I’d known her file would be in here. I’d requested all missing persons cases. There was no reason hers wouldn’t be included. And yet, seeing her name on the tab hit differently than I’d expected—like finding something familiar in a place it didn’t belong. “I didn’t realize they’d kept it active.”
“They haven’t,” Rios replied. “Not really.”
That made my attention sharpen. “What do you mean?”
He slid the folder across the table toward me but didn’t open it. “You should look.”
I hesitated.
It wasn’t fear, exactly. It was… weight. Fourteen years of knowing how this case had been treated. The searches. The flyers. The slow tapering off of effort until it had all become past tense, even though no one had ever said the words.
I pulled the folder closer and opened it.
The left side was exactly what I expected. Gwen’s photo. Her details. Her last known movements. Notes I could’ve recited from memory. I skimmed them quickly, like touching something hot just to confirm it still burned.
Then I shifted to the right side. Procedural documentation near to an inch thick. Logs. Reports. Years of nothing. A final entry noting lack of actionable leads. But the top page was newer than the rest. The date alone was enough to make my pulse spike. Recent. Last year.
I read it once. Then again.
Evidence submitted. Digital media. Related to ongoing investigation.
My fingers tightened on the edge of the paper, and I all but stopped breathing.
Rios stilled beside me. “You didn’t know.” It wasn’t a question.
I looked up at him. “Know what?”
He didn’t answer. He just held my gaze, something raw and uneasy flickering there.
And in that moment, I understood the truth he hadn’t meant to reveal. He had context I didn’t. Did everyone?
The war room walls closed in just a fraction.
I looked back down at the page, at the proof that something had happened long after the rest of us had been told there was nothing left to find.
My voice came out steadier than I felt. “What is this, Rios?”
He didn’t look away. “It’s something you need to see.”
And suddenly I knew—whatever was on the other side of that explanation, nothing about Gwen was going to stay contained anymore.
Thirty-One
RIOS
By the time Ford showed up, the dining room looked like it had been occupied by a small, determined militia.
Paper covered every surface. Painter’s tape marched up the walls in straight, stubborn lines. Madden’s borrowed laptop sat open beside a legal pad full of tight handwriting, and my notebook had turned into a mess of arrows and circles and dates. Somewhere in the middle of it all was a bowl of pretzels Willa had set down, but nobody had touched them.
The dog—Willa’s foster fail-in-waiting—lifted his heavy head when the door clicked, gave Ford a single assessing look, and dropped his chin back onto his paws like Ford hadn’t passed inspection.
Ford came in quietly, shoulders tense, a thumb drive held between two fingers like it might burn him. Bree followed close behind, face pale, eyes fixed on the floor until she looked up and found Madden.
Madden wasn’t in the dining room anymore. Not exactly. She was there physically, perched at the edge of a chair with her knees drawn in and a mug of coffee braced between her hands. But she’d pulled that mask I hadn’t realized she’d shed back on, and the woman who sat before me was quieter. Too controlled. That kind of control wasn’t calm. It was bracing.
Gabi slid in behind Ford and Bree, eyes scanning the walls in a single sweep. She let out a low whistle, then caught herself when she saw Madden’s expression. Daniel came in last, hair damp, in civilian clothes instead of his Coast Guard uniform, but his face was that of a man never fully off duty.
Sawyer came down the hall from the kitchen, Willa right behind him with a bottle of water and a second pot of coffee like she’d anticipated we were about to do something that would drain the room of oxygen.
