I'm sorry.I thought.
The words felt pathetic. Inadequate.
I'm so sorry.
But apologies didn't fix what was broken. They just acknowledged the cracks.
I rolled onto my side. Pulled the blanket up.
Stared at the wall and thought about all the ways I'd failed him. All the silence I could never take back. All the years I'd wasted being afraid when I should have been brave.
Sleep didn't come.
Just the weight of everything I'd done.
And everything I wished I could undo.
CHAPTER 10
Sloane
The fire wasout by the time I arrived.
Smoke still curled from the building's gutted frame, but the flames were gone, replaced by the steady work of crews picking through wreckage. Dawn was starting to break over the city, painting the sky in shades of ash and amber.
I ducked under the tape, flashing my press credentials at the officer on perimeter duty, and made my way toward the command post.
Engine 295 was on scene. I spotted Garrett near one of the rigs, talking to Rodriguez, his face streaked with soot and exhaustion. He looked like he'd been here all night.
Then his eyes found mine across the scene.
His whole face changed when he saw me. The tension draining out, jaw unclenching, shoulders dropping a fraction of an inch. The look of a man who'd been running calculations in his head and just got the answer he needed. He said something to Rodriguez, who glanced my way and nodded, and then Garrett was walking toward me.
"Hey." The word was soft. Almost private, despite the chaos around us.
"Hey."
I fell into step beside him as he guided us away from the worst of the activity. "Long night?"
"You could say that." He wiped soot from his forehead with the back of his hand, leaving a darker streak across his skin. I resisted the urge to reach up and wipe it clean. "But this one's different."
"Different how?"
"The building was vacant. Condemned six weeks ago, tenants already relocated. The demo crew was supposed to start next month." He stopped walking and turned to face me. "Nobody was inside. Nobody was supposed to be inside. The arsonist knew that."
"They waited until the building was empty."
"On purpose. They could have hit it a month ago when there were still tenants. They didn't." His gray-blue eyes held mine. "This confirms it, Sloane. Whoever's doing this, they're not trying to hurt people. They're going after the landlords and the buildings the city refused to fix."
"Vigilante justice." The words tasted strange. True, but strange. He glanced back at the smoking wreckage.
It made a terrible kind of sense. Someone who'd watched the system fail. Someone who'd decided that if the city wouldn't tear down the death traps, they'd do it themselves.
We watched the crew move through the wreckage.
"I should let you finish up here," I said. "Diaz is going to want a statement."
"I'll come to your apartment after shift. We can go over everything then."
