Page 18 of Pursuit of Her

Through her earpiece, Eve's voice continued issuing commands, directing the search with methodical precision. Reagan moved in counterpoint, a dance of pursuit and evasion where both partners anticipated the other's steps with intimate familiarity.

Eve was hunting her. And underneath the necessity of escape, Reagan felt the faintest flicker of something she had believed long extinguished: hope.

If Eve had figured out the vigilante's identity, if she was anticipating Reagan's movements rather than following them, it meant she was connecting the pieces Reagan had deliberately left for her. The evidence from each killing. The names in Davenport's appointment book. The breadcrumbs leading to the full truth of Phoenix Ridge's corruption.

Reagan emerged from a service exit into the rain-soaked alley behind the Harborside Building, the storm providing perfect cover for her departure. The police units would be focused on the rooftop and main exits; this tertiary escape route remained invisible to standard tactics.

As she merged with the shadows between buildings, Reagan permitted herself one backward glance toward the rooftop where Eve directed the search. Lightning illuminated the captain's silhouette for a fraction of a second—a solitary figure standing against the stormy sky, her posture straight and commanding as she scanned the surrounding buildings.

Looking for me, Reagan thought.After all these years.

She turned away and vanished into Phoenix Ridge's labyrinthine streets, the rain washing away any trace of her presence. Tonight's reconnaissance was compromised, but she had learned something far more valuable: Eve was closer than Reagan had anticipated. The carefully constructed distance between hunter and hunted was collapsing, the inevitable confrontation accelerating toward them both.

And when they finally stood face to face, Reaganwould have to make a choice between completing her mission and revealing the truth to the woman she had never stopped loving—the truth that might destroy them both.

She disappeared into the storm, a ghost moving through a city haunted by secrets that refused to stay buried. Behind her, Eve Morgan continued the search, separated by mere moments and ten years of calculated absence.

Reagan moved through the old warehouse district with the careful precision of someone who had mapped every possible escape route years in advance. The rain had intensified, sheets of water cascading from the sky as if Phoenix Ridge itself were being cleansed of its sins. Lightning illuminated the abandoned structures in brief, violent flashes, thunder following with increasing urgency as the storm centered over the city.

She knew these buildings intimately—had used them as observation posts during her original investigation ten years ago. The abandoned textile factory with its rust-stained water tower offered a tactical advantage: multiple exits, clear sightlines in all directions, and a covered vantage point from which she could monitor police movements while remaining invisible.

Reagan climbed the metal staircase, each step placed with deliberate silence despite the storm's cover. Water streamed from her tactical clothing as she reached the factory's upper level—a cavernous space of broken windows and silent machines, ghosts of industry long abandoned. She moved to the eastern windows that overlooked the harbor, her trained eye scanning for the distinctive silhouettes of police units.

Nothing. The search parameters had remained focused on the Harborside Building, exactly as she'd predicted. Eve would expand the search radius systematically, but Reagan had built in enough time to?—

"Don't move."

The voice cut through the rain's percussion like a blade. Low, controlled, and unmistakable even after a decade.

Eve.

Reagan froze, not from the command but from the shock of hearing that voice so close after years of distance. Her back remained to the speaker, rain dripping from her clothing to form a small puddle at her feet.

"Hands where I can see them," Eve ordered, her voice containing nothing but professional control.

Slowly, Reagan raised her hands to shoulder height, her fingers spread wide to show compliance. She kept her back turned, delaying the inevitable moment of recognition.

"Now turn around. Slowly."

Reagan drew a single breath, steadying herself for what came next. Then she turned, facing Eve Morgan for the first time in ten years.

Lightning flashed, illuminating them both. Eve stood ten feet away, her service weapon held in a perfect two-handed grip, aimed unflinchingly at Reagan's chest. Her dark hair was plastered to her head from the rain, water streaming down her face like tears she refused to shed. She wore dark tactical pants and a black jacket with POLICE emblazoned across the chest, the captain's badge gleaming at her hip.

Their eyes locked, and the world compressed to that single point of connection.

For three heartbeats, Eve's professional mask remained intact. Then recognition crept in those dark green eyes, followed by a cascade of emotions too rapid to isolate: shock, disbelief, anger, pain. Her weapon wavered for a fraction of a second, the only outward sign of the earthquake shaking her foundations.

"Reagan." A whisper almost lost in the storm's fury.

Reagan remained motionless, hands still raised, giving Eve the space to process what her mind must be struggling to accept. The ghost made flesh. The lover she'd believed dead. The vigilante she'd been hunting.

"Hello, Eve." Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, too calm for the typhoon raging in her chest.

Eve's jaw tightened, the muscle flexing beneath her skin in the tell Reagan had once known so intimately. "Ten years." The words were clipped. "Ten years I thought you were dead."

Rain continued to fall between them, the storm's fury matching the tension crackling in the air.

"I did what was necessary," Reagan replied, each word weighted with the decade of absence it represented.

---