until the chief finally spoke.
“Hospital.”
“Yep.”
Charlie scooped up his wife in his arms and followed Benash out the door.
Chapter 22
HER VISION was blurry as she woke, blinking against the incessant whiteness that surrounded her. Rubbing her eyes, she glanced around the room, her mind slowly working its way around to recognizing the furniture and apparatus of a hospital.
She allowed herself a moment to take stock of her body, not aware of any pain or injuries, and tried to remember what had happened that could have caused her to end up there.
Turning her head to the other side, she saw Charlie Crawford fast asleep in a chair.
CHARLIE WINCED as he woke, his neck aching from having his head on one side as he slept in a chair by the hospital bed. Groaning, he reached up to rub his neck, but stopped with his hand halfway there when he realized someone was touching him.
His eyes flew open, and he saw her watching him intently, her hand resting on his cheek. His own hand started to move again, going right past his neck, his fingertips resting lightly on the back of her hand.
He stared back at her, seeing tears in her eyes and a smile on her face.
“Seven be praised,” he breathed, launching out of his chair and gathering her up in his arms, kissing her desperately.
“Charlie,” she cried between kisses.
“Gods, Saira…”
“I'm so sorry…”
“No, honey, don't be sorry,” he whispered, resting his forehead against hers. “Nothing to be sorry about. It's gonna be alright now.”
She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him again.
“Gods, I've missed you,” he breathed.
“Charlie…”
He pulled back a little, wiping the tears from her cheeks. “It's alright.”
She took a deep breath and nodded, then did a double take as she looked past Charlie toward the door.
