Page 121 of Make Them Bleed
By noon, the city knows. The local sites light up:PROCUREMENT CHIEF RESIGNS, ARRESTED IN SEPARATE INVESTIGATION. My name isn’t in the articles. Arby’s is. It hurts anyway. I call my therapist and leave a message that says, “Make room. I’m bringing a storm.”
The rest happens fast, because it has to.
Search warrants land at Stonehouse, at the marina storage office, at Unit 14 by the tracks. Devereaux provides adjacency records with names this time, delivered to Chloe by a lawyer in a suit whose tie saysI believe in rules.Unit 14 turns out to be what we thought: a signal room and a staging area. Routers. A server with a mirrored drive. A cheap tripod with a broken latch that makes my stomach turn.
Rook Salazar gets picked up coming out of a gym at 5:40 a.m. with a duffel bag and a polite smile that doesn’t make it to his eyes. The arresting officer is too smart to accept help carrying the duffel. The contents do not help Rook’s day.
Beau Latham surrenders with a statement about loving the community and due process and not recognizing the “portrayal” of himself on the internet. Ozzy DM’s me a screenshot of Beau’s pinky ring on the courthouse steps and a caption:imagineaccessorizing for arraignment. I don’t laugh. I do breathe easier.
Coleman is the last to fall. He thinks he can outrun the mess. For twenty-four hours it looks like he can. Then Chloe and the DA walk into Club Greed’s back corridor with a judge’s signature and Devereaux’s cameras and a marina ledger that showsLaurel Ninebilled for a private security crew on the night Arby died. Coleman sees Chloe and, for the first time, looks like a man who miscounted his moves.
Etta is arrested too, but not at Club Greed. Not on a yacht. At an office that doesn’t have a sign, in a building that probably smells like new paint. She has a lawyer on speed dial and a calm face that makes me think she’ll trade half the board for the other half. Gage texts the group chat:Hoy flipped. Conditional. She’s naming the conduit and the sign-offs.I typeGray?and Gage repliesshe says “orbit.” not “orders.” DA is patient.Of course he is. Saints take time.
Chloe keeps me looped in without giving me anything that would turn me into a witness I’m not ready to be. “We’ll need you later,” she says on the phone, steady. “Not for the past week. For the dock and the boat.”
“I’ll be there,” I say. “Iwasthere.”
Two days after Bob’s arrest, my mother comes over with a bag of groceries and her wedding ring on a chain. We cook in silence for a while, chopping peppers and onions like they might confess under a knife.
“Did she know?” she asks finally. “Arby. About him and…that woman.”
“She did,” I say. “She tried to make him tell you. She tried to make him stop.”
My mother nods, tears starting finally, slow and steady. “Of course she did.” She looks at my crime wall, at the names and lines, at the red thread I haven’t cut yet. “Take it down when you’re ready,” she says. “Keep the picture you like in your head. Not the last one.”
I leave the wall up for now. I’m not finished with it. But that night I add one new card in the corner:KAREN. I draw a circle around it and a line toMEand leave that line bold.
When the indictments drop, the language is dry and heavy and exactly what I want:conspiracy to commit kidnapping, conspiracy to commit assault, felony murderfor Coleman, Beau, and Rook,racketeeringfor the business that built the scaffolding. Etta’s charges are listed aspendingwith a note about cooperation. Bob’s list is long and ugly. His lawyer releases a statement about regret. I don’t read it.
We don’t celebrate. We exhale.
At Arby’s grave, I sit alone for an hour before I can say anything that isn’t a noise.
“They’re going to trial,” I tell the stone. “It’s not all of them. But enough to start. You were right. The deal was poison. I wish you could say ‘told you so’ and roll your eyes and steal my bagel. I wish I had more for you than this.”
A breeze nudges the flowers I brought. It feels like nothing and it feels like permission. I cry then—real crying, the kind that empties your insides in a way that makes room for air again.
Arrow waits by the gate, letting me come to him. He doesn’t ask what I said. He does take my hand, and we walk back to the car like people who get to try again.
We go to Chloe’s office the next morning. I give my formal statement about the shop, the alley, the van, the dock, the boat. I sayEtta. I sayColeman. I sayBob. I do not make speeches. I answer questions and drink water and ask for a break when my chest gets tight. Arrow sits behind me, chair angled so I can see his knee, which is somehow better than seeing his face.
After, Chloe closes the folder and leans back. “You can post again,” she says. “I can’t tell you to. I can tell you it won’t wreck anything we’re doing. Don’t gloat. Don’t poison a jury. Speak like a person who understands you’re not the only one who lost something.”
“Okay,” I say. “I can do that.”
I go home and stare at the mic for ten minutes and then hit record.
The episode is calledLight Without Masks. I tell my listeners I took a break because I had to; because sometimes you stop making noise so you can make decisions. I tell them what I’m allowed to say about networks with friendly names and rotten cores. I talk about rules and rooms, about how power hides in systems and rooms and men and sometimes women who know better and do worse anyway. I don’t say Bob’s name. I don’t say Etta’s. I say: “I loved my sister. She was loud and sharp and she changed her hair when a chapter ended. This one ended wrong. We’re working on the sequel.”
I finish with, “If you are in a room where someone uses your friendship as leverage, leave. If you are offered a deal that makesyou smaller, walk. If you can’t walk, call someone who will stand outside the door and wait.” I look at Arrow as I say it. He’s standing in the kitchen, wiping the counter like it insulted him. He hears his name even when I don’t say it.
The episode goes up. I turn my phone over and don’t look for an hour. When I finally do, the first message is from my mother:I’m proud of you.The second is from Chloe:Good line about doors.The third is from Arrow, and it’s a heart emoji.
A week later, I sit in the back of a courtroom with Arrow and watch Bob shuffle in wearing a suit that looks too big. He pleads not guilty. His lawyer asks for bail. The judge sets it high. As he’s led back, he looks over his shoulder. My mother doesn’t come. I don’t wave. I don’t leave. I breathe.
Chloe testifies at a hearing about the yacht. Devereaux’s footage plays on a screen. It isn’t the murder; it’s faces at doors, hands on rails, the clock of a night where men believed no one could follow the math. The judge signs more paper. Coleman’s lawyer looks like he swallowed a lemon.
When the news crews try to spin me into B-roll, I put on a cap and keep walking. When a reporter shouts, “Do you feel vindicated,” I say, “I feel tired,” and keep going. Arrow takes my hand like it’s an ordinary thing to do.
