Page 94 of Beyond Redemption

I looked up, training my gaze on Olive for a few seconds before looking down. Liis was right. It would be too easy for Olive to absorb the responsibility for every life lost, and for everything that followed, including every time someone struggled with what happened and lashed out or self-medicated, like Maddoxes tended to do. There were a hundred ways we could process this, and ninety-nine ways to get it wrong. Knowing Olive since she’d been with us, she would blame herself for it all.

“They’re still bringing bodies in from the north side,” Taylor said quietly. “That’s most of Naomi’s team, isn’t it?”

Trenton responded with a question, but his voice and any response blurred into the background. I couldn’t stop seeing Bodhi’s face in my mind, lying beneath Liis’s hands as she pressed on his wound. His eyes barely open, fixed on nothing. The rifle resting beside him, one he should never have had to use. He’d held the entrance alone with only a few days of training against men who did this for a living. Not because he knew he could, and not because he had the training or experience to be there. He’d done it because Olive was on the other side of that door, and when the moment came, that had been enough.

Liis’s hand found mine, already knowing where my thoughts had gone. She didn’t say anything. She pressed her fingers into my palm once, anchoring me to her and the room instead of the memory.

A door opened, revealing Naomi with Lieutenant Jacobs close behind.

“Thought I’d check on my String Bean,” Naomi said, walking stiffly, favoring her wounds. She looked to Olive. “Any word?”

Olive blinked, then swallowed, sitting a bit straighter. “He’s still in surgery, I think. We haven’t heard anything new.”

Naomi lowered herself into an open chair, controlled and careful, then relaxed and winked at Olive. “I’ve met a lot of string beans in my career. They’re always the toughest.”

Olive managed a small smile, but it faded quickly.

“Baby,” Zeke said, pushing through the door, breath short as if he’d been searching for her for a while. “You just got patched up. You should be resting.”

She patted the empty chair next to her, asking him to sit without words. “I came to discuss something with Thomas and Liis,” she said, her gaze falling on me. “What can we expect in terms of local and federal law enforcement? The General said you’d already called it in, and he expects one or both to be here at dawn. And there’s a righteous fucking mess on our front lawn.”

“He’s right. But logistically, calling it in makes it worse, not better,” Liis said.

“How so?” Zeke asked.

“Because the report wasn’t ‘scene secured, send help’,” Liis responded. “This was a large-scale engagement, with unknown numbers and militia present. That triggers a high-risk protocol, command-level oversight, and coordination between agencies. We called to let them know what to expect, but that’s not enough to roll straight in.”

“They’ll stage?” Naomi asked.

“They’ll have to,” I said. “They don’t know who’s who yet. Unknown number of armed personnel, unclear jurisdiction, possible organized crime. Nobody’s sending deputies or agents into something like this blind, and certainly not in the dark. They’ll set a perimeter, hold for daylight and confirmation, then move in. Warn everyone now. No one engages when they arrive. You don’t want this turning into something you can’t walk back.”

“Lieutenant?” Naomi said without taking her eyes off me.

“On it,” Jacobs confirmed, turning and relaying the order into the radio on his chest.

Naomi nodded once. “Anything else?”

Liis cleared her throat before she spoke. “Any bodies and weapons should’ve technically remained where they fell, or been secured, but an entire compound—albeit now technically a crime scene—can’t remain untouched, and the injured need treatment. They’ll forgive prioritizing safety and survival over preservation of evidence.”

“You’ll need to clear the weapons, though,” I said. “All of them. Either agency could come in half-cocked. We don’t want any accidents.”

Liis added, “Bodies should be cleared from lanes only, and anything to do with the conflict should be moved for safety or medical necessity. They’ll question why things were moved, reconstruct positions and get statements, but certain movement is defensible, especially in a mass casualty active scene.”

Jacobs continued to relay our instructions to Command.

Naomi’s eyes narrowed. “How do we achieve the best outcome as far as consequences?”

Liis sat forward. “First, it matters how this reads when they arrive,” she said. “You were attacked. That’s your foundation. Armed assault, multiple shooters, forced entry. You held your ground. You didn’t chase anyone who broke contact, and you didn’t take this beyond your perimeter.”

“But…” Naomi began.

“No,” Liis stopped her. “That’s it. Nothing additional.”

Her eyes flicked toward the door, toward the compound beyond it. “Okay, so we didn’t pursue.”

“Good,” I said. “This helps you more than anything else. That you were on the defensive at all times stays clean enough to explain.”

“Even considering the number of casualties—mostly theirs?” she asked.