Burke shakes his head, and a darkness pools in my gut, something that I thought I’d outrun long ago.
The kind of darkness that seeded rumors that may or may not be true about my early days. Only Eve knows what really happened, because she’s the one who helped me corral the darkness, dam it up inside, hoping the pond might drain.
Clearly not.
“Burke.”
He stands up.
Burke is taller than me, and before he joined the force, he was in the army, so he doesn’t flinch easily. He stares at me, his jaw hard. “I know how hard this has been for you. You had everything—your wife, your child, your job—and then it imploded. And yes, you could have handled it differently, but I could have also. I should have pulled you from the case long ago—”
“Give me my daughter’s file. Now.” My voice is almost a growl.
“No. I can’t—”
“She wasn’t your kid!”
His jaw flickers. Then his voice softens. “Okay. But not here. Not now. I need your focus on today’s press conference. Besides, yesterday was hard enough, don’t you think?”
Yesterday. I’m frowning. But we had a birthday party two days ago, so, “You mean her birthday?”
“No,” he says quietly, and my gut twists with his tone. “What’s going on with you, man?”
And then I remember his words, and speak them even as I remember them. “Yesterday was the anniversary of her death.”
He nods as the words hit me, and now my gut is a stone.
Burke gives me a face that tells me that even he is broken by this date. “I told Eve the timing wasn’t good, but she was struggling too. I think she just needs this to be over.”
This. Her family. Her memories. Us.
“Me too,” I say, meaning something completely different.
I turn toward the door. “I hate John Booker for what he did.” I’m not sure where that comes from, because frankly, I’m usually not that raw with my feelings, but it’s better than putting my fist through the glass of the door.
Burke leans his bulk toward me. “What did you say?”
I round on him. “This is all Booker’s fault. If he hadn’t given me that box of cold cases—” And I can’t continue if I hope to keep Burke from walking me out the front door. Or calling 9-1-1.
I need that file. I need this job.
I need something to hold onto.
“What are you sayin’ man? John and you were best friends, all the way to his death. You spoke at his funeral. Not two days ago you told me that you wished you had half his investigative instincts.”
His words stymie me, and strangely, elicit a bloom of warmth inside that I can’t quite place.
Oh, God, it might be hope.
Because my greatest regret—up until this morning at least—was that John Booker, my mentor and I, parted with wrath between us.
“Oh,” I say.
“What cold cases?” Burke asks now.
I shrug, keep my voice easy. “I’m just frustrated that the Jackson killer is still on the loose.” I can still lie fast and hard when I need to. Spent about a decade undercover proving that, but it’s something Eve doesn’t like me to talk about.
Burke is nodding, so I clearly still got it. “Yes. And, didn’t you say that you might have found his first victim, according to Booker’s last notes?”