“No.”
Jake angles me a look. “Bother you?”
“She’s paid to keep secrets,” I say. “Reflex is survival.”
“But…you two…” He gestures vaguely. “There’s stuff going on with you two, right? So, you’re there comforting her on the day she found him, and she still doesn’t tell you?”
“We were early stages.” And Alicia carries deep shame over the infidelity—shame I recognize. If my dad gets wind of it, I can already hear him: You sure that’s who you want to latch onto? A cheater?
When I step through the side door, Alicia’s sipping coffee, crisp navy suit immaculate, looking like a woman about to run the world.
“Give me five—I’ll drive you in.”
She nods, composed, coffee steady.
“Good run?”
“Yeah. Cold does the lungs good.” I’m already moving—basement, shower, gear. Momentum is its own comfort.
Alicia’s focused on her phone, voice-dictating email as I drive her Rivian to the office. Her request to drive her car has me wondering if something’s wrong with my SUV, and since she’s clearly working, the question sits in my head the whole ride.
At least until we pull in.
A cruiser idles by the building entrance, exhaust ghosting into the cold.
Alicia’s sigh is barely there. “What now.” Not a question—just fatigue with a period.
I pull into the spot next to it. No running from whatever this is.
Gabriel comes around the corner. “Break-in.”
“When?”
“Window between midnight and four. Another tenant called it in—exterior cams were smashed. Your assistant’s with MPD. Looks like your suite was hit.”
Alicia takes off to join her assistant and the cops. I hang back with Gabriel.
“Doesn’t this push it closer to Vasquez?” I murmur.
“Maybe. Let’s see what they took. Feels sloppy.”
“In what way?”
“Bashing cams is amateur hour,” he mutters. “Pros blind them upstream.”
The cops fence us out—standard. Photos, gloves, slow questions. A sharp smell rides the air—ozone and cheap cleaner.
“Somebody hurried their exit,” I say. “Should’ve aired it out.”
Hours pass. It’s unclear what was taken. Files untouched. Computers untouched. No obvious breach of servers.
Alicia’s defense team arrives. Smart. If there’s any way to flip this into a procedural concern for the court, they’ll use it.
Since everyone’s present, the defense meeting gets moved up. Hudson arrives. Richard too. When I step into the conference room, he looks like he wants to argue but decides he doesn’t want to do it in front of a table full of attorneys.
We take our seats. Everyone gets the same folder—the compiled timeline, Alicia’s verified whereabouts, defense witness statements, prosecution’s witness list, autopsy summaries, poison notes.
I flip pages as Luca talks through it.