Page 8 of Beyond Redemption

The doors slid shut, sealing Liis on the floor below. The faint curve of her mouth—the one she tried to hide when she pretended she was just an insubordinate colleague and not my wife—burned into the reflective steel.

God, she was infuriating.

Infuriating and impossible not to stare at.

Most people spent years studying facial cues, standardizing reactions, trying to decode others in order to function. Liis had walked into my life already speaking my language as if it were her native tongue. The first time we’d argued I’d realized she wasn’t simply clever. She was engineered for exactness, attuned down to the atom, uncompromising in all the ways I respected and resented in myself, a mirror with kissable lips and a less flexible moral compass.

Her beauty was almost secondary to the problem she created for me. Almost. The cool confidence in her posture, the way her dark blouse hugged her frame, how she made proficiency look seductive without trying, and it all affected me more than I cared to admit. Ten years together should have dulled the edge. It hadn’t. Not even close.

She’d admitted she loved me, offered forgiveness for my shortcomings, agreed to marry me against her better judgment, then she carried our daughter. Delivered her. Loved her witha ferocity that made me reconsider whether there were new categories of devotion I hadn’t accounted for.

The elevator rose, humming to the next floor, and I exhaled lightly, letting thoughts of her drift off as I focused on preparing for what awaited me on the floor above.

Strange, how sharing a home, a child, and a universe with someone didn’t diminish the gravitational pull. If anything, it deepened it. Liis wasn’t easy—not by any definition—but ease had never appealed to me. Ease was corrosive. Liis kept me operating at my highest setting in every conceivable sense, and she did it daily.

The indicator blinked as the elevator slowed, and when the doors parted, the familiar drop in temperature met me first—a slight chill from overactive vents, followed by the collective awareness that passed through the floor whenever I stepped onto it.

Conversations clipped short. Chairs straightened. Screen angled subtly away from sightlines.

No one snapped to attention, this wasn’t Quantico, but the change was immediate. People who’d been leaning against desks found reasons to sit upright. Coffee cups drifted lower. Whatever non-urgent chatter had existed dissolved into focused keystrokes and redirected gazes. Respect was earned in this building, but fear? Fear arrived only when someone had watched you dismantle a problem faster than they could articulate it.

I didn’t cultivate it intentionally. But I didn’t discourage it, either.

The Criminal Investigative Division occupied two parallel hallways on this level, each with frosted glass sections that obscured more than they revealed. Light poured through at deliberate angles, brightening the edges of understated carpet and polished doors labeled with unit names. My section, MajorCrimes, anchored the rear of the floor, farthest from the elevators—a placement that never stopped feeling tactical.

As I moved down the hall, heads dipped in short greetings. “Morning, Chief,” from one corner. A stiff nod from another. A few avoided looking directly at me, which wasn’t surprising. The last all-hands meeting had ended with three reassigned case leads and a pointed reminder about ‘baseline competence,’ which my executive assistant, Constance, later told me sounded generous, given how irritated I’d been.

My office sat at the end, door already open, lights on, the faint smell of bergamot—the tea Constance brewed every morning—drifting into the hall. Constance stood just inside, a slim tablet in hand, shoulder-length blonde hair curled inward like she’d stepped out of a mid-century advertisement. Red lipstick, crisp blouse, fitted pencil skirt. Perfect posture, impeccable composure, and an unblinking confidence that made junior agents forget their own names.

She glanced up. “You’re two minutes early. Should I alert the press?”

“That won’t be necessary.” I stepped past her, ignoring the smirk she didn’t bother hiding. “Did you finally get some sleep, or are you running solely on spite and caffeine again?”

“Both,” she said, closing the door behind us. “Spite’s cheaper, caffeine’s legal, and together they accomplish the Lord’s work. Did you get Liis out the door in time for her eight o’clock?”

“I did, as if she’d allow otherwise.”

“Sit. You have updates.”

I hung my suit jacket on the back of my chair and sank into the seat, the leather molding to shoulders that still held the memory of yesterday’s workout. “Proceed.”

Constance swiped across her tablet, voice even, accent soft but unmistakably Southern—not drawled, not syrupy, but woven into her cadence like something she’d learned young andnever lost. “First, a reminder that the Undersecretary wants your briefing notes by end of day. He emphasized clarity. I emphasized that clarity is what you’re known for. He didn’t argue.”

“He wouldn’t dare.”

“Exactly.” She moved on without pause. “Denver called twice. They’re monitoring chatter around the Fairchild situation. Local leadership is… concerned the governor still doesn’t understand exactly which hornet nest he kicked.”

“That’s an understatement.” I steepled my hands. “He cut into pockets that don’t tolerate shortages.”

Constance nodded once.

I leaned back. “Has Deacon checked in?”

“Yes. Quiet.”

“Is Denver keeping things contained?”

“So far,” she said. “But Fairchild’s press secretary made a statement yesterday. Something about ‘standing firm’ and ‘unshakable resolve.’ You know the type. A speech written by someone who’s never lived through genuine retaliation.”