is fearr lúbadh ná briseadh.

"It's not the files that are the problem." A small shrug followed. "I made copies of what I could before they closed it. Reports. Photos. Statements." She took a bite before continuing. "Enough to keep working." The admission came easily and Jo didn't look particularly guilty about it. "It's everything around them." She leaned back slightly in her chair, absently pushing a piece of food around her plate, her appetite already losing ground to the conversation. "I just keep running into things I can't verify. There are these weird marks at some of the scenes. Patterns that repeat. Witness statements that stop making sense when you line them up next to each other." Her jaw shifted slightly. "Enough that I don't think I'm imagining it. Not enough that I can officially accuse a well-connected businessman of making sacrifices to a demon." The words were delivered dryly enough that they almost sounded like a joke. Almost.

"Usually when something brushes up against the supernatural, the department has people we can ask." She paused. "I obviously can't do that. I could try to ask around, but you might've noticed that most supernaturals aren't exactly eager to work with law enforcement."

“SMART,” LEILA COMMENTED, quietly impressed by Jo’s foresight. The more she spoke about it, the more apparent it became that this wasn’t a passing suspicion. How long had she been building this case? Her eyes narrowed at the marks. Demons. The only species she was dubious about, although she did her best to remain impartial. The same could be said of her coven’s affinity for black magic, the necromancers who had already taught her a plethora about toeing the line between life and death. So, she held a quiet respect for demons. Perhaps there was a good reason behind the markings… but there was only one way to know for sure.

“No, they’re not,” she agreed. And not without reason. Suspicion often surrounded the supernatural community, whether there was a reason for it or not. Her own family had once been easily swayed against her kind. This case was different, however. Sigils, patterns, it was all too obvious. “And I’d imagine if said well-connected businessman were tied to a demon, they would go to great lengths to hide it.” Or retaliate against any overly curious officers who tried to uncover it.

As soon as she thought it, the answer became obvious. Somehow it felt as though she was hurtling toward an impasse; Jo already knew her by her real name —the one so many struggled over— and trusted her enough to let her tend to scrapes and bruises, even if the latter had initially taken some convincing. She might as well know how those bruises seemed to heal so quickly.

And if it meant saving a man from spending the rest of his life in prison and returning a father to his family, she could do it. For Jo. “I might know someone who can help."

Underneath the table, her thumb pressed into her thigh, the food on her plate losing its appeal. “So long as you promise to keep your informant anonymous.” The corner of her lips quirked up, faintly strained beneath the attempt at levity, “And try the curry before you start your questioning.”

"I guess with the medical ideas, I'm afraid of breaking something I'll never be able to fix. With something mechanical or chemical you can fix it or replace a part, but the human body isn't like that. It has limits, and when you break them you can't just go back." As he'd learned from personal experience., but they didn't need to get into that.

“THAT EXPLAINS IT THEN. You come by it honestly.” She nodded as he spoke about his own limits. “I can see your point.” For her part, she’d always been more willing to take her chances with the human body over anything with an engine or a battery. She was hopeless enough when it came to troubleshooting her computer.  

Then, remembering, she reached into her white coat pocket and handed him her business card. A courtesy usually reserved for patients or referral consults. “We should talk more.” She folded her hands back into her pockets. “Somewhere that doesn’t smell quite so much like bleach.” 

"Then it must still be as big and sprawling as I remember," the wolf smiled. "I was. I enjoyed being alone and the greenhouses allowed me that until I was found again. Do you think I could pay it a visit some time?" It had been awhile since he was last in the Dumisani greenhouses.

“YET I CAN’T SAY I’VE MET MANY FIREFIGHTING WOLVES. What a coincidence,” Leila teased lightly. “It is, perhaps even more so with the freshly planted rows of Valerians.” Some days she would sit amongst the flowers for hours, and it was almost like being back in Ireland. The lush greenery had a way of transporting her far beyond the city's limits.

Down the hall, an intercom announced an incoming trauma. Leila's attention shifted briefly. Two minutes. Her gaze flicked back to him then, amused. “At this rate, I'm afraid I’m going to have to insist you do.”

The heavier turn in conversation came easier with her than it did with most people. Leila never recoiled from the ugly parts once Jo stopped sanding the edges off of them. Never gave her that strained look people got when discussions drifted too close to violence or coercion or the uglier realities of the city they lived in. She listened. Thought about it. Followed the logic instead of dismissing it outright, and Jo could feel some tight knot in her chest loosen slightly as Leila picked apart the same details that had been needling at her for weeks now. Even the way Leila skirted around mentioning the chief directly sat strangely soft against old bruises Jo had only ever let her near.

“That’s what bothers me,” she admitted, quieter now, gaze drifting back toward the papers scattered across the table. “It’s too clean. Too convenient.” Her thumb rubbed absently against the side of her wrist before she caught herself and let her arms fold again instead. “Lahey’s been doing this for decades. He’s not stupid. Which means either he missed something huge...” Her jaw shifted faintly. “Or he didn’t.”

The mention of old Irish myths drew her attention fully back toward Leila then, the idea fitting almost too neatly into the reality of Vievecor to ignore. A city built on concealment. Every species had its own way of bending perception, slipping past notice, making humans doubt what they’d seen. As Leila spoke, Jo found herself watching her again with that same helpless focus she always seemed to slip into around her eventually, tracking the movement of her hands, the shape of her mouth as the Irish curled softly off her tongue, her accent thickening around the unfamiliar words in a way Jo found distractingly beautiful. “Yeah,” she said quietly once Leila finished, nodding more to herself than anything. “I think the veil’s probably threadbare here.”

At the question about his prior convictions, Jo exhaled softly through her nose before pushing herself upright off the table. “They were desperate,” she said, crossing back toward her phone. “Petty theft. Breaking and entering. Fraud.” The kind of crimes committed by someone life had backed hard enough into a corner, not someone who enjoyed hurting people. She unlocked the screen and pulled up a social media profile before stepping back toward Leila, angling it so she could see. “He’s got three kids,” she said, pulling up a photo. A little girl missing her front teeth sat on a man’s shoulders while two younger boys clung to either side of him, all grinning at some county fair. “His wife’s been sick for years. Their medical debt is through the roof. Half the stuff on his record started after that.” Her thumb tapped once lightly against the edge of the screen to keep it lit. “I can absolutely believe he stole for them. I can believe he confessed for them too. But this—” She shook her head. "Those murders were gratuitous, almost ritualistic."

Her expression tightened faintly as she switched to another article. Another man stared back from the screen—Magnus Rourke, all tailored suits and polished smiles beside headlines about development projects and expanding investments throughout Vievecor. Jo scrolled once more, revealing a photograph lower in the article of Rourke beside Lahey at some private club event, whiskey glasses in hand.

LEILA TOOK THE MINOR VICTORY GRACEFULLY, watching with restrained amusement as Jo broke her stare. As content as she was to know she’d met the challenge, she much preferred the understanding it brought. The way Jo’s words seemed to contradict themselves. How readily she flirted and made jokes to deflect, only for her voice to soften and lose its teasing edge when she allowed herself sincerity. She was far more serious than Leila had initially given her credit for, something that became clearer the longer Jo talked her through her suspicions.

Green eyes flicked to her wrist, the swipe of her thumb against the delicate skin. It wasn’t the first time that evening that Jo had favored it. On the couch, when Leila was meant to be engrossed in vascular anatomy, Jo had flinched. It was subtle, a shift of weight to her other side, perhaps she didn’t even notice that she’d done it. The spot was tender. Leila had played doctor to her before, at first only at her own insistence, but gradually Jo trusted her enough to seek her out. There was a physicality to her work, an accepted risk that came with being a police officer, so the brunette never passed judgment.

Still, she didn’t like the frequency. Was this more of the same?

Just as she suspected that complacency wasn’t the cause for Jo’s injuries, it didn’t explain Lahey’s case. Not when his ‘murder’s’ social media told such a different story. She frowned at the photo. “He wouldn’t risk losing them.” Were Lahey to be believed, where there should have stood a grizzled murderer, instead stood a devoted family man.

“What could he even gain from the murders? Anything is possible, but…” she pinched the screen to zoom in on the man’s face, careful not to react to the post. “This man doesn’t strike me as a mercenary.” Instead, her eyes narrowed on Rourke’s grin. On its surface, there was nothing inherently wrong with the developer’s aspirations, the proud gleam of perfectly straight teeth. Still, she caught on the way the smile didn’t reach his eyes.

“He’s covering his tracks the best way he knows how.” But it didn’t explain how the two would have met, or where. On the surface, their circles couldn’t be further apart.

But Jo was right. Supernatural involvement couldn’t be dismissed. There were corners of the city where long shadows were cast, where people went to disappear. Or to make deals. As many supernaturals as there were in Vievecor, the city was not infallible. Corruption still thrived, perhaps more so than in other cities, as it had an additional population to exploit. Many of the city’s species would go to great lengths to maintain their secrecy.

Wasn’t that why she only visited her coven in the early mornings, slipping away just as the crowds began their commute so she could disappear among them unnoticed?

She had noted the way Jo didn’t recoil from the folklore. The concept was difficult for others to grasp: how ingrained the legends of the faire folk were in her upbringing. If Jo could accept the Féth Fíada… would it be such a reach to accept cailleach phiseogach?

Her thoughts lingered on the topic long after their food was delivered.

Months ago, she probably would’ve pushed even harder, leaned heavier into the flirtation just to keep everything superficial and uncomplicated. But things with Leila had long since stopped feeling uncomplicated, and Jo found herself pulling back from the edge of it more often than not these days, suddenly too aware of what it meant to her when Leila smiled back.

So instead she turned her attention toward the spread of notes across the table while Leila continued dismantling the classification system with the kind of certainty that always pulled at something deep in Jo’s chest. Fuck, she was weak for the way Leila talked about medicine. That passion. That precision. That absolute confidence in her own intelligence.

The sound of the call connecting cut through the beginning of another tangent, and Jo’s attention lifted automatically, grateful for the excuse to just watch her openly for a second instead. Leila rattled off the order easily, thumb hooked against the edge of her phone, expression still thoughtful even while distracted, like her brain never really stopped moving. And the second the call disconnected, she slipped seamlessly back into the conversation. I’m the best surgeon in my residency class, naturally.

That dragged a quiet laugh out of Jo, warm and low as she shook her head. “Naturally,” she echoed, unable to hide how openly charmed she looked by it. And when Leila tied it back around with that crack about eventually being committed, Jo felt something in her soften all over again.

At Leila's question, though, Jo’s eyes snapped back down toward the papers a little too quickly, suddenly very interested in an upside-down diagram of the digestive tract. “I was…” Jo cleared her throat lightly. “Looking into whether there's a place in Chissob Hills that does deep tissue massages at this hour.” She shrugged, the picture of innocence if it weren't for the mischief lingering at the corners of her lips. “For work-related reasons, obviously.” The excuse collapsed under its own weight almost immediately and Jo exhaled through her nose, shaking her head at herself before relenting. “No, there’s this case Detective Lahey’s been working,” she continued after a moment, voice turning more measured. It still wasn’t the full truth, but close enough to count. “A string of murders spanning three districts. He built a seemingly airtight case against some guy with minor prior convictions and got a confession out of him. Now everybody’s acting like it’s a done deal. Press conference, interviews, the whole victory lap.” Her jaw shifted faintly. “But I don’t think he did it.”

That finally pulled her attention back toward Leila. Jo turned and leaned against the edge of the table, folding her arms loosely across her chest. “I pointed out the inconsistencies but they dismissed me. Told me there's no point chasing ghosts when we already have a confession.” The bitterness there sharpened slightly. “I got told to stay in my lane and let the real detectives handle it.” Her wrist still ached from where her father had grabbed her afterward, reminding her not to question him in front of his people. "Obviously, the chief agreed. They used to be partners after all—him and Lahey."

LEILA SAW THE WORDS COMING BEFORE SHE HEARD THEM, the telltale twitch of Jo’s lips dragging her gaze downward for a brief moment. I always thought playing doctor was supposed to be a more pleasurable experience. She rolled her eyes, though there was no heat behind it. Always an incorrigible flirt.

Not that she minded, the lines never worked anyway. At first, she merely saw them as distractions, blinders that simply got in the way of parsing her true thoughts. Eventually, she’d begrudgingly come to find them endearing. She’d always had a soft spot for bangs. “It is.” A wolfish grin spread across her lips. “For the doctor, anyway.”

She hummed. “Obviously, can’t protect the city with tight shoulders.” The joke lingered only briefly before Jo relented, her quiet exhale shifting the room’s levity into something more serious. It was her turn to fall silent, watching Jo instead, struck by the way her mind shifted gears so cleanly—humor giving way to a sharp, disciplined focus. The back of her neck warmed under her stare. What was behind that fire, she wondered. It was more than a simple desire to be right, or some contrarian impulse against authority. Her determination held steady even in the face of dismissal, the set of her jaw betraying devotion to something grander than ego: the truth.

Above all, Leila was inclined to trust Jo’s instinct. She had the mind of a detective, and it was impossible to hide the quiet smoldering of admiration beneath her gaze. God help the man on the wrong side of Jo’s determination.

“Not to question the chief,” she began, careful to tread lightly where Jo’s father was concerned. She would like to believe that the man might give credence to his daughter’s concerns, even if she had little reason to think that. “But you’re right. There’s no telling what could have been done or said to coerce a confession, especially if he has a record. If the case is truly that airtight, and he confessed…” She was far from being an expert; at best, she was a devoted amateur true crime TV viewer, but the facts didn’t sit right with her either. “What if Lahey found the evidence a little too conveniently? I’d imagine someone careful enough to extend their crime spree across multiple districts wouldn’t be so willing to hand themselves over.”

The mention of supernaturals gave her pause. Leila hadn’t divulged her own ties to the supernatural, and, not for the first time, she considered telling Jo the truth. It was an unusual sway towards honesty, and she swallowed it down. “It would be… naive to assume there isn’t a supernatural element at play, especially here.” She chose her words carefully, fingers toying with the fraying edge of one of her papers. “We have a myth in Ireland called the Féth Fíada. It’s an enchanted mist given to the druids and the Tuatha Dé Danann — the god-folk,” she clarified for Jo’s benefit. “They used it as a veil to conceal themselves and walk undetected in the realm of men.” Her gaze rose from the table, the light catching the glint in her eye. “Whether it’s true or not, it’s said the veil separates the magical world from the mortal one. I would argue it’s thinnest in a city like Vievecor.”

The headache was well set by the last two hours of his shift, not even extra strength Ibuprofen would do anything to fix this. He needed a thick, greasy burger, a glass of scotch and a twenty four hour rest. At this rate he’d be lucky just to get one. The hospital had a policy of zero days off during city wide events so even if he had wanted to he’d be back in twelve hours. He could hear the crowds that still cluttered the ER waiting room as people waited likely impatiently to be seen in order of severity. People didn’t always understand that. They hurt, they ached and like anyone in discomfort they wanted it to go away. Unluckily for the people of Vievecor who directed themselves to the Garond District Hospital they’d find that a slew of emergency vehicles kept their automatic doors busy, bussing in various injured individuals from Vibefest. “Alright let’s get some fluid in Mr. Parker here, check his vitals again and if stable send him on his way.” He nodded to his CEN before heading back to the central desk. The place were chaos was supposedly wrangled, the altar of the ER gods that everyone had to pay tribute to. Quickly he swallowed down the last of his fiber water, having aged out of energy drinks, and grabbed the next clipboard.  Rolling his shoulder, before during back around to the zoo he called home.

“What’s next?”

FOR THE CITY, VIBEFEST MEANT GREAT MUSIC, FREE-FLOWING DRINKS, AND LOWERED INHIBITIONS. For the medical staff, however, it meant seeing firsthand the result of human judgment colliding with a city-wide party.

Leila glanced up in acknowledgement, green eyes catching on the exhaustion written across his face. She was only a couple of hours into her shift, and already she could relate to his condition. “What a dangerous question,” she said, scrawling the last of her notes into the chart and handing it off to the nurse at the desk to file. A minor laceration from a broken bottle; three sutures, and the finger would be good as new. Hardly an injury that warranted a surgeon’s oversight, but it was all hands on deck.

Finally, she turned her full attention to Howell. “You can have your pick.”

“Bed three’s recovering from dehydration and heat exhaustion,” she said casually, nodding toward a green-tinged elven patient. “Bed nine’s an ankle fracture waiting on imaging clearance.”

Her fingers tapped the chart left on the desk, more deliberately. “Or you can join me on a consult.” That one she flipped open for him to see, angling the vitals and presenting complaints for his inspection. “Forty-one-year-old male presenting with second-degree burns and a suspected liver laceration after a pyrotechnic misfire knocked him off a soundstage onto a barricade.”

Her brow lifted slightly as she reached the bottom of the page. “Oh — and he’s high. Or stoned. Or both.” She let the implication hang there for half a second before adding, “Swears he’s sober, though, so that’s reassuring. Either way, his pain is under control for the moment, which is… helpful. Paramedics reported debris embedded in the full-thickness areas.” He would likely need surgical debridement— the embedded debris carried a higher risk of infection and further tissue loss if she didn't get him to the OR tonight.

The movement brought her into Leila’s space almost immediately, close enough that her socked foot brushed against Leila's when she landed. Jo steadied herself instinctively with one hand against her friend's waist, fingers spreading briefly against the warmth of her side before she forced herself to let go. She had clearly miscalculated, the proximity hitting her all at once then—soap and perfume and something distinctly Leila—and for a split second she forgot what they’d been talking about entirely. “Uh... Thung thong,” she decided finally, brows lifting as she glanced down at her. “I’m not sure I trust you with anything sharp and pointy right now.”

It was easier to retreat into motion than risk eye contact for another second, so Jo drifted past her toward the papers and notes spread across the kitchen table, fingertips skimming absentmindedly along the edges of the pages. Even that felt unfairly intimate somehow, tracing the lines of Leila’s handwriting with the same helpless curiosity she’d started to associate with the woman herself.

ANY WORDS OF AGREEMENT DIED ON HER TONGUE the instant Jo’s hand found her waist. The joke was already a break from her usual teasing; perhaps it was the way her smile grew soft, or the sureness of her words. As if it were a given that their paths would remain intertwined for years. It was a wonder how she did that, sincerity so readily wound within a joke that Leila might have missed it. If she didn’t catch on nearly every word the other woman spoke, she would have missed it. She was a moving target, an enigma that seemed to hide in plain sight, if one only paid enough attention.

She was somehow closer now than before, forcing Leila to cant her head upwards to hold her stare. Up close, she could see where the darker ring of her iris met the warm brown around her pupil, lit softly by the ceiling light. “Says the woman who, moments ago, entrusted me with her organs,” she noted, a raised brow countering her point.

It was a mercy when she stepped away; any longer would jeopardize all hope of a twilight-years friendship. Finally able to exhale, she was back on task. Thung thong and pad kee mao. With the menu unfolded across the counter, she tapped in the familiar series of numbers. Her thumb hovered over the dial button, pondering the question. “The criteria,” she decided, pressing the green button with a definitive nod. “It feels too broad for what they intended: to have a definitive guide to grade the complication and standardize treatment. Surely with a revision—“ The click of the receiver interrupted the oncoming tangent, and she rattled off their order, honoring Jo’s request for no sharp objects.

Hanging up, Leila drifted toward the table to join her. “You’re right, though. I’m the best surgeon in my residency class, naturally, so I’ll probably never see a pancreatic fistula. And by the time I do, it’ll be time for me to be committed anyway.” Her lips pulled into a full grin, eyes softening.

"Werewolf blood could have the same turning problem, but I wonder if you could use something other than whole blood. Like if you could give someone werewolf platelets." If the blood even worked as part of the same species. It was kind of funny, a few years ago Chris would have been absolutely delighted to find out that supernaturals were compatible donors for humans, but now he was leaning away from the idea. Was that a good thing with him being more realistic or was he losing his humanity?

Chris leaned back against the wall and folded his arms as he listened to Leila. He thought for a moment about some way to fix the problem. "What if you could put spells on blood that was in a blood bag? Or could you create like... a magic IV needle that could enchant blood that goes through it. If it could channel your magic into it then you could keep your focus on the surgery as long as it didn't exhaust you." He made a gesture to indicate vaguely 'outside.' "You should come by the lab sometime, write some ideas and suggestions down."

“I LIKE THE WAY YOU THINK.” Washed platelets could neutralize enough of the werewolf turning factor to make donation possible. It would mean they could even get around donor cross-matching, making the supply far more widely usable. Not a bad idea at all.

“Enchanted bags, then any blood drive facility would be able to establish their own supply. Almost like a protection rune.” It would take some doing to combine body magic with blessing magic —and ensure enough stability for reasonable shelf life— but there were others she could consult on the matter. The Effendi Coven, in particular, could prove a useful resource.

“I might have to take you up on that.” She made a mental note to follow up with Vivian about the feasibility of the idea. “You should give yourself more credit with the medical project ideas, you’re not half bad at it.”

"Nice to meet you, Leila. I'm Caleb," the wolf said in return, along with a smile of his own now that they had properly recognised one another. "Of course I have. It's a wonderful building. Probably my favourite of the three. I used to wander off and get lost in the greenhouses there as a child. My mother was never happy when that happened..."

LEILA’S BROW QUIRKED AT HIS LOGIC, an amused smile finding its way to her lips. “I’d argue that does make you a sort of superhero. Not everyone willingly runs towards danger.” She doubted that she could be so brave.

“Likewise, Caleb.” She hummed at his retelling. “I can imagine. I still get lost sometimes, and I’m there every week.” A child would readily be swept away by the greenhouse’s rainforest-esque sprawl. “Were you the type to wander off often?”

His nose twitched. The scent of her blood was effervescent, reminding him of popping champagne bottles on New Years Eve when he was still human. He couldn't help the acrid, copper-tinged saliva pooling on his tongue, and he licked his lips.

"I like when they bleed faster," he replied. His tone was matter-of-fact, as if they were speaking on a topic as droll as the weather. "Because I'm always, always hungry."

His body went rigid, but his gaze flickered back and forth over her face. "They can't help me. My sire has given me bags before. They taste horrible, and I can't drain one without gagging. It's better when it comes from someone."

LEILA DIDN’T FLINCH beneath the weight of his stare, though her fingers twitched at her side. She hated to use her powers unnecessarily, much less in defense rather than to heal. Beyond that, it was strange how little she was swayed by the hunger in his eyes, the tension locked through his frame. Her time at the hospital had left her jaded; she should probably request some time off… or sleep more.

“Wouldn’t it be better for it to last longer, then?” The question was posed calmly, almost thoughtfully. “Since you’re always hungry.” Her arms moved to fold loosely across her chest, thumb pressing into her forearm. There was no judgment in her expression, only the measured patience of someone trying to approach a wounded animal without startling it. “You’re treating it like a fire to smother all at once.” A slight tilt of her head. “No wonder it keeps consuming you.”

As if arguing reason with a starved vampire had ever ended well.

“And if the bags make you sick, then your sire could stand to use some creativity.” Dry, matter-of-fact. “There are ways to acclimate the body to almost anything.” A beat passed before she exhaled softly through her nose.

“Though I imagine patience is harder when you’re starving.” Her eyes flicked to the right, back in the direction she’d come. The bar was hardly a buffet, but beyond it, there was another option, one that a patient had mentioned. Drained to the point of near translucence, he’d spoken of a club. A mecca where humans could willingly engage vampires, where they could feed. “If you promise not to make me regret it, I’ll help you.

The menu hung loose between her fingertips, forgotten almost entirely. Leila leaning back against the counter opposite her should’ve been nothing—just a shift in posture, a more comfortable stance—but it pulled Jo’s attention in all the wrong ways. She tried to follow Leila's explanation anyway, nodding at the right moments, catching pieces she recognized from previous study sessions, but it didn’t take long before the details blurred. Before her focus snagged elsewhere—on the restless tap of Leila’s fingers, the slight pull of her brow when she was thinking too hard. The way her voice shifted—sharper when she was frustrated, softer when she was explaining something she cared about. And for one traitorous heartbeat, Jo's mind wandered. To what it would be like to slip off the counter, bridge the distance and shut her up mid-sentence with a kiss. To be allowed to do that.

Jo blinked hard, jaw tightening as she shoved the thought aside before it could take root. She shifted on the counter instead, socked foot bumping lightly against Leila’s thigh in a small, absent correction when the Irish slipped through. “Nonsense,” she supplied under her breath, the hint of a smile tugging at her mouth, before letting herself fall back into the rhythm of Leila’s voice—right up until it turned on her.

“…Uh.” The word slipped out before she could stop it, posture straightening a fraction like she’d been called on in class and absolutely did not have the answer. Her mouth opened, then shut again, grip tightening slightly around the edge of the menu she still wasn’t reading. “In my expert opinion…” she echoed, something more thoughtful settling in. “If you’re cutting pieces out of people, I’m guessing they probably need most of what you’re taking, no?” A small furrow settled between her brows. “So maybe not jumping straight to that isn’t the worst call.”

ANOTHER CRUX OF HER PROFESSION was Leila’s infallible attention to detail. She could be too serious, a tendency to get lost in the weeds, driving her to spend far too long stuck on a topic. Take this, for example. It was a grading scale designed for simplicity and quick application. Her mentor swore she couldn’t see the wood for the trees.

Yet Jo humored the neuroticism, listened, and somehow grounded her. The rhythmic tap of her fingers stilled at the brief contact with her thigh, resting idle against the countertop for the first time that night.

Leila smiled to herself as Jo reset, taking the opportunity to observe her with a newfound levity, unencumbered now that the focus was on Jo. The way her brow furrowed as if tugged together by the weight of her thoughts. She could stop her—she tended to learn best when she was forced to talk through a topic, so mission accomplished—but she let her go on. She leapt at any opportunity to hear what was going through the brunette’s mind. “Is that so?” she hummed, finally dropping her gaze. It was pretty good for an answer that started with ‘uh’. “I suppose you’re right; my insanity is a small concession for extra pancreas.”

LEILA LAUGHED SOFTLY AT THAT; the sound surprised her more than anything. Of course, she would blather on about his own neighborhood. “Even better, you can stop there on your way home,” she said, amused. “I’m sure you’ve seen much more of the island than I have, then.” Most of her visits depended entirely on whether Fionn decided the beach or the sidewalk was more interesting, and the beach often won out. Curiosity tugged at her again as she glanced back toward him. “I’m not sure I’ve visited your gallery,” she admitted. “Would you recommend it, or am I about to get a very biased answer?”

He shifted a bit uncomfortably at Leila's enthusiasm, not wanting to shut her down completely but also shuddering at the idea of using supernatural blood to treat humans. "I get where you're going with the idea but I don't think blood transfusions could ever be really viable. Just think about it with vampire blood, it's addictive to humans normally, and a small amount of blood is enough to turn someone who's almost dead. If someone comes in the ER and you use vampire blood, they'll heal, but that's because they've turned. So now you have a traumatized newborn vampire on your hands who doesn't really even have a sire."

“NO, OF COURSE,” Leila immediately agreed. “Vampirism is blood-based; it would be a disaster.” She’d seen the worst of its capabilities in a teenage werewolf; his death was enough to keep her far from vampire blood. Still, what if all supernatural blood didn’t behave the same way? It stood to reason that the blood of a being created through genetics or a bite might be stable. “But werewolf blood. Or a witch’s blood.” 

Magic wasn’t directly transferable, but if there was a way to imbue her own blood with even a fraction of her blood magic… Just a small vial could be enough to stabilize the worst of her hypovolemic patients. “If you had the right donor and patient cross-match, you could buy someone time.” She hesitated for a moment. He’d been honest with her; he deserved to know the full picture. “I saw a patient a few months ago who was bitten by a rattlesnake. That was the least of their problems, but when we got them into surgery, it took nearly an hour for me to control the bleeding— the venom kept causing the blood cells to rupture, and I ended up having to use my magic more than usual. That’s an extra hour under anesthesia that could’ve been avoided, or an hour I could’ve spent stabilizing the next patient. If there was a way to be in two places at once…”

She made a face. "Ugh, please don't. You know how much I hate paperwork," she said as if the idea alone inconvenienced her, though her tone lacked its usual edge, softened at the corners in a way she didn’t offer most people. "And I'm pretty sure brain matter all over these walls would come with a truckload of it." It wasn’t quite a joke, but it leaned in that direction, her mouth twitching like she almost let herself smile before thinking better of it.

She shifted as Leila moved toward the kitchen, pushing herself upright. The motion pulled at her shoulders, a dull, familiar ache from the day's drills, but something sharper tugged at her wrist when she put weight on it. Jo adjusted without comment, rolling it once like it was nothing, like it hadn’t been bothering her all evening. Her eyes tracked Leila without permission. They always did. Caught on movement, on the line of her back as she bent to dig through drawers, on the brief glimpse of skin before Jo dragged her gaze away again, slower this time.

"Thai," she answered, like she hadn’t already decided the second Leila held the menus up. Because Thai meant reaching across the table, meant taking from Leila’s plate and pretending it was a negotiation when she gave something back. She pushed off the couch and crossed the room in a few easy steps, plucking the menu straight from her hand without asking, their fingers brushing just long enough to register.

She didn’t bother with a chair, hopping up to sit on the edge of the counter instead, the menu hanging loose in her hand, mostly ignored. Her gaze flicked over it, then back up, settling on Leila with less effort to hide it now. “What was it?” she asked, nodding vaguely toward the abandoned notes. “The part that’s trying to kill you.” There was a faint shift at the corner of her mouth, almost a smile. “Come on. You’re not getting out of this without at least pretending to let me help."

IT WASN’T PARTICULARLY FUNNY, but that didn’t stop the faint puff of a laugh from slipping out. “Because you asked so nicely, I’ll try to keep the explosions to a minimum.” The menu was gone before she realized it, and not entirely because the brunette was so damn quick. No, her mind was so caught on the ghost of a touch that the menu’s absence barely registered. “Thai it is.” But then Jo was asking something that actually required an answer, and her thoughts were dragged back to the stack of papers.

“If you insist,” she sighed, rolling her eyes. She moved to lean back against the island across from Jo. It wasn’t a particularly large kitchen; she was close enough to easily swipe the menu back if she wanted to, fingers lingering a beat longer than was polite. She pushed a hand through her hair instead, exhaling. “Pancreatic fistula management after a pancreaticoduodenectomy—” She caught herself, deciding to spare her the worst of the jargon, “— a Whipple. You take out part of the pancreas and small intestine and hope that fixes it.”

“There are three grades—A, B, and C. A’s basically nothing, it’ll correct itself. B and C need treatment.” She paused, frowning slightly. “That part’s fine, it’s the line between them that I can’t seem to keep straight.” Her fingers tapped lightly against the countertop as she tried to organize the mess in her head. “A grade B can tip into a C if the leak worsens or antibiotics don’t help. And Cs… you’re back in the OR. Otherwise, you’re looking at sepsis, multi-organ failure… death. So there’s a clear right answer, but where they draw the line— absolute seafóid.”

There was a reason she’d chosen to become a surgeon: definitive solutions. “Feels like it’d be safer to just reoperate on a B before it can even think about becoming a C.” Her job was to quickly find the problem and fix it, not wait for a problem to devolve into a bigger problem and then swoop in to fix it.

“Which is a long way of saying I do, in fact, hate this and would like to change professions.” She wasn’t serious, the tired smile on her lips betraying any attempt at stoicism. “So,” she quirked a brow, “what’s your expert opinion, Doctor Officer?”

SHE HALF EXPECTED JO TO STAY WHERE SHE WAS, dismissing the offer in favor of standing sentry— and for the third time that day, she found herself surprised when she settled beside her. So close, yet just out of reach.

It was then that Leila felt it: the darkness. A shift in Jo’s energy. A separation where once there had been none. And even as she moved closer, the distance remained. It was as if a long shadow had been cast across her, dimming the light she had come to expect to find there. She hadn’t noticed it in the park, too distracted, too overwhelmed by emotion to notice. Or maybe it had always been there, just beneath the surface, and she had only just developed her soul magic enough to recognize it. Whatever it was, the echo of Jo’s dismissal remained: What changed? I did. 

The unsettled feeling didn’t leave when Jo stood, even as Leila’s hand instinctively reached towards her arm to draw her back. The space beside the bed felt abruptly still— more than it should have.

But Jo’s back was turned, and Dr. Clarkson was the only witness to the offending motion. “Doctor,” he acknowledged Leila after a brief hesitation, before stepping out.

Her eyes stayed on Jo.

There was something there now, subtle and restrained, but no longer entirely hidden. A thinly-veiled curiosity with nowhere to go. It lingered even after Jo turned away, the door falling shut behind her. 

A week passed slowly. The bruise faded from angry violet into something duller, and if she sped it along with blood magic, who could blame her? She was tired of the pitying looks she received while filling her shopping cart, bags of flour and cocoa powder betraying how she would spend her recovery. 

Her stalemate with work lasted just as long as her headache, a call to check on her patients turning into an hour-long overview of what would be waiting for her when she returned. When the scrub nurse informed her that Mr. Rawson would be transferring to his primary care physician for all follow-ups, Leila couldn’t help but remember the flash of a badge.

And so she found herself at the precinct, steps echoing across the tile floors until she reached the desk. She handed the receptionist a container filled with brown and white cupcakes, a small folded piece of paper taped to the lid, ‘Detective Darling’ scrawled on the front. 

Did she want them to call her? It wouldn’t take long to reach the detective. She cast a sidelong glance down the hallway leading to the bullpen. No, it’s alright; she was running late. No need to interrupt. And then she turned on her heel, the lingering smell of lavender and bergamot perfume the only trace of her presence.

Jo’s hand hovered for a second before it moved, hesitation slowing her movements like closing the distance carried weight she wasn’t sure she could hold. Her fingers brushed the edge of the paper, then flattened against it, her thumb dragging once across the ink as if that might prove it wasn’t real. Carefully, she peeled the note free and flipped it open.

Míle Buíochas.

Her breath caught hard enough to hurt. For a moment she just stood there, the bullpen moving around her in a dull, distant blur, voices and phones and footsteps muffled as though someone had packed cotton into her ears. The words didn’t change no matter how long she looked at them. They didn’t soften, didn’t lose their edge. If anything, they settled deeper, carving out space where she had spent the better part of five years pretending there wasn’t any left.

Jo’s knees gave before she quite registered the decision to sit. Her grip tightened on the note, thumb pressing into the fold like it was skin instead of paper, like she could keep her from slipping away completely if she just didn’t let go. The scent of lavender and bergamot filled her senses as though there was more than just the barest hint of it clinging to the paper. It sat in her chest, familiar enough to ache. For a second her eyes closed, shoulders slumping as the air stuttered out of her in an unsteady breath.

She had walked away. She had made that choice, over and over again, every day since. Had made it again at the park. Had made it again at the hospital.

To protect Leila. From herself. From him.

Jo swallowed hard and forced her eyes open again, the precinct coming back in pieces. After a moment, she folded the paper along its existing crease with more care than she’d ever given casework and set it aside within reach. The container stayed where it was for a beat longer before she pulled it closer, lifting the lid just enough to peer inside. Guinness chocolate with Bailey’s frosting, if she had to guess. Her mouth pressed into a thin line. Leila was everywhere—in every choice, every detail, impossible to ignore.

Jo closed the lid again and dragged a hand over her face before reaching for the first report on her desk. For a moment, she didn’t trust herself to do anything else. The words blurred once, then again, something sharp pricking at her eyes, before they finally settled into something legible, though a minute later she couldn’t have said what she’d read.

The container stayed at her elbow the entire time. It wasn’t until much later—long after the bullpen had thinned and the noise had dropped—that Jo reached for it again. She opened it without looking this time, like it might be easier that way, and took one of the cupcakes, turning it once between her fingers before finally taking a bite. It tasted exactly like she remembered.