Careful, Garrison. That sounds like entrapment.
Only if you fall for it.
Erin exhaled, half amused and half rattled, then forced herself to look at the release again. She knocked out a second paragraph, though every few sentences her eyes flicked back to the phone.
Another buzz.
Anyway, thanks for humoring me. Makes editing feel less like I’m screaming into the void.
Erin typed slowly, deliberately.
Writing these feels the same. The void just has different stationery. But glad I could keep you company in it for a minute.
She lingered longer before replying this time.
More than a minute. But I’ll take it.
Erin put the phone down again, deliberately this time, face warm but steady. She finished the draft, hit save, and emailed it to her captain. The watermark still blared across the page, but the document was done.
She sat back in her chair and stared at the ceiling for a long moment, aware of how close she’d come to blurting out something she wasn’t supposed to. One almost-slip was bad enough. The fact that it had been for Jamie made it worse. Or better. She wasn’t sure.
When she finally stood and pulled on her jacket, the weight in her chest had shifted. She should have felt heavier for carrying the secret. Instead, she felt lighter for carrying the conversation.
* * *
Erin let herself into the apartment with her shoulder, the door catching on the rug the way it always did. Leo’s nails clicked on the hardwood as he rounded the corner at a trot, tail swaying like a slow metronome. He bumped his head into her thigh, then leaned his full weight there as if he could anchor her to the spot.
“Hi, handsome,” she said, rubbing the soft place behind his ears. “I’m late. I owe you a walk.”
She hung her keys on the hook by the door and shed her jacket in one smooth motion, dropping it over the back of the narrow bench. The place smelled faintly of laundry soap and the last coffee she’d made at home, the good kind that didn’t taste like a crime scene. She toed off her boots, lined them up beside the bench, and shrugged into a hoodie from the peg on the wall. Leo danced two small circles when he saw her reach for the leash. Sheclipped it to his harness, then paused long enough to tuck her phone into the pocket of her joggers. The weight of it was familiar and distracting at the same time.
Outside, the evening had settled into that blue hour that made every window look warmer than the air. The sidewalk held a shallow sheen from a sprinkler that had run too long. Leo kept a steady pace beside her, ears pricking at each sound that rose out of the neighborhood. A mailbox creaked shut two doors down. A kid bounced a basketball with lazy effort, the rhythm uneven but determined. Someone’s television carried a laugh track through their open window.
Erin breathed in through her nose and let it out slowly. Her body liked the routine of walking at this time, when the day’s edges softened and the impulse to check her inbox finally lost its hold. She let Leo set the route, which meant they reached the park without either of them deciding it out loud. At the edge of the path she unclipped his leash with a practiced flick. He sprang forward into a rolling canter, then glanced back to check that she was following. She jogged after him. The air bit a little when it reached the back of her throat. She welcomed the bite.
They did two laps around the small field, Leo’s gait smoothing into a happy lope while Erin settled into a pace that made her mind quiet for the first time since the desk. The texts kept trying to replay themselves anyway.Handcuffs already.She felt heat creep along the column of her neck and shook her head once with a rueful smile, as if she could dislodge the memory by force.
When Leo slowed and circled back, she clipped the leash and they made their way home. The stairwell smelled like dust and a neighbor’s garlic bread. Inside, she filled Leo’s bowl, then leaned against the counter while he ate, the soft sound of kibble against porcelain oddly soothing. Her phone was still in her pocket, heavier than it should have been. She pulled it out, turned it over in her hand, then set it facedown on the counter without unlocking it. The temptation to check for Jamie’s name felt like picking at the corner of a bandage just to see if it still hurt.
The counter edge dug into her palms. She still didn’t move. The apartment felt too quiet, too taut, like it was holding its breath with her. That pressure,the mix of guilt and old mistakes and the heat of what she almost texted, had nowhere to go.
She pushed away from the counter.
“Be good,” she told Leo, brushing his head as she grabbed her keys again. He blinked at her like he knew she needed to leave, even if only for twenty minutes.
Outside, the evening air was cool enough to sting. Erin zipped her hoodie up and walked without a plan until her feet chose one for her.
The sidewalk between the precinct and the news station glowed under the streetlamps, neutral ground. Not the newsroom, not the precinct. Not Boston, not Washington, DC. Just a place where neither of them had home court advantage.
A familiar figure sat on the low brick planter that separated the two lots. Camera bag at their feet. Shoulders hunched. Hood up. The picture of someone trying not to be noticed.
“Tilly,” she said softly.
Tilly didn’t startle. They looked up slowly, expression unreadable. “Erin.”
The air hummed with the streetlamp above them.
Erin stayed standing for a beat, then sat on the opposite edge of the planter. Not too close. Not too far. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
