Page 36 of Her Last Warning
"BP's one-forty over ninety," a new voice reported."Pulse is ninety-three percent."
"Sir?Can you hear me?Can you squeeze my hand?"
Rachel splashed cold water on her face, watching droplets fall back into the pristine white sink.This should feel like a victory.They'd caught the killers, prevented a fourth death, brought an end to the string of murders.So why did it feel like she had lost?
Because some wounds couldn't be healed, she realized.Some losses couldn't be avenged or balanced or made right.The Reynolds would spend the rest of their lives in prison, but it wouldn't bring Emma back.David Shook would recover, but he'd never again feel completely safe in his own home.And Rachel...Rachel would add this case to the weight she carried, another reminder that survival wasn't always the gift it was supposed to be.
She heard a knock at the bathroom door."Gift?"Novak's voice, concerned but professional."They're about to transport Shook.Reynolds is secured.You okay in there?"
The ambulance siren had gone silent, but she could hear the rumble of its engine idling outside.Soon they'd load David Shook into it, begin the process of documenting the scene, take Michael Reynolds into custody.The machinery of justice would grind forward, turning tragedy into paperwork, pain into procedure.
"I'll be right out," she called back, proud that her voice remained steady.
Rachel straightened her shoulders and dried her face with a hand towel that hung beside the sink.She had a job to do.The time for processing her feelings would come later, in the privacy of her own home, maybe with Jack beside her to remind her that not every survival story ended in such darkness.
But as she reached for the doorknob, her hand trembled slightly, and she knew that this case would stay with her long after the reports were filed and the trials concluded.Because sometimes the hardest part of surviving wasn't the struggle to live – it was figuring out how to carry on in a world where life and death followed no rules, where miracles and tragedies both balanced on the same precarious line.
Rachel squared her shoulders and opened the door.This case may be wrapped, but the ripples of it would cause would go on for quite some time.And while she was helpless to stopthoseparticular ripples, it was her job to prevent as many others from forming as she possibly could.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
Rachel's key slid into the lock with a whisper.The house beyond the door held its breath in darkness, the kind of absolute stillness that made even the gentlest movements feel like intrusions.She stepped inside, her shoes barely making contact with the hardwood floor, and eased the door closed behind her.The lock's mechanism engaged with a soft click that seemed to echo through the empty foyer.
She was home.It was dark and it was quiet, but it was warm and familiar.Her heart sagged with relief at the feel of the familiar space around her.
The digital clock on the microwave cast its glow from across the kitchen—1:08 AM.Rachel stood motionless in the entrance, letting her eyes adjust to the darkness while her mind wandered back to the interrogation room.Linda Reynolds' face haunted her thoughts, the woman's expression eerily serene as she explained why she and her husband had killed those people.The universe made a mistake,she'd said.We were just trying to set things right.Michael, on the other hand, had not been as much help.He’d passed out and was currently in the hospital being treated for a severe panic attack and psychotic break.
Linda’s words held a terrible logic that Rachel couldn't shake, the desperate reasoning of parents who'd lost everything.She understood loss—had faced it herself more times than she cared to count.Peter's death still visited her in dreams sometimes, and the phantom pain of her cancer lingered in quiet moments like this one.But she'd never let grief twist her into something unrecognizable, the way it had transformed the Reynolds.
The house felt different at night, larger somehow, as if the darkness had expanded its dimensions.Rachel had walked these halls countless times, in every possible state—exhausted after cases, sick from chemo, terrified during Alex Lynch's rampage.Tonight, fatigue draped over her shoulders like a heavy coat, but underneath lay something else: a bone-deep weariness that came from looking into the eyes of killers and seeing only broken people staring back.
She moved through the house like a ghost, each step carefully placed.The stairs posed their usual challenge—third step from the top creaked if you stepped on the left side, second from the bottom groaned no matter where you placed your foot.She made her way down the hall, pausing long enough to simply reach out and touch Paige’s bedroom door.She then made her way down to the end of the hall and opened the bedroom door.Jack's steady breathing filled the room, a reassuring rhythm that made the house feel less empty.His presence reminded her of how far she'd come since Peter's death, how love had found her again when she least expected it.As she gathered her pajamas to take into the bathroom for her shower, the bed sheets rustled.
"Welcome home," Jack's voice was thick with sleep."You okay?"
"Yes," she whispered, pausing in the bathroom doorway.
"Case closed?"
"Yes.I'll tell you everything in the morning.Now go back to sleep."
He groaned and nodded, laying back down.She smiled and entered the bathroom.It felt good to strip out of her clothes—as if this little act would also somehow shed the memories of the past forty-eight hours or so.
The shower's spray hit her shoulders with welcome warmth, and Rachel closed her eyes, letting the water cascade over her face.Steam rose around her as she tried to wash away the Reynolds case—the crime scenes, the victims' faces, the thought of Emma Reynolds, a girl she had never met, shot in the head for her purse less than three weeks after beating a life-threatening condition.It was all hard to fathom as she stood in the hot water.It was hard because there was a part of her that almost sided with the reasoning Linda Reynolds had given.Sometimes, things justdidn’tseem fair, especially when it came to the unexpected loss of loved ones.
And what was the harm of thinking you could somehow change it all?
The water couldn't wash away the weight of it all, but it helped, if only a little.Rachel thought of her own time in hospitals, the way hope and fear had played their endless tug-of-war in her heart.She remembered the faces of other patients, some who made it, some who didn't.She thought of Scarlett, whose victory had been so cruelly snatched away.The memory of her friend's murder sent a familiar chill down her spine despite the hot water.
And finally, Rachel gave herself permission to cry.Her tears were washed away, down the drain with the water, as she started to think once again about the many ways she could start taking advantage of the second chance at life she had been given.
* * *
Sunlight filtered through the bedroom curtains when Rachel finally opened her eyes the next morning.Her phone showed 9:07 AM—a luxury she rarely afforded herself.The extra sleep had helped, though remnants of the case still clung to her consciousness like cobwebs.They were there waiting for her right away, parading in front of all other memories.
She sat up and found the other side of the bed empty.But that made sense.Jack had that meeting this morning.She saw that he had left a note resting on his pillow, the paper slightly crumpled where he'd written it.
Gone to my morning meeting.Should be back by noon.Decide what you and Paige want to do this weekend.Something in Williamsburg?Maybe DC?
