Flagler pointed at him with a pen. “See, that right there? That’s why they’re recommending me for the damn commendation instead of you.”
Buddy barked a laugh. “Figures.”
“I also wanted you to know, and please tell Fallon, we’re doing everything we can to find out what happened to Tessa,” Flager said. “I’ve spoken to her parents, and we’ve updated the files with all the new information. I’ll keep an eye out, and if anything at all comes across my desk, you’ll be the first to know.”
“I really appreciate that.”
Flagler slipped the file shut and stood. “Two more things. One. If you ever pull a stunt like that again, call me five minutes earlier. I had exactly zero prep time to brief Washington.”
Buddy smirked. “Didn’t have five minutes.”
“Second thing,” Flagler said, tone shifting one notch toward sincerity. “No more favors. I mean it. You’ve used up a decade’s worth. And next time you need help, someone better be actively dying.”
“That’s a high bar,” Buddy said.
Flagler patted his shoulder on the way out. “Good thing you’re creative.”
The door clicked shut behind him.
Buddy sat back, the room settling around him in a way that finally felt like an ending—not the kind that closed doors, but the kind that left the horizon open and waiting.
Fallon.
He needed to see her.
Not because she was fragile—hell no—but because she was his. Because somewhere between the chaos and the sirens and the kiss that tasted like survival, he’d realized he didn’t want a life that didn’t have her in it.
He reached for the cane he hated to use and pushed himself to his feet.
He had somewhere to be.
Someone to be.
And she was waiting for him.
Fallon sat at the kitchen counter with an open scrapbook in front of her, pages warped at the edges from years of humidity and poor storage. Tessa’s handwriting curled in bright blue ink across one of the captions—Spring Fling, 2009!!—so earnest and obnoxious she could almost hear her friend laughing while they glued down the pictures.
A half inch of whiskey glowed amber in Fallon’s glass. It wasn’t doing the job. Not numbing, not smoothing, not settling. Just sitting there like a companion she didn’t ask for.
Her forearm ached with that familiar post-stitch throb. Her ribs felt too tight. And in the soft spill of the kitchen lights, Tessa’s smile—alive and seventeen and untouched by monsters—was too much and not enough all at once.
The front door opened.
She didn’t turn. Only one person walked into her house like he belonged there.
Buddy’s steps were slow, measured, the soft tap of his cane announcing each one. He wasn’t supposed to ditch it yet—stubborn fool—but he was using it just enough to keep her from lecturing him into bed rest.
He stopped beside her, leaned down, and kissed her cheek—warm, familiar, grounding in a way nothing else in the last week had been.
“Hey,” he murmured.
Fallon slid the whiskey bottle toward him. “Want some?”
“Yeah,” he said, “but I’ll get it.”
He reached for a glass himself—slow, careful, refusing the help she offered even as he winced, sitting down beside her. He poured two fingers, took a quiet sip, then set the glass between them.
His hand drifted to the scrapbook. He flipped to the next page, thumb brushing over a photo of Fallon and Tessa splashing each other from a half-sunken rope swing.
