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ONE

Quinn

Mardi Gras:French for “Fat Tuesday,” Mardi Gras marks the final day of the Carnival season, culminating weeks of parades, private balls, and krewe-led celebrations across New Orleans. Organized largely by krewes—private membership societies that fund and stage parades—Carnival blends pageantry, exclusivity, and civic spectacle into one of the city’s most powerful annual rituals.

I'm alreadyten steps ahead before we hit the sidewalk.

Leah loops her arm through mine and exhales into the humid air. The street swells with noise, brass from a bar somewhere behind us and a woman laughing loudly up ahead. Neon bleeds pink and green across the cracked asphalt, and the whole Quarter smells like spilled beer, fried dough, and sweat.

"God, I needed that drink. Thank you for appeasing me." She squeezes my arm and grins.

I give her a weak smile.

"Whether you'll admit it or not, I know you did, too."

"I always need my Leah Time."

She bumps her hip into mine. "You were doing that face the whole time, so..."

"What face?"

"The one where you look like you're constipated."

I snort despite myself. "That's notaface. That's justmyface."

"Exactly." She steers us around a couple taking a selfie in the middle of the damn sidewalk. "You're still on duty, Quinny. You need to learn how to turn it off."

If I could, I would.But I don't say that. Instead, I clock the two guys weaving toward the curb ahead. They're in their mid-twenties, loud, one of them carrying a drink. The other one's shoving him, laughing, and neither of them is watching where they're going.

I adjust our trajectory without thinking, angling us left so we don't cross their path. Leah doesn't notice. She's still talking, something about the bartender and his ridiculous mustache, and I nod at the right moments while my eyes track the carriage line rolling past. Tourists crammed into open-air boxes pulled by horses that look bored as hell. The driver on the closest one is half-asleep, reins loose in his lap.

"Are you even listening?"

"Mustache guy. Definitely trying too hard. Yeah, I got it."

Leah laughs and tugs me forward. "See? You were paying attention."

Not really. My jaw aches, and I realize I've been clenching it for the last three blocks. I roll my shoulders, but they don't loosen. The hum under my ribs won't quit, the thing that tells me to notice, to measure, to catalogue every damn variable in a six-block radius. I blame my training at Quantico.

Just tired. Just adjusting.

That's the line I've been feeding myself since the promotion. New role, new pressure, new stakes. Of course I'm wound tight. Anyone would be.

Leah stumbles on a crack in the pavement, and I catch her elbow before she can pitch forward.

"Whoa. Thanks."

"Watch your step."

"Yes, Officer." She salutes, and her grin is so damn bright it almost cracks through whatever this is.

We reach the curb, and I scan the crosswalk. We've got a green light, the walk timer counting down, fifteen seconds. The drunk guys are closer now, one of them staggering into a family with matching t-shirts. The mom glares, but the guy doesn't notice.

I shift my weight, ready to move, but Leah's still adjusting her purse strap, and I'm not walking without her.

The crosswalk timer flips to ten as the carriage line rolls closer. I grab her arm to indicate we have to go, and she snaps to.

Leah steps off the curb, and as I join her, my attention flickers, just for a moment, to the drunk guy now stumbling backward, arms flailing, drink sloshing. One of the guys stumbles and nudges into me, making me lose my balance.