In the quiet of the room, Eddison watches Priya scrape the crème off the rest of the Oreos, tucking the cookies back into the packaging. “What happened, Priya?” he asks finally.
“I didn’t think I was going to be able to get down to the chapel before we left,” she says after a minute. “I’d only just learned about it, but it sounded . . . it sounded like something Chavi would have loved. I know it’s stupid, but I can’t help but feel like leaving the country is leaving her behind. We’re taking her ashes with us and everything, but it’s just . . .”
“It’s a big move,” he says neutrally. Waiting.
“Archer agreed to drive me down. When I went inside the chapel, he stayed in the car. Joshua said he saw Archer in town.” She takes a slow, shaky breath, her eyes glassy with shock. “Why would he go to town?”
“We’ll get the full account from him soon, but he went to get help. He thought the killer might follow you, so he left you alone as bait. He was looking for backup so he could get back and protect you.”
“How could he protect me from town?”
He shakes his head. Archer may or may not lose his place in the Bureau—he did technically catch the killer, after all—but he’ll be in a hell of a lot of trouble. Eddison’s going to help make sure of that. “You were alone in the chapel, you called me, and Joshua came in.”
“Joshua, of all people. He’s always been polite. Kind. Charming without being creepy. He felt safe. I just thought—” She sniffs and rubs at the bloody dig between her eyes, blinking away tears. “I thought if I ever saw my sister’s murderer, he would look like a murderer, you know? Like I’d be able to see all the things wrong with him. I never imagined someone like Joshua. Someone so freaking normal.”
“His name isn’t Joshua; it’s Jameson. Jameson Carmichael. The first girl he killed was his sister, Darla Jean.”
“He said Chavi was a good sister.”
“I know.”
“He said Aimée was a good friend.”
Her eyes are still glassier than he’d like.
“What happened after the call dropped?”
She bites her lip, her teeth tearing at a scab, and he steels himself not to cringe at the beads of blood that well up. Her eyes are huge and tear-bright, and when he scoots to the edge of the chair and holds out his hand, she seizes it with a strong grip that makes the week-old bruises and abrasions sting. “He said he had to protect me from the world, had to make sure I stay good.”
“He came at you.”
“He had a knife. Well, obviously. He likes the stabby stabby.”
“More like the slicey slicey.”
“I love you,” she huffs.
He gives her hand a careful squeeze.
“I don’t think he was expecting me to struggle. Maybe his version of a good girl wouldn’t? But I’m stronger than I look, you know?”
“Always have been.” He shakes his head at her doubting look. “Twelve years old, Priya, after the worst days of your life, angry and scared and grieving, you threw a teddy bear at my head and told me not to be such a fucking coward.”
“You were scared to talk to me.”
“Damn straight. But you called me on it.”
She’s got both hands curled around his now, picking at loose curls of skin along his nails, and he doesn’t try to stop her. “We fought over the knife, but he’s a lot bigger. I got it, though, eventually, and I—I stabbed him.” Her voice drops to barely more than a whisper, thick and heavy with pain. “I’m not even sure how many times, I was just so afraid he’d get up and come after me again. He didn’t have a phone, and mine wasn’t working. I think the throw killed it, and it shouldn’t have, because we paid extra for the cases.”
“Priya.”
“I stabbed him,” she says again. “And the knife—one side of it is straight, but the other edge is serrated and it makes this—this tearing sound when it comes out, and I don’t ever want to hear that sound again. I shouldn’t even have been able to hear it, because we were both struggling, and panting, and I might have been screaming, I don’t know, but it was like it was the only thing I could hear.”
“What happened next?”
“Archer ran in, just as Joshua fell. He had two men with him. One of them took me outside, tied his scarf around my neck to help with the bleeding. He said he used to be an army medic. Eddison, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“For what?”
“For being so stupid.” Despite her rapid blinking, the tears spill over, and he can feel the warmth when they drip off her chin onto the back of his hand. “It doesn’t matter that I didn’t suspect Joshua, I knew someone was after me. I shouldn’t have put it on Archer to protect me without backup. I should have just forgotten the stupid windows and stayed home.”
Fuck distance and professionalism.
He shifts up onto the bed, wrapping his arms around her again and rocking her slightly, and feels her break. She’s almost silent as she sobs, gasping for breath as her body quakes. He doesn’t try to calm her, doesn’t try to tell her it’s okay. He doesn’t try to tell her she’s safe now.
Safe, he’s learned, is a very fragile, relative thing.
Slowly, the storm passes, and he reaches for the box of tissues beside the bed to help her clean her face. What’s left of her makeup is a little terrifying, but he wipes off as much as he can without making it worse. He taps the bloody scrape between her eyes, leans forward to press a kiss just above it.
“Thank you for being alive,” he murmurs.
“Thank you for letting me snot all over you.”
That’s his girl.
Vic and Deshani come back together, Deshani holding a triangle of cups aloft purely by carefully applied pressure, Vic holding his own cup of coffee and a sky-blue-and-white-striped bag with little blue footprints and a repeating It’s a boy!!! banner. He looks so sheepish and exasperated holding it that it makes both Priya and Eddison dissolve into giddy, just-this-side-of-hysterical laughter.
Vic sighs and hands the bag to Priya. “They were out of ‘Congrats, it’s a tumor’ bags,” he says, not quite managing a straight face.
Eddison slides off the bed and over to Vic, while Deshani pulls the curtain around the bed to help Priya change. “Anything from Ramirez?”
“A text. Archer’s still down at Rosemont; Finney’s got a team of senior agents on the way to take over and haul his sorry ass back; Sterling and Ramirez are at Carmichael’s residence. He keeps pictures.”
“Of Priya?” he asks, gut clenching.
“Of all of them. They’re bagging some of the card stock on his desk, pens, handwriting samples. Photos, clearly. It’s fairly safe to say he’ll be charged if he survives.”
“How likely is that?”
“They’re still working, but they don’t seem very hopeful. His lung and ribs are pretty well torn up, some nicks to his heart, some pretty important blood vessels.” His voice is quiet, that not-whisper that’s clear but doesn’t carry an inch farther than he wants it to. “Archer recovered the knife at the scene, so they’ll cast it and test it against the previous murders.”
“But without being willing to put it in writing or swear before a court of law, you’re pretty damn sure our murderer is on an operating table right now.”
“If he could survive long enough to make a confession, that would be lovely.”
“Is Priya going to need to stay here in the hospital?”
Vic shakes his head, crossing his arms against his chest. “Once the pharmacy sorts out the medications they want to send her home with, you can head out with the Sravastis. If they need to make a stop or two along the way for essentials, that’s fine, but only necessary ones. Once you’re at the house with them, stay there.”
Another gift. Normally that’s Vic’s job. Speaking with families, monitoring who comes to visit and what they say. The Eddison from college, from the academy, would be laughing himself shitless, but the man he is now—the agent he is now—knows to be grateful for true friendship wherever it can be found.