#task force eclipse

The mid-afternoon sun blazed in the sky, unobstructed by clouds, watching over an unusually quiet neighborhood. It would have had a peaceful air if not for the undercurrent of tension that permeated the air, like live lightning. Static electricity hovering, not quite tangible but all the same, there.

If one was to look closer, to focus in on a block of buildings, then a street, then a house, they would see that tension’s source. A house blocked off by police cars and their flashing blue-red lights. Code 3.

On the well-kept front lawn, groups and pairs of officers clustered together, speaking in urgent tones. Inside, even more officers teemed amidst the mess of overturned furniture and opened drawers, speaking over each other, radios crackling as they relayed directions and information.

At the center of it all, Sergeant Aisling Hayes stood tall, her shoulders squared as she gave out orders without once pausing for breath. Her brown hair was pulled into a severe bun, but in the chaos of the earlier raid, strands had been pulled out, framing her face. They were perhaps the only disheveled part of the sergeant’s appearance—everything else, from her pressed uniform to her calm demeanor, was flawless.

As Valerie emerged from her shop, opening the back door to let Solo hop out onto the pavement, she felt Hayes’s stare land on her, a beam of icy frost that burned into her spine, assessing every move she made. It took more willpower than Valerie would have liked to admit to ignore the shiver that chased up her spine, but she managed it, grasping her K9’s leash loosely and letting him trot at her side on the smooth pavement.

Val felt several stares land on her as she made her way across the front lawn, although most of them dissipated just as quickly as they had come. The only one she truly cared about was the sergeant’s, anyway. After all, it had been Hayes who had requested Valerie here, who had diverted her from her patrol to search this house instead.

Hayes who greeted her as she stepped across the threshold of the open front door.

“Officer Walsh, thank you for coming.” The sergeant gestured with one hand, inviting Valerie to follow her as her strides ate up the polished wooden planks. A fine carpet was rolled up in the corner, no doubt removed in case evidence had been hidden under it. “As you’ve most likely been informed, two teams of officers conducted a drug raid on this house earlier in the morning. The objective was to locate and apprehend the prime suspect in a drug trafficking case.” She looked back to make sure that Val was following—both physically and mentally—then continued. “However, the suspect vanished shortly before our arrival. I have units out searching and canvassing, and a BOLO’s been posted, but my team has reason to suspect that evidence related to the crime has been hidden somewhere in this house.” They stepped out of the living room and into a kitchen, Solo’s eyes darting as he took in the scene. Hayes continued talking. “My officers—as you’ll notice—have turned this place upside down and haven’t found a thing. Still, they’re only human.” She turned so that her back was to the far wall, and glanced down at Valerie’s K9, appreciation glinting in her brown eyes.

“Which is where we come in.” Val gave Solo even more slack, scanning the kitchen thoroughly. The sheen of a sliding glass door caught her eye, and she looked out at the terrace beyond; a backyard that rivaled three basketball courts side-by-side greeted her. “Is there a possibility that evidence may have been hidden outside?”

Hayes nodded, the hint of a smile gracing her lips. “An excellent observation. Although the chances are high, I am aware that it will take a single dog hours to search this entire property. I have requested another K9 officer to do a sweep of the perimeter and work inwards across the terrace, to ensure that every piece of evidence that could be hidden is located.”

Before Valerie could reply, Hayes’s eyes focused on a something behind her shoulder, and a light smile graced the sergeant’s unyielding expression. “There she is.”

Valerie turned, and her gaze snapped instantly to the woman stepping into the house, her K9’s leash gripped loosely in a slender hand. Unlike the other officers in the house, she was wearing plain clothes, her gun and badge hanging from her belt, half-hidden by a jean jacket.

Yvonne Maxwell. What are the chances?

Out of all the K9 officers in the New York area, how had the two of them managed to be assigned to this search, when the reports for their last assignment had barely been finalized? Of course, they’d worked on cases before, filled in reports together, sat in hospitals and waited anxiously for each other’s results. Val knew plenty about the way Yvonne—the way she took her coffee, and the way she liked her eggs cooked—but it wasn’t often that they were paired together so many times in the span of a few weeks. Especially since there was no official record of them being assigned to each other permanently.

When she met Yvonne’s gaze, the other woman’s eyes held that same observation, but it was near covered by mirth, by warm happiness. Who better to work with than your best friend was a question she posed frequently, often when Valerie’s anxious doubts resurfaced. And the way their skill sets complimented each other wasn’t something that could be forced or faked.

“I’ve heard you two work well together,” Hayes murmured as Yvonne approached them, her running shoes making soft thumps on the wooden planks of the floor. The sergeant’s voice was back to its normal volume when she said, “Officer Maxwell, it’s great to see you.”

Hayes launched once more into an explanation of the case, which Val listened to with one ear, hardly registering the words she’d heard not a few minutes earlier. Yvonne was told to check everything that could possibly hold evidence or illegal substances, and to let her K9 lead the way.

And then it was time to work. Hayes gave them both a nod and strode back towards the living room, ordering updates on the officers pursuing her suspect and the canvassing others had done. Yvonne’s eyes were narrowed as she took in the sunlit terrace, and she spoke a command in rapid, fluent Czech—instantly, her K9 was pulling her outside, his nose pressed to the ground.

Valerie watched her step over the threshold of the glass door before she turned her attention to Solo’s tense frame. Giving him as much leash as she could, bracing for his immediate reaction, she ordered, “Solo, suche.”

And he did.

—

They found plenty of evidence—hidden beneath a secret panel in the dark wooden baseboards, a mix of illegal firearms and illicitly-obtained substances, to name a few. Solo had spent the better part of an hour sniffing at every corner and under every piece of overturned furniture; Val had no doubt that the place was covered in microscopic pieces of evidence that would be nearly impossible to trace without a K9.

Yvonne’s K9 found his own share, hidden in one of the elaborate outdoor pool’s filters, although Valerie didn’t get any more information than that. Then again, it wasn’t information meant for her, but for the detectives who would work the case.

All of the evidence would be examined thoroughly by forensics, and the results would be scanned through the NYPD’s database and added to a case file while the search for Hayes’s main suspect continued. Valerie’s task was finished.

All that was left was the incident report for her to fill out, detailing the commands she’d given her K9 and Solo’s investigation throughout the house. Sitting at a small table in the brightly-lit break room, a coffee in a paper cup going cold next to her computer, she filled in each tedious box, revisiting her memory several times to hammer down the specifics. Each action she’d done, each move Solo had made. Everything catalogued with precision as the sun began its descent across the sky in the window across from her, painting the sky a pale orange.

Val was nearly finished with the report, her hands aching from typing in so much information, when her phone began to buzz, a soft melodic ringtone filling the otherwise silent, empty room. She fished it out of her pocket, and Callie’s name rolled across the screen. Her full name—Callisea Morgan. She was calling from her work phone.

Immediately, worry flashed through Valerie’s body, leaking into her blood and twisting like a vine over several of her ribs, tugging insistently. She accepted the call with her heart racing. Callie never called unless it was important or she was in trouble. She hated phone calls more than anything else.

“Callie? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” God, please let her be okay. Valerie had been anxious when Callie had left for Chicago, leaving her with the barebones details of it’s an important case and this task force is vital to national security. She hadn’t been allowed to say anything else.

“Val. I’m not bothering you, am I?” The detective’s voice was shaking with worry, which only made Valerie’s heart race faster. Something is wrong. Something is horribly wrong.

Valerie pushed her computer away. The report mattered so little to her, it meant nothing to her compared to Callie’s safety. “No, of course not, you know you’re never bothering me. What is it? Are you okay?” If something had happened—

“I’m fine. I was the last to arrive—the investigation’s in full swing already. There’s just…” Callie cleared her throat, her voice wavering, and Valerie’s tension mounted, rising up in her shoulders almost painfully. The pull in her ribs turned painful. “I have reason to suspect that this case is related to the Emery case thirteen years ago.”

“What? Callie, that’s not—”

“Possible?” Her voice cracked. “I though so too. But the evidence is there.”

Valerie knew everything about that case. The very first murder Callie had worked on as the lead detective, one that had sent her into a tailspin of impossible clues. One that, thirteen years ago, had started in panic and ended in agony. Case number 803641, centered around Meredith Emery, no suspects ever found. It had never been solved, and it had remained locked away among stacks of unsolved cases, collecting dust and emanating loss for over a decade.

Until now, apparently.

There was another detail, too, one that nobody knew—

Don’t even think about that right now.

“I…Callie…I’m so sorry.” What else could she do? What could she say to make it better? So far away, Valerie only had those pitifully useless words to offer. I’m so sorry. Words that were meant to make the speaker like they were doing something, like they were helping. Val hated those words.

Why had she said them?

Callie’s voice was impossibly small, on the verge of breaking, when she asked, “Do you have access to the case file? I can’t retrieve it from my computer here, and the more information the task force has the faster we’ll get on this new case.”

“I can get it for you by tonight,” Val promised, rising from her chair. She’d been one of the officers assigned to it originally, before she’d become a K9 handler. Before everything. She was one of the few officers in the whole station that still had access to it. “But I need you to be sure about this—”

“I’m sure, Valerie. This is a chance to make it right. Please.” She knew, even if she couldn’t see her friend, that Callie was holding the phone in a white-knuckled grip, like she always did when her voice became this breathy, this tinged with fear and worry. Had she been in Chicago, Val would have pulled Callie into her arms and let her own steady heartbeat even out the detective’s racing pulse.

But Valerie wasn’t in Chicago. She was in New York, and she was going to do the best she could to ease the weight on her friend’s shoulders.

“I’ll get you the file by tonight. I promise.”

“Thank you, Val. Thank you so much.”

Before Valerie could say anything else, the call ended with a beep and a long, yawning silence that stretched out through her mind and dulled every thought until her mind became nothing but a dull cacophony of muted sounds. Slowly, she let her vision focus back in, let the stillness of the room steady her uneasiness. Fuck. Of all the people who had been sent to Chicago, why had Callie been dealt such an unlucky hand? After all the pain she’d already gone through, the grief, she was the last person who needed to open up the largest failure of her life and examine every piece.

Valerie wished, desperately, that she could have been in Chicago, that she could have told Callie to take a deep breath and helped her ease into comfort. She wished, just as she had thirteen years ago, that those initial moments of shock could have been less painful for her best friend.

But the universe was being cruel today, it seemed. Because pain was being dished out without remorse, and Val could do nothing to stop it. And even the blazing sun, finally going down, painting the landscape outside in shades of pale gold and red, was spreading it’s dark, bloody rays across the sky.

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Xavier Griffin was a fourteen-year veteran of the FBI, a former NSA agent, and, through plenty of trial and error, had discovered that he worked best alone. As his main task on this team was to ensure civilian safety, of course he could coordinate with others, but a partner? He’d been incredulous when Kane had told him Detective Morgan was flying in from New York, even if they both had chemistry backgrounds. A partner!? He had assured the SAC that there was no need, but Kane had been adamant—Xavier’s mother would have said the boss was being catégorique.

Still, he hadn’t gotten this far in his line of work by being stubborn. Xavier had let it slide—which was how he had ended up in the task force’s lab, watching Detective Morgan freak out and lose her breakfast over pictures of the killer’s horrid work.

Not being absolutely heartless, Xavier had attempted to comfort her, but…well, there was a reason he hadn’t become a therapist. He certainly hadn’t managed to get through to her, and his attempt to close the folder had only increased Morgan’s panic. Desperately clawing through it, she’d grabbed the close-up of the victim’s wrist, gasped, and stumbled back, wide-eyed.

It must have caused more noise than he’d anticipated, because Monroe and Sterling—for once not looking down at her phone or her reports—soon joined them in the lab, confusion and concern written across their faces. The moment they saw Morgan, clutching her chest, breathing hard as Xavier tried to steady her with whispered nothings, they had rushed forward, near-silent.

Sterling had quickly steered Morgan away by her shoulders, her even voice echoing through the lab—hey, hey, Morgan, look at me, it’s okay, take a breath, focus on me, tell me what’s wrong—and Xavier let the woman take his partner silently; the former UC who had a psych eval every few months could figure out whatever had caused Morgan’s panic better than he could.

“You guys alright?” Monroe leaned over to peer at the pictures, brows creased. The cybercrimes specialist glanced over at Morgan and Sterling, then back at Xavier.

“Yeah…” Xavier cast his partner a worried glance. “I don’t know what happened. One moment, she was asking me to show her the victims, the next she was panicking.” He decided to omit the part where she’d vomited—it wasn’t exactly a great second impression, and Morgan deserved a better reputation than that. For some reason, Xavier felt that her frantic behavior had a deeper cause than just squeamishness. He’d read her file: Callisea Morgan had worked in the Robbery/Homicide department of the NYPD, and had seen more than her fair share of bodies, murders, and other, less mentionable atrocities.

This shouldn’t have been any different.

But…for some reason, it was.

And he was going to get to the bottom of it, because an unstable partner in an already dangerous, volatile, and deadly case was the last thing Xavier needed. This task force wasn’t only a great thing for his resumé—it involved the lives of innocent people. Failure? It wasn’t something he would accept. It wasn’t something he could believe.

Monroe brought him back to the present with a shrug of his shoulders. “Kane told us she flew in from New York, and it doesn’t seem like she even got a chance to unpack. Maybe she’s just exhausted.” The FBI agent nodded to Morgan’s duffel bag, which she’d dropped near the door, a jacket slung over it. “She’s probably staying at a hotel, or a friend’s if she’s lucky.”

“Her file doesn’t have any connections in Chicago,” Xavier offered. He’d analyzed it extensively—she was so unimportant to the system that he had barely needed clearance for the information. “Probably a hotel. And yeah, she looks absolutely bone-weary.”

Monroe glanced over at the two women in the back of the lab, both speaking in soft tones, looking as calm as the professional government agents they were. Although Xavier himself had seen his partner’s reaction to the pictures, he could hardly believe that Morgan had composed herself so quickly; her efficiency made him doubt this was the first time she’d experienced a panic attack.

Gathering himself, Xavier smiled politely at Sterling, intending to ask Morgan whether she actually even had the skill to be on this team, but the redheaded agent didn’t even acknowledge him as she breezed past with the detective at her side, steps hurried.

Xavier glanced at Monroe, baffled. “She just—Sterling just stole my partner.”

The cybercrimes expert snorted, eyes trained on the spot where Taylor Sterling had just vanished with Xavier’s partner without so much as a word. Who does that? Sterling barely even knows me, and she spoke all of one sentence to Morgan when they were introduced.

“Why the hell did she just steal my partner?”

Monroe was chuckling, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Nearly everyone has heard of the legend that is Taylor Sterling, Griffin,” the man told him. “There are plenty of accounts and even more myths and twisted stories about her, but one thing has always remained the same no matter which tale you listen to: she doesn’t let anything stop her. Whatever she’s doing, I don’t intend to miss it.” He strode out with his hands in his pockets, following the two women and leaving Xavier alone.

What the hell?

Deciding that perhaps Monroe had a point, Xavier hurried out of the lab, casting the polished, ordinary room a last glance before he adjusted his cuffs and followed the sound of echoing footsteps down the long hall.

When he arrived in the main office, Sterling was lifting a stack of papers from her desk, and the others had all lifted their attention to her, although Reilly and Santos cast curious glances at Morgan, standing at the edge of the room silently. Xavier decided not to join her, and instead took a place near Monroe’s desk, occupied by the tech expert himself.

Sterling raised the folder she’d been looking for, turning to face the room. “Detective Morgan has made an impressive connection, everyone, and I think it’s important for us all to hear it.”

Xavier shifted his weight. An impressive connection? She barely saw anything in the picture to even recognize the acid. How did Morgan, of all people, make a connection? He trained his gaze on his partner, eyes narrowed slightly. If she felt the weight of his gaze, she didn’t acknowledge it, instead keeping her focus on Sterling and the others.

“Now,” Sterling opened the folder and drew out the photograph of the first victim, “this is the body found three weeks ago.” She put that one down and pulled out two more, their deaths, their destroyed bodies, so similar they were near-identical to the first. “These are the ones found two weeks and one week ago, respectively.”

Had she been anyone else, an officer would have chimed in by now and told her to stop repeating basic information, but Taylor Sterling carried herself with such unwavering surety and poise that everyone in the room knew not to interrupt her. Something in her voice made this review seem like the most important information in the world.

“We all know that our killer’s three victims have an hours-old tattoo branded onto the inside of their wrist. Coincidentally, that tattoo is one of the few pieces of skin not burned away by acid.”

“It’s Latin,” Santos added. “The direct translation is ‘we are all crazy’, but having a dead language as our reference is… tricky, to say the least.” She bit her lip, studying whatever notes she’d been making. “It hasn’t brought up any matches yet, for…well, anything.”

Sterling nodded. “And that tattoo, it seems, has already appeared once in the past.” At the team’s puzzled glances, the redhead waved Morgan forward. “Detective Morgan, please tell us all what you know.”

Xavier gritted his teeth. What was even happening? Morgan had gotten to Chicago no more than an hour or two ago, and she’d been given access to the murder files a handful of minutes past. What did she think she knew? She was arrogant, cryptic, and probably psychotic.

“Thirteen years ago,” Morgan began, her voice loud enough to be heard by all, “Meredith Emery, an accountant, was kidnapped and reported missing. Her body was found days later, dumped in the back alley of her own neighbourhood, in Newark, New Jersey. She was murdered in the exact manner that these three men and women were, and…” the detective inhaled sharply. “She had that exact same tattoo branded on her wrist.”

“Emery, you said? With an E, not an O?” Knight was tapping away on his keyboard, searching through files. He glanced up at Morgan for the confirmation.

“With an E,” Morgan confirmed. “E-M-E-R-Y. First name Meredith—case number 803641.”

Xavier crossed his leg over the other, drawing himself up. “How do you know all this, Morgan? Do you just peruse strange murder investigations that happen around your home and memorize them all?”

Morgan stiffened, raising herself up, and for the first time since he’d met his new partner, Xavier saw fury, not fear or panic or optimism, in her eyes. Fury.

“I know this,” she gritted out, “because I was the lead detective on the case. It was the first murder I ever investigated. And maybe you don’t have the capability for empathy, Griffin,” she practically spat the name, “but I make a point to never forget the names, faces, and details of those I do not manage to bring to justice.”

So you failed? What a surprise. Instead of voicing the thought, Xavier gave a shallow nod. “My apologies, then. Perhaps you could do us a favor and bring out the case file of Miss Emery?”

“I’ll give my friends in New York a call. Kane will have the file by the end of the day.”

What a low blow. Kane? Not him? Not her goddamned partner? Xavier cast a glance around, but only Reilly seemed to have noticed the slight—from the slight smirk on his face, he found it more amusing than irritating.

“Amazing.” Knight clapped his hands together, and Xavier saw it for what it was—a weak attempt to dispel the tension rising around them. “While the actual murder file is something I can’t access, I pulled up Meredith Emery’s profile.” He turned his computer screen around, showing it to the group. The pale blue eyes of a smiling middle-aged woman stared back at all of them.

It was a photograph. The shot ended at Meredith’s shoulders, but her hair was clearly longer than that, wavy and dark brown, and she had a silver pendant hanging at her neck. She reminded Xavier faintly of his partner, but it was really the general space around her, the beaming smile she cast up into the camera, more than any of her facial features.

“That’s her,” Morgan confirmed softly. The room’s attention shifted back to her, but the detective’s eyes were fixed on Meredith. “And…that tattoo doesn’t say ‘we’re all crazy here’.” She ripped her gaze away and appraised them all. “It’s a reference to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland—‘we’re all mad here.’”

Santos stiffened, half-rising out of her seat. She was so startled it was almost comical. “What? How did we not know that?”

“This killer’s gotten better over the years, but when Meredith was murdered, they left behind a small keychain with the Mad Hatter on it. That’s what led me to make the connection.”

“This—we need to reanalyze everything.” Monroe was already out of his seat, rummaging through his own papers. “It’s clear whoever this is is having fun with their murders. Let’s see if we can find any more hints like that.”

“Thank you, Morgan,” Sterling chimed in, sweeping her red hair over a shoulder. “For everything. If you hadn’t been added to this task force, we probably wouldn’t have made the connection until much later—if we ever made it at all.”

“You’ll have the file soon,” the detective promised, retreating to the main lobby, phone already in hand, ringing as she dialed up one of her colleagues. The echoes of her whispered conversation trailed across the room as she turned a corner, getting quieter and quieter with every step.

Xavier followed her with his eyes until his partner disappeared, then drew his attention back to the folder on Sterling’s desk, photographs lying on top of it. The tattoo of the last victim was stark against the manila, space-black ink on burned, bloodless, ivory skin.

A quick search of the internet, if only to feel a little useful, pulled up the full quote Morgan had mentioned. Xavier studied it on his phone screen, then pasted it into a message to the entire task force. Phones pinged as the words went through.

“Oh, you can't help that,” said the Cat: “we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.”

We’re all mad here.

 Omnes hic insanientes sumus.

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Julianne Santos arched a brow at her partner as he came into the room holding two coffees, smoothing a thumb over the car keys Kane had thrown her minutes ago. “Who’s driving?”

Reilly shrugged, setting hers—one cream, one sugar—on the edge of her desk and crossing his arms in front of his chest, sipping at his own coffee. “I should, since I know the area, but if you have a preference…?”

She lifted the keys and tossed them into his raised hand, taking a sip of her steaming drink with the other hand. “Go ahead. I haven’t been to Chicago in ages, and I remember enough to know that the roads are hell.”

He smiled, slipping the keys into the pocket of his jeans. “I can’t say I disagree.”

As Jules pulled her copy of the case file from her bag to review it once more, Reilly came around the desk to lean his hip on the corner, scanning the pages Julianne had annotated in red pen. Most of it was simply her original unfiltered assessment, which she’d done as soon as she’d received the information, at an ungodly hour of the night; majority of the scribbles were undoubtedly useless, accompanied by a flurry of arrows that only increased the document’s frantic appearance, but Reilly made no comment as he perused the pages, taking in every detail with what Julianne would have called an appreciative eye if she was being optimistic.

Well. If she’d cared more about others’ opinions, she wouldn’t have managed to be nearly as successful in her career as she was, but the lack of judgment did not lower her spirits. If anything, paired with the coffee, it made her look forward to a day of properly meeting her partner and seeing the way he worked; letting him drive would increase that opportunity, which was another bonus.

“Are these your first impressions?” Reilly tapped his finger on one of the markings Jules had made, a nearly unintelligible scribble of words followed by far too many question marks. She braced herself for a scathing remark as she gave a nod, but Reilly set his coffee down and continued his examination. “These are brilliant, Santos. Half of these aren’t things any other detective would think to look at, let alone cross-reference or evaluate.”

She felt heat rise in her cheeks, although it didn’t last long—a mere glance at her own writing sent ice rushing through Julianne’s veins, soaking her in cold reality. People had died, had experienced the worst moments of their lives, and it was laid out for her to examine like specimens in glass bottles, when they had been so much more. They had been people, with favorite seasons and songs, who hated certain drinks and loved their families. They deserved justice.

Softly, she said, “I appreciate it. I figured if our UNSUB is using acid as their main weapon, and they brand their victims with Latin words, the connection between our three victims might not be as clear as it is in other investigations.” Reilly nodded, and she stood, adding, “We have a plan?”

“I have some colleagues down in the police department who finalized their reports—we could swing by and grab everything we need, along with any evidence they collected. Morgan and Griffin might manage to pull something in the lab if they can analyze it thoroughly.”

Julianne rose from her seat with a nod, tucking the case file away and slinging her bag over a shoulder, coffee in hand. Together, she and Reilly made their way to the elevator in the foyer. As it began to move, taking them down to the main floor, Jules adjusted her hair, deft fingers smoothing back the flyaways escaping the bun at her nape.

They lurched to a stop quickly enough, and the elevator doors slid open with a quiet hiss, exposing the quiet officers suddenly to the cacophony of whispers in the foyer and noisy streets beyond.

Julianne stepped closer to her partner as the noise of secretaries, workers, and visiting people enveloped her, keeping him in her periphery and ignoring the few curious glances that tailed them.

Reilly advanced through the room with ease, his eagle-sharp eyes scanning every detail of the foyer before they’d even stepped fully into the room. He looked every inch like the fierce, determined, former Army Ranger partner that she’d been told she would work with. For her part, Jules catalogued her own information, adjusting the jacket she’d thrown on this morning so that the badge hanging from her belt was visible to all—her gun, meanwhile, was not.

Her partner held the glass door open for her as they stepped outside, and Julianne slanted her palm over her eyes to keep them in shadow, safe from the burning sunlight that slammed into them straight-on.

Reilly did the same, managing to suppress everything but the hint of his grimace. “The department isn’t too far” he said, matching her pace as they made their way across the mostly empty street to the curb, where two black military-grade SUVs were parked. “A half-hour drive if we go slowly.”

Jules stopped at the passenger-side door, turning to face him. “And if we don’t?”

He smiled, and a hint of wildness broke through his serious facade as he stopped at her side, the keys in his hand. “No more than twenty minutes. With this car, fifteen.”

“Well then,” Jules opened the door and threw him one last glance as she got into the seat, smiling. His dark eyes were fixed on her. “What are you waiting for? Drive.”

—

Chicago, hellish roads and all, was no match for Nathan Reilly.

They made it to the Chicago Police Department in just under fifteen minutes, and as Reilly parked in an empty stretch of the lot, Julianne finished the last dregs of her coffee, already feeling less tired.

She and Reilly walked through the door together, and several cheery greetings followed them across the station as his friends and colleagues stopped by to say hello. A few of them stayed long enough to ask about who Jules was, but the majority disappeared just as quickly as they appeared, carried off like whirlwinds. By the time they made it to Reilly’s desk, perfectly polished and organized, Julianne felt like it had taken them half an hour just to make it across the station.

The detective that waited for them was tall, wearing plain clothes. Her gun and badge gleamed under the edge of her jacket, and she held a plastic box to her hip, although her gaze was focused on the folders she’d left on Reilly’s desk. When Jules approached, she looked up and smiled, setting the box on the desk as well.

“Morning, Nicholls,” Reilly said. “This is my new partner, Detective Julianne Santos, with the LAPD. Santos, this is Detective Sloane Nicholls.”

“Pleased to meet you, Detective. I hope this information aids your investigation.” A brief handshake, then Nicholls continued, “The box is evidence we gathered, not that there was much of it. We have statements from the families of the victims as well.”

“Thank you. We appreciate your help.” She turned to look at the contents of the box, but a buzz in her pocket stopped her. Jules lifted her phone just as a call appeared on the screen, headed by Kane’s name. Immediately, she opened her mouth to say something, but Reilly waved her off, his brow furrowed in concern as Julianne accepted the call.

“This is Santos.”

SAC Kane’s voice greeted her as soon as she spoke. “Detective Santos, are you still at the police department?”

She looked back at Reilly, who was conversing with Nicholls, although his body was angled more towards her than to his colleague. “Yes, sir. Is there anything you need?”

“Before you come back, stop by the morgue. The coroner that worked this case has finalized tox reports and an assessment ready to go, but their system is down and the only way to collect anything is by picking the actual documents up.”

Jules’s breath caught. “Foul play?”

“We don’t have reason to suspect our UNSUB knows about this task force, Detective, but I can’t say for sure. I’m not naive enough to say its a coincidence that right after my team assembled, the coroner’s system has magically crashed. I hope I’m wrong to mistrust anything, but I’d like you to check it out and let me know for sure.”

“Of course. We’ll get the reports, and watch out for anything suspicious.”

“You do that. And Santos?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Be careful.”

“Always.”

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