Page 64 of Sinful Reality

“Your privacy will be a long-lost memory once we break this case. It’s pretty fuckin’ huge, Min. Your name will be right there beside mine and Lowe’s.”

“I just want it to stop.” She closes her eyes and releases a pent-up sigh. “I haven’t slept properly since I was five years old. If we’re right with this and it’s Gloria, then I want her behind bars so it never happens again.” She licks her dry lips and nods. “Go. Take care of it. I’ll be waiting for your next update.”

“Alright.” He makes a clicking sound with his tongue and grunts in time with the squeak of his chair. “I’ll be back soon.” He kills the call and drops our apartment into silence, all except for Cato’s breathing and Minka’s sprinting thoughts.

I swear, I can almost hear them as clearly as I see them written on her face.

“If it was Gloria, she’s going to prison.” Wandering closer, I lower into a crouch, resting my arm on her knee and capturing her eyes when she allows me to. “Lachlan will go away, too. But it won’t be the kind of prison you’ve spent your lifetime hoping for.”

She firms her lips, her blocked nose making it difficult to inhale enough oxygen to fill her lungs.

“He hurt those girls,” I continue. “No matter howspecialhe is, and no matter that he didn’t do it alone. He’s the man you’ve hated for most of your life. And if this shakes down the way it should, he’ll end up in a psych ward somewhere, eating pudding and watching Oprah reruns every day. It won’t feel any more like a prison than the life he’s already living.”

“Are you asking if that’s enough for me?” Her eyes flicker between mine.Notsaying the word so loudly booming in the back of my mind.The Vigilante.The whole fucking reason she became the woman she is today. “You think the psych ward isn’t enough?”

“I think I worry about you.” I reach across and hold her chin, pulling her back around when she attempts to look away. Locks of tangled hair tickle my wrist, individual strands catching in her lashes when she blinks. “I think you’ve spent a long time thinking about this day. You’ve probably imagined a sense of relief when it’s done. A feeling of ‘justice has been served.’ But that might not be what we get this time. If it was Gloria and Lachlan, she’s going to die soon, he’ll go into a home where nothing really changes, and Serena is just…” Swallowing, I shake my head. “She’s just another girl to add to the list. She makes nineteen, and she was the first. No one even knew she was gone.”

“If we’re right and Gloria dies soon, then it’s all over. Forever. Lachlan will go into a facility, and hewon’tget a replacement each year. And Serena will be remembered.” Tears well in her eyes, punctuated by a hitch in her breath. “She has to be somewhere, Archer. Her body issomewhere, but wherever it is, it’s not in the ground with a marker honoring her memory. She deserves that.”

“So we’ll look for her.” I release her chin and take her hand in mine instead, twining our fingers together and stroking her delicate wrist with my thumb. “We’ll buy her a marker and have it placed wherever she’s buried. We’ll do that, not only to honor her, but you, too.”

“Me?” A deep line digs between her brows when she frowns. “Honoring me?”

“The little girl whose childhood was stolen, and then the young woman whose innocence was shattered because she had to autopsy a child who had already been a mother. You did good on this one, babe. You’ve helped them all.”

“Only if we’re right.” Her cheeks warm, and her eyes drop to her lap. “Pretty embarrassing if we’re completely off the mark.”

Chuckling, I lean in and offer my lips. But I wait for her to glance up and accept. For her to close the gap and be the reason we connect.

“Cato was the one who figured it out. If he’s wrong, then the embarrassment is all his.”

“Yeah.” Cato turns on his heels and starts toward the hall. “Fuck me, then. Fuck all that work I did. Fuck the hours where it felt like my eyes were bleeding, all so I could pinpoint one grainy ass picture and stare at a woman I wouldn’t take to bed if she was the last one left.”

I roll my eyes and smile at the woman on the verge of a complete emotional meltdown. “He has standards, it seems. So weird. I was sure he didn’t.”

“I can hear you!” He slams the bathroom door and flips the shower on. “Get off my couch and use your own damn bedroom.”

“Come on.” I straighten my legs and carefully pull her up with me. “Sleeping on the floor is for frat boys and suckers, Chief Mayet. Where was your common sense? Where was your dignity?”

“I think I lost it somewhere in that hole I dug a few days ago.” She relaxes into my side and allows me to lead her around the couch and toward the kitchen. “How much longer until I’m not sick anymore? I don’t want this.”

“Start with vitamin C and we’ll reassess.” I stop at the counter and help her onto the stool, releasing her hip and staying put until she’s settled and the swaying ends. “Less coffee,” I decide. “More juice. Less sleeping on the floor, and next time I tell you you’re on the decline, how about you fuckin’ listen?”

She lays her arms on the counter, creating a pillow for her head; then she slumps onto her new resting place and groans. “I just want thisweek to end. And I want Fifi to come back to work at the George Stanley. And I want Aubree to be here right now.”

“Now?” I open the fridge and snatch out one of the dozen bottles of orange juice I stacked in there yesterday. “You’re tired and sad and youwantAubree here?”

“She’s like sunshine when it’s cloudy,” she moans. “It pisses me off. But I think going too long between visits is bad for my health.”

I crack the lid open and turn to place it by her elbow. “I’ll call her for you. You know she’s only next door.”

MINKA

I’m in my office approximately four hours after my kitchen counter nap, my computer screen spun on my desk, Archer and Fletch standing guard by the door, Aubree draped haphazardly on the couch so the glitters of her shoes flicker in the sunlight fighting through the clouds outside. And I… well I sit in my visitor’s chair, my spine ruler-straight, my hands clasped tight in my lap, my heart pounding faster than it should, and my eyes plastered to the screen that just so happens to be split in two.

I have no clue how it’s been done, and I couldn’t explain how I’ve dialed into two different body cams at the same time—Sophia Solomon said she’d take care of it, and rarely does she fail to deliver. But the screen labeledoneon the left is a far clearer image than any of those Cato and I watched in the last twenty-four hours. I’m met with Gloria Donohue’s friendly smile. Her neat hair tied in a ponytail, and her face as fresh as they come.

No cosmetics or skin creams for her.

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