Page 67 of Bear and Order

"Did you see this?" "I heard about that." "They said there was proof." "Maybe the complaints were right all along."

The words drift through the crowd and each one lands like something deliberate. Marissa. It has to be. Nobody else has this kind of timing, nobody else keeps striking in the exact moment momentum starts to shift, as though she has been watching and waiting and measuring every inch of recovered ground. The realization settles heavily. This is her final move, her last attempt to bury the story before the truth surfaces, and watching the crowd's faces shift and whisper, I can see it working.

Again.

Brock appears beside me almost immediately, and his expression darkens the moment he sees the flyer in my hand. "Where did this come from?"

I hand it over. He reads it once, then again, and the anger in his eyes becomes unmistakable — not loud, not explosive, just cold and certain and very focused. "She's getting desperate," he says quietly.

I nod, because he isn't wrong. The accusations feel different from the ones that came before — sloppier, more emotional, less carefully constructed. Like someone running out of options and reaching for anything within arm's length. The realization should comfort me. Instead it makes everything feel more dangerous, because desperate people take risks, desperate people make mistakes, and in the space between those two things they cause damage that doesn't wait for the truth to catch up.

The bakery booth empties steadily. Not completely, but enough — customer after customer drifting away, questions replacing purchases, rumors replacing facts with the easy confidence of things that have never been tested. I watch it happen and feel the familiar frustration return, except this time something underneath it is different. I don't feel helpless. Angry, yes. Frustrated, absolutely. But not helpless, and that distinction matters more than I expected it to.

Because I know the truth now. And soon everyone else will too.

The realization steadies me in a way nothing else has managed in months. Brock notices immediately. "You look different."

I glance toward him. "Different how?"

"Less afraid."

The observation surprises me, mostly because it's accurate. I look toward the crowd, toward the flyers still circulating between hands, toward the whispers still threading through every corner of the festival, then back at him. "I'm tired of hiding," I say, and the words settle between us with a weight I didn't plan but don't take back.

Brock studies me carefully, and the approval in his expression is impossible to miss. Good. Let him approve. I earned it.

"I'm done letting people tell my story." The words leave firmly, certain in a way that doesn't feel forced or borrowed. It feels mine — something I arrived at myself, through everything this year has cost. Brock's smile appears, small and quiet and genuinely proud, and something about the combination is so unfairly effective that I turn my focus immediately. A survival instinct. A necessary one.

Helena finds us near sunset, and she doesn't look tired — the woman apparently feeds on investigations, growing more energized the deeper the conspiracy runs, which is a deeply concerning personality trait and also, right now, exactly what I need. She carries a stack of folders beneath one arm with Theo following close behind her, looking equally pleased, which is somehow worse.

She drops the folders onto the table without ceremony. "We're done."

My pulse quickens. Brock steps forward immediately. "What do you have?"

Helena opens the first file, then another, and the evidence unfolds across the table like something that has been waiting to be seen — bank records, witness statements, corporate transfers, tax fraud documentation, asset concealment, forgery, financial manipulation layered over years and constructed with the kind of patience that only works when no one is looking. Theo points toward one section. "Three additional victims came forward." Another. "Two more corroborated witness statements." Another. "Verified transfers connecting directly to the offshore account."

Helena folds her arms. "The fraud case is airtight."

The words settle over the table and stay there. Brock studies the paperwork slowly, carefully, moving through each page with a certain thoroughness, not allowing himself to celebrate until he's certain. Then he exhales, and the tension in his shoulders eases — not completely, but enough that I notice, enough that it means something.

I stare at the evidence. At the mountain of proof spread across a table inside the same festival where flyers full of lies are still circulating through the crowd. At everything we've fought for, lost for, sacrificed for, and kept going toward even when the distance felt impossible to close. The truth. The complete, documented, undeniable truth. It's finally here.

Helena notices my expression and smiles — not her usual sharp and amused one, but a real smile, warm and direct. "You ready?"

I think about the bakery. The accusations, the flyers, the lies, the customers who walked away, the people who believed the worst because it was easier than waiting for the facts. I think about Marissa — about summer festivals and birthday cakes and late-night conversations and all the years I spent trusting someone who was measuring the distance between my ribs and deciding where to press. My answer arrives without hesitation, without fear, without the tremor that would have been there six months ago.

"Yes."

The festival continues outside — music, laughter, the ordinary sounds of a town celebrating itself. Yet underneath it all, something else is approaching, something much larger than any festival and far more important than any accusation printed on a flyer and passed between hands in a crowd.

Tomorrow I will stop defending myself in whispers. Tomorrow the truth comes into the light. And judging by the look on Brock's face, quiet and certain and entirely resolved, he intends to make sure everyone hears it.

30

BROCK

The bakery has become headquarters. Nobody officially decided that — it simply happened, the way most things do when Helena is involved. The front tables are covered with files, witness statements sitting beside financial reports, bank records overlapping with tax documentation, and Helena's notes occupying an entire section by themselves. Nobody has complained, mostly because Helena looks fully capable of weaponizing paperwork.

Theo sits across from her, watching with considerably more attention than the situation requires. I notice. Helena notices. Juniper notices. Theo apparently doesn't care.