“The girl code look,” Alex whispers.
“The girl code look.”
Alex goes still. Not her usual fidgeting, always-moving energy. Just... still.
“A state representative,” she says slowly. “Gave you the girl code look. About a city controller. At his own fundraiser.”
“Yeah.”
“The look we give each other about guys at bars. The look that means don’t go to the bathroom alone and I’ll say you have a boyfriend and text me when you get home.”
“Yeah.”
“Except this isn’t a bar. This is the Pennsylvania Former House Speaker warning you about a man whose grandfather’s portrait hangs in City Hall.”
The coffee maker ticks as it cools. Outside, the bread truck for Sarcone’s backs up—same time every morning. KYW News Radio drifts up from below—”Traffic and weather on the twos.”
Normal Saturday sounds.
“Fuck,” Alex finally says. “This is real.”
“That’s what I was sitting with this morning. This isn’t just Dom covering up one murder. This is?—”
“Systemic.” Her voice is flat. “The system protecting him. Has been for years.”
“Yeah.”
She shakes her head slowly. “What do you want to do?”
The question I’ve been avoiding all morning.
“I have no idea.” I press my hand to my chest. “Part of me wants to walk away. I have this weight. Like if we keep going, something terrible is going to happen.”
“I know,” Alex says softly.
“But then I feel like I’m giving up on her. On Dahlia. On all of them.”
One tear escapes. Then another. I swipe at them angrily.
“She was alone. When it happened. When he—” I can’t say it. “She was alone and scared and she died in an alley and nobody even knows her real name. Nobody filed a missing persons report.”
My voice cracks.
“And I heard it. I have her ring. I have evidence. And it’s still not enough.”
I’m crying now. The ugly kind. No sound, just heat and salt.
“What chance do we have? Two twenty-seven-year-olds with a ring and some financial records against whatever this is.”
Alex slides off her stool. Comes around the island.
She pauses for half a second—remembering last night, when I flinched from her touch in the car.
Then she wraps her arms around me. Slow. Giving me space to pull away.
I don’t.
I fold into her. My best friend. My dandelion.
